All right, Ephesians 6, we are finishing up Ephesians. Next week, we're going to begin a short two-part series called God With Us. It's going to be rooted in the nativity, but much more than that. I think we need to be reminded of what it looks like to walk with God. I think we miss that in our conference attending, our sermon listening to, our fellowshipping. We do all kinds of things and I'm not sure we really are reminded of walking with God, the importance of walking with God and what that looks like. So, and then over in the new year, we'll pick up with Colossians, which is our next letter we're going to be studying. But this morning, Ephesians chapter 6, we're going to look at the text we read earlier, verses 10 to 24. And as we approach this final text in Ephesians, I want you to listen carefully. And I want us to listen carefully to the warnings and the instructions that we find in these verses. I want us to be reminded that there is a war that is raging that is more real than any and every war that has ever been waged in the history of the world. A war that is more impactful than any and every war that has ever been waged in history. Yes, a war that is more serious than World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the War on Terror, even more important than all of those wars combined. I want us to get... Our minds wrapped around the fact that there is a serious war that is raging on earth now for the very souls of our children. There is a war that is raging even right now for the very strength of our marriages. There is a war that is raging right now for the life of this church. And there's a war that is raging right now for your spiritual pulse and your testimony as well. We find it easy to talk about the spiritual battle that's going on in families. We find it easy to talk about the spiritual battle that is going on in churches. We find it easy to talk about the spiritual battles that are going on in the nation and in the world, but the reality of the situation is our families, our marriages, our churches, our nation is made up of individuals. And as long as we cast the magnifying glass on families and churches and nations, we keep the magnifying glass off of us, which is ground zero for this war. So I don't want you to think Thoughts about family, yes, we need to think about that. I don't want you to get wrapped up in thoughts about the church. Yes, we need to think about that. There's a war that's raging here. I want you to zoom in on you, not the person next to you, not the people over there that really need to get their act together, not the people in front of you that really have some issues. I want you to put the magnifying glass on you because there's a war that is raging for you, and if you fall in the battle, your marriage falls. If you fall in the battle, your family falls. If you fall in the battle, your church suffers. So put the magnifying glass on you this morning and recognize the unseen reality that is unfolded in this text. Understand the only hope of protection that we have that is unfolded in this text. And I want you to embrace the only strategy that we have for advancing the kingdom of God against the enemy lines. that we find in this text this morning. So I want to just set the stage with that as we look at Ephesians 6. Let's read the text again, beginning in verse 10. Finally, Paul's drawing all of this to a close. Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God so that you will be able to resist in the evil day and having done everything to stand firm. Stand firm, therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace. In addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word. God. Verse 18, with all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit and with this in view be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints and pray on my behalf that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel for which I am an ambassador and change that in proclaiming it I may speak boldly as I ought to speak. but that you also may know about my circumstances, how I am doing. Tychicus, the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord, will make everything known to you." He's the one that's going to deliver this letter. He's the one that also is bringing with him the letter to the church at Colossae, which we'll study next. So Paul's writing these two letters together. He's sending them by the hand of Tychicus, who's going to not only deliver the letters, but also report to them about Paul. It says in verse 22, I've sent him to you for this very purpose, so that you may know about us and that he may comfort your hearts. Peace be to the brethren and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be with all those who love our Lord Jesus Christ with incorruptible love. