Once again seeking the help of
God I would like us to turn to the chapter that we have been
looking at. Ephesians chapter 6 and the last part of the physical
armour which is the sword of the spirit. Ephesians chapter
6 and verse 17 the last part and the sword of the spirit which
is the word of God. Again by way of introduction
we have been looking at the armour of God that is given to the Lord's
people. We know as we have noticed over
the over the weeks that the armour is given to those who have been
called to be soldiers of the Lord Jesus Christ, that is all
believers are called to be soldiers, all are born into the army of
the Lord Jesus, all are new birth into the kingdom of light and
are called to walk through enemy territory until they reach the
promised land. They are soldiers of the Lord
Jesus. They have no strength or ability
of their own. They are to be strong in the
Lord and the power of his might. And it is very dangerous for
us to believe that we have our own strength that we have our
own ability. It's very dangerous when Christians
become proud and self-sufficient then we are more likely to lay
aside that armor, to go in our own strength and to be wounded,
to bring shame on the Lord Jesus. In prayer I mentioned regarding
somebody in America who has fallen a man by the name of Mr Lawson,
who is a very prominent minister, a pastor of a church, a conference
speaker, a very famous preacher throughout the whole world, I
would think. And he We can only say that he's fallen into temptation
and we don't really know what has happened, but he's been taken
down from being a pastor. He's been removed from being
in the leadership of the college or the university that he was
at. And he's been, any conference that he is due to be speaking
at this year and next year has been removed from all of those
things. And he was even starting his own Bible college to instruct
ministers, preachers, how to rightly divide the word of God.
And that has now been closed down or money has been reimbursed
to those who have signed up. And so a Christian has to be
extremely careful. And we are faced with evidences
round about, especially at this time. There have been so many
ministers of God, men of God, that have fallen. that have been tempted, drawn
aside by, as I've said, the counterfeit goods of Satan. He lays things
in the pathway and instead of having the eyes focused upon
Christ and to have joy and satisfaction in the Lord Jesus Christ and
his holy word, they turn aside and buy these counterfeit goods
And the consequences of a man of God falling brings implications
in the church, in his case, the worldwide church. And if we become
proud, self-sufficient, then we are more likely to fall. The apostle Paul, he said, the
Lord has given me a thorn in the flesh to stop me from being
exalted above measure. God knew the danger that there
was in man, in the apostle, that the revelation that had been
given to him could make him proud, so he gave him a thorn. And we,
as we become exalted, as we see ourselves in our own strength,
we lose sight of our need of the help of God, we will fall. Satan is ever ready. A roaring lion going around seeking
whom he might devour. He's ever ready firing arrows. And we are warned and we are
warned and we are warned in scripture that nobody is able to resist
him without the help of the Holy Spirit. The scripture says, beware
lest he that thinks he stands, beware lest he falls. As soon
as we become self-sufficient, I'm not going to fall. No, not
me. I'm capable. There's the danger. It's like putting your head above
the trenches, looking around. Instead of keeping your head
down, the enemy fires that arrow straight into the mind, into
the heart. And we've seen the dangers of
those things. And so believers and myself,
the Lord is putting on a public display that we are to be warned
that great men fall. And it's a warning to us, unless
we should be exalted above measure, that we are walking a narrow
way that leads to life with a great, a great enemy, an enemy within,
an enemy without, a spiritual enemy, a physical enemy, We must wear our armour tightly
and we must be aware of the temptations and the traps and the tricks
that Satan puts to cause us to stumble. Because we wrestle not
against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers,
against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual
wickedness in high places. Wherefore because of this take
the whole armour of God you may be able to withstand in the evil
day and having done all to stand. So we've seen that we need the
righteousness of Christ, the breastplate of righteousness,
the feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace, that
we need the shield of faith to quench those fiery darts, the
helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit which is the word
of God. And we've seen that that armour
that is being given to us is specifically designed by God
to enable us to walk in enemy territory. The enemy is a spiritual
enemy. The armour that we have is a
spiritual armour. We notice that throughout the
ages the armour that is given to the military has evolved over
time. to combat the different schemes
that the enemy has to bring harm to the opposition or to the army.