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the opportunity we have, the grace that we have, the mercy that we have to one more time sit under your word. Help us to see the seriousness of this time. Help us to hear your voice. Help us to respond in Christ's name. Amen. As we consider the unseen reality around us, as we consider our desperate need of protection and our desire that I hope is there to advance the kingdom of God, against enemy lines. There's four things that are vital for us to see that are unfolding for us in this text. I want us to look at these four things that you need to take away this morning from this scripture. First of all, our strength. We need to see our strength. Verse 10 says, finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. So we see our strength is rooted where? Be strong in the Lord. Be strong in the Lord. Now, we know that today as we look around, as we talk, as we, God forbid, watch commercials, we know that there is a great emphasis in our society and our day and time placed upon physical strength and physical health. It seems like everywhere you turn, there's another 5K that's got to be run. Somebody's got to run or somebody's got to walk. It seems that everywhere you turn, somebody's driving by with a little CrossFit sticker on their back window. Everywhere you turn, there's some new dietary supplement or some new diet or some new something, some juice, some shake, some oil, some something that's going to that's going to guarantee you no cancer, that's going to guarantee you a strong heart, that's going to guarantee you a six-pack, that's going to guarantee you a long, long, long, long life, because we all want to live forever here on this earth. So all of this emphasis is just poured into physical health, physical strength, we want to live forever, and imagine, imagine if we put that much effort into our spiritual strength and being strong in the Lord. Just imagine if we recognize that this life is a vapor. Last night, about 9 o'clock, I was putting gas in the vehicle on the way back from family. I'm walking out of the convenience store, and I'm in a t-shirt, and I breathe, and I see that air come out of your mouth. You see the mist, the vapor that comes out in front of your face. Every time I breathe and I see that vapor, I think of James. our life is a vapor and it seems so important and it seems like you know we want to live an extra year or two or three and we want to live it to the fullest and I get that and I understand that and I don't want to get fat and have a heart attack tomorrow but but The fact is, our life is a vapor. It's like that mist that came out of my mouth. And when we die and step into eternity, it doesn't matter if we live 50 years or 150 years, that life is going to seem like nothing more than a mist. And we are going to wish, we are going to wish that we would have put just a fraction of the effort into our spiritual strength as we have our physical strength. Even Paul tells us this in 1 Timothy 4, 7 and 8. Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness. For bodily discipline is only of little profit. It profits, but it really only profits a little. But godliness is profitable for all things since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. We need to be strong in the Lord. But then, he says, and in the strength of His might. We need to remember that no matter how strong we get in the Lord, it's not our strength. We're not buffing up. It's still all the Lord's strength. No matter how strong we get in the Lord, it's not like we're getting stronger. We're just relying more on His strength. strength of his mind. And I think we all know deep down that we can do 550 sit-ups, a thousand push-ups, and run 10 miles a day, and eat nothing but vegetables, and we can still get pancreatic cancer tomorrow, right? I mean, it's like there's no guarantees here. Every breath we breathe, every beat of our heart, we know is tied to God, who can cut it off at a moment's notice, no matter how fat or skinny we are, right? And we need to also recognize that our spiritual strength is exactly the same way. Our spiritual strength is absolutely inseparably tied to the mercy and the grace and the power of God. He is our strength. You think about this, when a general leads his military into battle, the strength of that general is found in his soldiers. It was found in his army. I mean, the army disappears. If the army goes AWOL, the general is all of a sudden very vulnerable, is he not? The strength of the general is found in his army. The strength of the general is found in his soldiers. But listen, the Christian life is absolutely positively opposite of that. The strength of the general is not found in his soldiers. The strength of the soldiers is found in their general. And if we go AWOL, he is still sovereign and he can still accomplish all of his purposes with or without us. He doesn't find His strength in us. He doesn't need us. We find our strength in Him and we need Him. And it is His mercy and His grace that He said, here I am. Take my yoke upon you, for it's easy, and find relief for your soul with me. I will give you strength. When we're weak, what? He is strong, right? We find our strength in our commander-in-chief, the Lord Jesus Christ. If you just turn back a few pages to Ephesians 3, verses 14 and 16. Ephesians 3, verses 14 to 16. I want you to just get a snapshot of our strength in the Lord. Ephesians 3 verse 14, for this reason I bow my knees before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name that he would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inner man. That's what we need for our Father to strengthen us with his power through his Spirit in the inner man. And it is this strength that we find in our God that gives us faith to deploy into the battle and not go AWOL. It is the strength that we find in our God that gives us faith to deploy for this battle rather than warm a seat every Sunday, and that be the extent of our kingdom involvement. It's the strength we find in our God that gives us faith to get off of our blessed assurance and get into the battle before us. So we see our strength, but I want you to also see our struggle. Look in verses 11 and 12. Put on the full armor of God so that you will be able to stand firm against what? The schemes, the schemes, and we can talk about what it is to scheme. You just need to know that Satan is a schemer, and he's smarter than any of us in this room. And you think about it, he's had how many thousands of years to dissect and evaluate the heart of man? So we're not gonna be sharper than Satan. You just may as well get over that. He's got thousands of years on us. He is a schemer. We need to be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. And then it says, for our struggle, for our struggle. We're standing against the schemes of the devil, for our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. So get this in your mind. as you are strengthened in the Lord, that you are strengthened for this battle against not flesh and blood, but against Satan, his schemes, and his spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. So we get all worked up and in a tizzy to vote for our leaders. We read the headlines. We see the wars, we watch the stock markets, and we can go on and on and on and on. But if we are not looking beyond all of that to the real powers at work behind the scenes, we're on the wrong battlefield. And if we're all wrapped up in headlines and stock markets and who the president is and who the governor is and where the wars are being waged on this earth, we're not on the front lines. We've got to look beyond the headlines and realize that there's a bigger war going on right now. Or we're going to find ourselves on the wrong battlefield and we'll become some kind of political activist dressed in Christian clothing. The war that is raging is not here, it's behind the scenes. And that keeps our eyes on the real front lines. We're not battling against secular society. If we get on the wrong battlefield and we get wrapped up in the headlines and we stop there, we find ourselves hating people. And refusing to show grace and compassion and love to people. who differ from us and who are wrapped up in a secular humanist mindset and worldview because we think that's the battle. We've got to get beyond the headlines, beyond secular society, and stand firm against the schemes of the devil. And we've got to constantly remind ourselves of this, folks. For the war, there's no way that we can win the war if we're fighting on the wrong battlefield. It's a spiritual battle. It is a spiritual war. That's the front lines. And let's just bring this down to a little near home here, because here's what we do. We see our issues. We see our sin. We see our despair. We see our frustration. We see our apathy. We see our personal conflicts. We see our misplaced focus. We see our own spiritual dryness. But if we don't look beyond the surface of those things to the powers that are at work in the spiritual realm, we again are on the wrong battlefield and we find ourselves tuning into Joel Osteen who can help us feel better and deal with surface issues rather than tuning into Jesus who can go to war with us on the front lines. Do you see what I'm telling you? We get wrapped all up in these surface issues and we try to use all these concepts and ideas to fix them rather than going to the actual front lines of the battle which are in the spiritual realm. Now I know you're sitting out there and some of you Some of you in this place have reacted to the charismatic people who might find the devil behind every bush. They're blaming their car won't start on the devil. They're blaming their shoes coming apart on the devil. They're blaming their pinky toe hurting on the devil. They're blaming everything on the devil. The devil's behind every bush. And what many of us have done is we react to that and we say, well, it's all the flesh. I don't need the devil. The devil doesn't have to do anything to me. I mean, it's all the flesh, flesh, flesh, flesh, flesh. And I'm going to tell you something. Satan is just as happy with that approach as he is with the approach that finds him behind every bush. And it's just as ignorant to think that Paul tells us in Ephesians 6, there's a war raging. And it is not against