We've seen it even in Ukraine as drone warfare has increased
and increased there's been different armor that has been created to
combat those drones. And so the armour that is given
to the people of God is an armour designed by God specifically
for the enemy and the opposition that they walk or that they do
combat with. In Corinthians it tells us that
our enemy is a spiritual enemy and the weapons that we have
are not physical weapons but they are spiritual weapons. 2nd Corinthians chapter 10. verse 3. For though we walk in
the flesh we do not war after the flesh for the weapons of
our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God to the pulling
down of strongholds, casting down imaginations and every high
thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringeth
into captivity every thought to the obedience of Jesus Christ. And so it tells us there that
the weapons of our warfare are not physical weapons they're
not carnal weapons because the enemy that we have although we
are walking Physically through this world we are also in a spiritual
battle and so the weapons of our warfare, the things that
we have to fight with, they are not physical weapons but they
are spiritual and as we saw last week that Satan is very concerned
about the mind. If he can control the mind, if
he can affect the mind then he affects the whole disposition
of the believer. If he can fire an arrow of a
dart of fear then that Christian will walk in a timid way. If he can fire lust, he can inflame
that Christian to commit sin. If he can fire doubts, if he
can fire lack of assurance, he causes that Christian to not
have the confidence to shine as a light in a dark place. And
so he is concerned with the mind. And we see here casting down
imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the
knowledge of God and bringing into captive every thought to
the obedience of Christ. And so the weapons of our warfare,
they are spiritual weapons. And the sword that is given to
the Christian is a spiritual weapon. It is the sword of the
spirit, which is the word of God. Everybody, I don't know if I'm
saying everybody, but most men anyway, like weapons. We go to see the soldiers at
Buckingham Palace We look at those ones on their horses and
we see their armour and we look at their sword and we admire
their sword. If we see the soldiers marching
what we are drawn to is their guns and we like to speak about,
did you see his gun? Did you see his sword? And so
every soldier also delights and takes care of his weapon. Their weapons must be kept clean. They must be taken apart. The
modern soldier takes apart his gun, he oils it, he removes the
dust from it, he puts it back together because he knows that
his weapon is the most important part of his armour to protect
himself. He can't go out into the battlefield
without his gun. He might have protective armor,
but he has nothing to be able to fight with. He would not bring
fear into the enemy, into the mind of the enemy if he walks
on the battlefield without a gun. He would be a target, an easy
target. And so the Christian is to be
well acquainted with his weapon. He's to be familiar with his
weapon. He's to delight in his weapon. He's to know his weapon inside
out because he should understand that that is what God has given
him to combat, to do combat with the forces of darkness. Satan
and his demons. But how often it is in our lives
that the weapon that we have is not our delight. How often it is it's a last thought. You might read a couple of verses
but life's so busy that we get up and go and we neglect the
weapon that God has given and then we wonder why throughout
the day we're full of fear full of anxiety that we don't have
the strength to continue that the things that take place affect
us so much and we realize We haven't cleaned our weapon. We haven't examined our weapon.
We haven't meditated on our weapon. We're doing war with a spiritual
enemy yet we haven't taken any spiritual food. We haven't equipped
ourselves with the spiritual sword that the Lord has given
to us. As you look at the soldier he
holds on to his weapon very tightly. It's like he's in love with it
because he knows that his life depends on that weapon and that
that weapon must work in a right way. And we as Christians We should love our weapon. We should love our sword that
the Lord has given to us. The Psalmist tells us only that
he delights in the Lord, in the word of the Lord. It was his
meditation day and night. And so the Christian is to hold
the word of God as a mighty weapon. it's only by this weapon that
we are able to combat the forces of darkness to overcome the lies
and the deceit of Satan. God has only given us this weapon.
He doesn't say fight with your own wisdom. He doesn't say fight
with your own strength. He says you don't have any strength
of yourselves. He says you need my strength,
the Lord's strength. You need the power of God. And
he says you need my word that is the sword of the spirit to
enable you to walk this pathway that leads to eternal life. And
so what we hold here in this book is all that we need to fight
against every fiery dart and every attack that Satan brings
to us, whether it be through false teaching. We are able to
overcome that false teaching, heresies by the word of God,
the truth of the word of God. We are able to put to flight
the armies of Satan by the sword of the Spirit, which is God's
word. God's word is spirit. In John 6, Jesus is speaking
And verse 63, it says, or to make it make sense,
goes from 61. And when Jesus knew in himself
that his disciples murmured at it, he said unto them, doth this
offend you? What? And if ye shall see the
Son of Man ascending up where he was before? It is the spirit
that quickeneth or makes alive, the flesh profiteth nothing.
The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are
life. The words that the Lord Jesus
Christ was speaking, they are spirit and they are life. By the word of God, the scripture
tells us that the earth was framed or the earth was put together.