flesh and blood, but it is spiritual. And then for us to say, well, you know, the devil, he's not really... He might be in Haiti and the voodoo stuff going on down there, but, I mean, in my life, I mean, I'm enough trouble on my own. He doesn't really have to fool with me. He's not really... Okay, don't fool ourselves. Let's just get real here and recognize that your sin, your issues, your apathy, your spiritual dryness, your conflicts, yes, they probably are due to the flesh, but Satan uses our flesh and he maximizes the opportunity to cause us to sin. The fact of the matter is, he is like a hound. You've been hunting maybe, some of you have been hunting with dogs and the dogs will just be walking along and all of a sudden you'll just see their nose pick up a scent and they're off. Satan is just like that. He is quick to take the scent when his prey goes by and that may be a word spoken, that may be the glance of an eye, It could be a small matter, but oh, he can sniff it out. And he has much experience in inspecting and dissecting hearts and picking up scents and seeing tendencies. And he has a stunning ability to pick up on our trail and drive us right where he wants us into the hunter's net. And that's what dogs do. the rabbit or they run the deer across the path where the hunters are standing so that the hunters can take the prey. And Satan picks up our scent and he can see that little tendency, he sees that weakness and he picks up on it and he runs us right into his nets. It's like Satan has this capability of leading us down, down, down by a winding staircase. And we just kinda keep gradually circling downward. And we never see the bottom until it's too late. Heard a story told, and I'll probably butcher it, because that's what I do to stories, but you'll get the point. I think it's called A Perfect Murder. It was a story, not a movie. It's a man and two men who worked back in the days when people would climb skyscrapers and they actually had skills that were impressive. They built these skyscrapers and they would get up on the skyscrapers and they would walk the rails and they were putting rivets into the metal and one man would heat the rivets and his partner would be over here driving a rivet. When he would be done driving the rivet, his partner would be done heating the rivet, and he would toss it with his tool. He would toss the rivet red-hot to his partner, who would catch it in a bucket, take it out with his tool, drive it in, and it was like clockwork. I mean, they would move just heating, tossing, catching, driving. Heating, tossing, catching, driving. These two guys got a job to build kind of a skyscraper, a building. And the guy that heated the rivets and tossed the rivets, found out that the guy that caught the rivets and drove the rivets had been committing a bit of a sin with his wife. And he began to think about how he could pay this man back. And he got an idea. So he gets up on the skyscraper the next day with his partner and he's heating rivets. And he tosses the rivet, but he tosses the rivet one inch further out than he normally tossed it. That's an inch. So his partner catches the rivet, drives the rivet, throws the rivet. So that day, he threw it just an inch out, and the next day, he threw it in the same place. And this went on for a few days, and then the next series of rivets, he just threw another inch out. and got his buddy used to catching him a little bit further out. And this went on for weeks and weeks and weeks as he inched his rivets out until finally he threw the rivet a little further out and his buddy stumbled and fell from the skyscraper and died of the perfect murder. That's what Satan does to us. He doesn't usually just come to us and say, hey, why don't you go into the First National Bank, rob it, kill everybody, kidnap a couple of kids. He doesn't do that. What he does is he sees where we are, and he sees our weaknesses, he sees our tendencies, he sees our flesh, and he begins to move us an inch by inch by inch by inch. This is who our struggle is with, and we need to recognize that we have a formidable opponent. Our strength is in the Lord, and that strength in the Lord gives us the faith to deploy And our struggle is with Satan. And recognizing our struggle with Satan gives us the coordinates to the battlefield in the front lines. So what's the third thing we need to see is our stability in verses 13 to 17. Verses 13 to 17, it says, take up the full armor of God so that you will be able to resist in the evil day. and having done everything to stand firm. Stand firm, therefore, having girded your loins with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace, in addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming errors of the evil one, and take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." So I want you to see the recipe for our stability here. If you look back in verse 11, he says, put on the full armor of God, So that you will be able to what? Stand firm against the schemes of the devil. Then in verse 13, take up the full armor. of God so that you will be able to resist in the evil day and having done everything to what? Stand firm, verse 14, stand firm. Our stability, stand firm in verse 11, stand firm in verse 13, stand firm in verse 14, our stability is found in our armor. We're able to resist and stand firm because of our armor. Our strength in the Lord gives us faith to deploy to the battle. Our recognition of our struggle with the devil gives us our coordinates to the front lines. And our armor gives us what we need to resist the enemy's attacks. Now notice he says in verse 11, put on the full armor of God. And in verse 13 he says, take up the full armor of God. It's important we don't miss a piece. It's the whole armor of God. If we miss a piece of the armor, we are in trouble because Satan is a very capable archer. I don't know if you remember the story about Ahab going into battle or not, but Ahab went into battle. He had been told he was going to die, so he stood back, he dressed in complete armor, and one of the arrows of the enemy just flew astray. It was a stray arrow from the battle and this stray arrow goes off course way over there to where Ahab is and it finds one crease in his armor and sticks in him and kills him. Satan has the capability to put the arrow in any piece of armor that we leave off. He can find a gap in our mesh. He can find the joint in our harness. He's an archer that can split an arrow. I don't know how many of you have shot bows and arrows, compound bows. There's something that we called, I mean, I grew up a redneck, this may be redneck terminology, but Robin Hooding. And Robin Hooding means you shoot one arrow into the bullseye, and then you draw back, and you aim, and you shoot again, and you drive that arrow through the nock of the previous arrow. That's called Robin Hooding. I just Robin Hooded that arrow. It's costly, but it kind of gives you a prideful feeling for a moment or two until you have to go buy another arrow. But Satan has the capability to do that time and time and time and time again. He can shoot the nock off of any arrow. So we need to put the full armor of God on. And notice that it's the armor of God. It's a standard issue by God. We don't have the right to say, well, you know, I think a good piece of armor would be a backplate. He doesn't give us a backplate. John Bunyan said he didn't give us anything for our back because he assumed that we wouldn't be retreating from the enemy, we would be moving forward. So we don't turn our back to the enemy or he'll shoot us in the back. We don't have anything for our back. We don't have any right to put anything on our back. He's given us his armor. I mean, if you were in the military, if you've ever been in the military, or if you know someone in the military, you can probably ask them, do they get to bring their guns from home? I really like my .30-06 that I used to hunt deer with. I'm going to bring my .30-06 to war. They have the right to... I made a pipe bomb at home. It worked really good. I'm going to bring that with me. I've learned how to make IEDs. I think I could plant some of that. They don't get to do any of that. It's all standard issue by their leadership because if everybody's bringing all different kinds of weapons, that doesn't breed unity and power. It breeds confusion, doesn't it? So God says, here's what you use for battle. Here is your armor. I'm going to give it to you loud and clear. What is it? Gird your loins with truth. And those days, Roman soldiers, you know, they didn't look quite as manly as many of us do today. They had on little skirt looking things. So they would have to gird up their outfit. They would pull up the the robe or they would pull up their little skirt and they would tie it up so they didn't trip up on it in battle. He says you gotta gird up your loins before you get into battle so that your robe doesn't get in the way while you're in battle. He says you need to put on this belt of truth and you need to tie up all the loose ends, tie up the loose ends by going to truth. And where do we find the truth? In the Word of God. So you put on the belt of truth. You immerse yourself in truth. You're not going to find truth in most university textbooks. You're not going to find truth on most television programs. You're not going to find truth anywhere guaranteed truth but in the pages of Scripture. So you tie up the loose ends with truth. You gird up your loins with truth. And put on the breastplate of righteousness. That breastplate covered your vital organs. You put on righteousness. Doing right, being right, being made right. You put on your feet shoes of the preparation of the gospel of peace. Your feet have been prepared to go into battle because you have made peace. You have had peace made with you. There's a war that's raging between us and God, and Christ makes peace. And when we have peace with God, When we have peace with God and we put on the boots of peace, then we are courageous enough to enter the battle. In addition to all, take up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one, and the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. So we have this armor. We have truth. We have righteousness. We have peace. We have faith. We have salvation. We have the Word of God, the sword of the Spirit. That's our weapon, is the Word of God. This is standard issue by God and we need to have it all on completely or we are vulnerable to the enemy. I want you to hear this. We don't confide in our armor. We don't rest in the armor of God. We rest in the God of the armor. Our armor is useless without the God of the armor. So we don't rest in our armor. We rest in the God of the armor. And all of that ultimately points to Jesus Christ. And I know I've shared this with you before. I'll share it with you again quickly. So that if you didn't get it the first time, maybe you can get it this time. This armor all points us to Christ, the belt of truth. What does the Bible say, John 14, 6? Jesus said, I'm the way, the truth, and the life. And no one comes to the Father but through me. Where's truth? What is truth, Pilate asked Jesus. And Jesus said, I'm the truth. The belt of truth is Jesus, the breastplate of righteousness. In 1 Corinthians 1, it says, Christ Jesus became to us wisdom from God. righteousness and sanctification and redemption. Jesus Christ is our righteousness. So you put on the belt of truth who is Jesus. You put on the breastplate of righteousness who is Jesus. The shoes of the gospel of peace we just read a few weeks ago in Ephesians 2 14. He himself is our peace. Jesus is our peace. The shield of faith, Hebrews 12, 2. He's the author and perfecter of our faith. The helmet of salvation, Psalm 62. He alone is our rock and our salvation. The sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, John 1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and in Revelation we see that He's coming with a sharp sword from His mouth, and on His thigh is written a name that no one knows, and He goes by the title of Word of God. This armor, yes, it's truth. Yes, it's righteousness. Yes, it's peace. Yes, it's faith. Yes, it's salvation. Yes, it's the Word of God. But ultimately and finally, it's Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. And it's one thing to have armor in the house, but it's another thing to put it on. You know, I have a bunch of kids, so. It's not really good to have, you know, I'm wondering, I got a loaded pistol here that I can defend off would-be invaders, but the real invaders in my house are 12 and under. So I'm thinking there's a lot more danger of one of them shooting me than me needing it for an intruder. So I bought this little box, you know, this fireproof, heavy box, lock box, and I have the pistol in the lock box. And I got to thinking the other night, you know, the pistol is in the fireproof box locked up in a bag under my bed, the keys to it are in my bag that I put my computer in, in the living room, and I'm just thinking, I guess I could say, intruder, give me a moment, let me run get my keys out of my work bag, and give me a moment to run and dig the other bag out from under my bed and open this box up so that I can defend myself, and that doesn't work very well, does it? And that's how many of us treat Jesus. You know, I walked down an aisle one day in Vacation Bible School, and I repeated a prayer, and I got baptized, and I joined the church, and I feel really good about that. And now Jesus is on the shelf, and I'm going to run get him when I need him. You know, Jesus is my friend. He's my buddy. I've even seen t-shirts that say Jesus is my homeboy, whatever that means. And you know, when I need Jesus, I'm going to run get Jesus. And until I need Jesus, he's on the shelf. And when I die, he's going to jump off the shelf and say, here I am. What good is our armor in the house if it's not on us? What good is Jesus on the shelf if we're not clothed in Him? That's what the Bible tells us to do in Romans 13, 12 to 14. The night is almost gone, the day is near. Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh. put on the armor of light, put off the filth of this world, put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Our ability to stand firm is rooted and grounded in putting on the entire armor that God has issued for us, truth, righteousness, faith, peace, salvation, sword of the Spirit, ultimately putting on Jesus Christ. Now, lastly, number four, our supplication. Our supplication, verses 18 through 20, with all prayer and petition, pray at all times in the spirit and with this in view. Be on alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints. And pray on my behalf that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel. for which I am an ambassador in chains, that in proclaiming it I may speak boldly as I ought to speak." Notice in those verses he says, all prayer, all prayer at all times. with all perseverance, for all the saints. Okay, just stop and recognize with me how important prayer is to the Apostle Paul. And then pray for me. So do you see how important prayer is here to the Apostle Paul? So yes, let's put on our breastplate. Yes, let's put on our belt and our shoes and get our shield and our sword and our helmet. But let's not stop there and miss the fact that several verses are committed to this one thing of prayer. Recognizing our strength in the Lord gives us faith to get out of the camp and into the battle. Recognizing our enemy and who we struggle against gets us to the front lines in the battle. Recognizing and putting on our armor enables us to stand firm and resist in the face of the enemy. But prayer enables us to advance. Prayer enables us to advance with boldness. And we need to ask ourselves this morning if we take prayer as seriously as Paul took prayer. And if we take prayer as seriously as he appeals to us to take prayer. How quickly, how quickly we erupt into fellowship. when the Amen is said. How quickly we can't wait for the sermon to be over so that we can catch up with friends. And we erupt into fellowship when in reality, if we saw where our streak lies, if we saw the struggle that is going on now for you and for me and for our marriages and for our children and for our church, if we really saw the importance of putting on Christ, we wouldn't just erupt into fellowship, we would crumble in prayer. We would crumble to our knees. We don't advance the kingdom of God by good times with each other. We advance the kingdom of God by prayer. And we don't need to wait on somebody to institute something. We just need to do it. Because again, the church is made up of individuals. And if individuals wait on the church, I'll just go ahead and tell you, we'll grow old and die together and wait. Waiting, because we can't wait on the church as individuals take initiative to pray. Our strength is in God alone. And that gives us faith to get out of the camp and into the battle. Our struggle is not with flesh and blood, but the spiritual realm. That gets us on the front lines. Our ability to stand firm is rooted in putting on the armor of God, which gives us the ability to resist the enemy. But prayer, prayer gives us the capability of advancing the kingdom of God. So I want us to just end with a few questions. One, are you strong? Are you strong? You can go ahead and answer that question for yourself. Are you strong? And if you're not strong, then why not? Are we waiting on the Holy Ghost to sprinkle some fairy dust on us and fix everything? I mean, is that what we're waiting on? What's keeping you from being strong in the Lord? What is it that is keeping you right now from being strong in the Lord? What is it that he is showing you that is keeping you from being strong in the Lord? What is God showing you now that is keeping you from advancing and being strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might? And what are you going to do about it? I mean, we can play little games and check off the sermon, take the notes. I mean, some of us come, we take a lot of notes. We don't want to miss church because we want to get all the notes. I heard one preacher say some of us don't want to miss church because we don't want to miss out on our nap. What are we doing? If we're not strong in the Lord, why are we not strong in the Lord? What are you going to do about it? You're just going to get up in the morning and carry on as usual and expect something miraculous to happen? The miraculous that needs to happen needs to happen right now with God showing you what's keeping you from being strong and you saying, I am going to do something about it with the help of the Lord. Our strength is in the Lord. Are you dressed for battle? Are you dressed for battle? Are you girding up your loins with truth? Are your feet shod with the gospel of peace? Are you taking up the shield of faith? Have you put on the breastplate of righteousness? Do you have on the helmet of salvation? Do you have the sword of the Spirit? Are you putting on the armor of God? Better yet, have you put on Jesus Christ? Because if you put on Jesus Christ, you get all that. Have you put on Christ? I want you to listen to me very, very carefully. You will not stand against the schemes of the devil if you have not put on Jesus Christ this morning. Listen, God is holy and He demands perfection. That means if you're going to be acceptable to God, you can never, ever sin. Not one time. and your entire life can you sin. Do you think a pure and holy and righteous and sovereign and perfect God is going to sweep your sin no matter how little it seems under the rug? Absolutely not. And if you're not perfect here this morning, you are not acceptable to God. And as far as I know, there's only been one that's been perfect and acceptable to God. And that was God Himself. God in the flesh. Jesus Christ. The very image and reflection of God. So here is what God the Father has done because you are not acceptable to Him and I am not acceptable to Him and we do not maintain and keep His standards perfectly because He is just. He has to deal with that. He has to judge our He has to punish our sin. The wages of sin is death. But because He is love, He made a way to deal with our sin and show us grace and mercy. And that was stepping out of heaven and coming to earth as the man Christ Jesus to live the life that God requires of you and me on our behalf. He lived a perfect, sinless, spotless life, born of a virgin, lived His life, never committing sin, fulfilling every facet of the Father's will. And God the Father can take His perfect righteousness and He can attribute it to us. And then he went to the cross and on that cross he took our sin. He took your sin, your iniquity, your transgression upon himself on the cross. And God the Father from heaven judged our sin in Christ on the cross. He poured out his wrath upon his son upon the cross until the judgment against our sin was finished. So that He could not only take the perfect righteousness of Christ and attribute it to our account, but He could take our perfect unrighteousness and attribute it to Christ and deal with it on the cross and bury it away in a borrowed tomb. And on Sunday morning, the Father raised Christ from the dead, raised Him from the grave, triumphant over death, triumphant over hell, victorious over the grave, so that He was affirming the acceptance of His sacrifice, His life, His death, His burial. Do you want that? Do you want to put on Christ who will give you His righteousness and take away all of your sin, give you a clean slate? There's not any penance involved, just wipe the slate clean, you get a do-over. And he says very simply in Romans chapter 10 that you need to confess Jesus Christ as your Lord. You take a new master. You take a new boss. You take a new ruler. You confess Jesus as your Lord, and you believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead. And it says, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and you believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. Call on the name of the Lord for everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. So I want to invite you this morning to take Jesus as your master, your Lord. I want to invite you this morning to look into your heart and see, do I really believe that he conquered death? He conquered hell, He conquered the grave, and He rose victorious from the dead for me. Will you call on His name right now, where you are this morning, and plead with Him to remove your heart of stone, and your sin, and your filth, and change your life? Would you do that this morning? You don't need to come hold anybody's hand. You don't need to put anything in the offering plate. You don't need to get your life together. You just need to turn from your sin and trust Christ this morning for salvation. And you can put on the full armor of God right now. Can be clothed in the armor of God. Do you have Christ put on? And finally, I want to ask you, are you advancing? Are you engaging in battle three prayer? All prayer at all times with all perseverance for all the saints. Look around. Look around this room right now. And there are people who are lost. There are kids who are lost. There are people who are drifting. There are people who are in spiritual funks. You look around this room, now's not the time to start thinking about what we're going to talk about. Now's not the time to think about what we're going to eat. Now's not the time to think about what we're going to do after church. Now's the time to engage the battle. And to pray. Because I'm not convincing enough. You're not convincing enough to tear down the strongholds of Satan. Only the Spirit of God is. So we need to appeal to Him now to work in our midst. We need to appeal to Him now to move and to speak and to convict and to work in people's lives. This needs to be wartime here, not finish time. This needs to be battle time now, not the finish line. We don't need to be looking towards the end. We need to be looking right now at the heat of the battle. Will you engage in the battle by praying for those around you? Or are we just going to amen this thing out this morning and go to the house? Are you strong? Are you dressed for battle? Are you engaging in advancing the kingdom of God through prayer? It's my hope. It's my hope that we'll not just amen and jot down some notes, but they will do life differently from this day forward. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your love. We thank you for your mercy, your grace, your word that you've given us, directions that you've given us in your word, the reminders of where our strength lies and where the real battle is our hope of resisting, and our method of advancing your kingdom. Take away our apathy. Take away our unconcern. And replace it with a burden. that will drive us to our knees. We need your grace. We need your mercy. We need your help. We need you, Spirit, to work among us this morning and to put your finger on those who need to put on Christ and have a new start, a new day today. I pray that you would transform hearts and minds and lives and that you would bring to repentance and faith those who need to know you. And we'll give you the praise for it in Christ's name. Amen.