The book of Genesis tells us that God spoke and divided the
darkness from the light. God spoke and he created the
world. God spoke and the earth brought
forth flowers and trees, fishes and animals. And then he spoke
over that world. it was good and so God's word
it is powerful it is able to accomplish what he desires it
to please. You and I if we were to go outside
and to shout let it rain it would do nothing. Our words are not
spirit and they are not truth they don't have that power within
them to produce what we want to happen. Sometimes in family
life you can tell a child to do something and they don't do
it. Our words don't have that power within them to produce
the desired effect all of the time. Sometimes we speak and
the children listen and they obey Our words do not have that
power that God has in his word. His word is a living word and
is able to produce life. It is able to produce physical
things out of nothing and so his word is spirit, it is truth,
it is life, it is powerful, it is effective by God's word. Lazarus was raised from the dead. Remember when Mary and Martha
and Lazarus died the Lord Jesus Christ he arrived four days after
he had died and he asked for the stone to be rolled away and
they said by now he smells, his body has begun to decompose. They rolled away the stone and
Jesus spoke. Lazarus come forth. His words
are spirit and his words are life. They have that power to
accomplish his will. And in the chapter that we read
together We saw that the Lord Jesus Christ used the Word of
God to resist the temptations that were laid before him by
Satan. He used the Word of God as a
sword to defeat his enemy that had come to tempt him. In Matthew chapter 4, when satan
begins to tempt him if thou be the son of god but he answered
it is written man shall not live by bread alone but every word
that proceeds out of the mouth of god again he comes to tempt
him and he quotes satan quotes scripture for it is written that
if thou dash thy foot against the stone, the angels will bear
thee up. Jesus says, it is written again,
thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. again the devil would
take them up to an exceedingly high mountain and show him all
the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them and said unto
him all these things will i give thee if thou will fall down and
worship me then said jesus unto thee get thee hence satan for
it is written thou shalt worship the lord thy god and him only
shalt thou serve and so we see that the lord jesus christ took
the sword of the spirit which is the word of God and used it
to do combat with the devil as he came to tempt him and try
to cause him to deviate from the path that God had given him
to walk. Christ's will was to do the will
of the father and not to deviate from that pathway and Satan comes
and tries to tempt him. Oh, if, if, if, if Jesus says
it is written, it is written, it is written. And so Jesus knew
the word of God. He knew what was written and
he was able to quote it to Satan to put to death his lies and
those doubts that he was those seeds of doubt that he was casting
before the Lord Jesus Christ. How often it is with us that
Satan comes and he puts those ifs. We're feeling down or we
are we are going through life, maybe struggling, and he comes
with an if. If you are truly a Christian,
if you are loved by the Lord, if you are really walking in
his way, if you are in his will, he comes with these ifs. If you
are God, why are you struggling in such a way? And he likes to
sow those seeds of doubt in the mind of a believer. and we're
quite happy often to listen to him. Oh yes, I will sit down
with you Satan and talk about the Lord Jesus, how horrible
he is being to me. How nasty he is making me walk
through this horrible pathway and we're quite happy to take
up a seat and to have a chat with Satan about how horrible
God is to us. but instead of quoting the scripture,
it is written. It is written, it's through much
tribulation that we must enter the kingdom of God. It is written,
get behind me, Satan, and do not cause me to doubt or talk
bad of my saviour and my God. It is written. And we're quite
happy to leave our sword in the sheath instead of pulling it
out to quote the word of God. And Jesus is saying, well, this
is the weapon that I have given to you to enable you to fight
those temptations. And yet you leave that sword
in its sheath and you sit down with the enemy and you have a
conversation about how nasty I am being to you. Jesus overcame
temptation by the Word of God. It is written. Satan was defeated
by the Word of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember in the Garden of Eden,
Satan is told that the seed of the woman is going to bruise
the serpent's head. We know that the Lord Jesus Christ
came into this world to defeat the power that Satan held over
his people and he came as the Word of God. John chapter 1. In the beginning was the Word
and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The same was
in the beginning with God. Verse 14, and the word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld his glory, the
glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and
truth. So Christ is the word of God. And God used
his word as a sword to defeat Satan. upon the cross at Calvary. Christ gained the victory for
his people. He is more than a conqueror. He experienced that full wrath
of God, the outpouring of that anger. He quoted, it is finished. then he gave up the ghost and
he rose again on the third day. And so the word of God is a spiritual
word, it is a living word, it is an effective word, a powerful
word. It is a word which can be used
by the Lord's people to enable them to combat Satan and his army as the Lord
Jesus Christ was used by God, the Word of God, to defeat Satan,
to crush him. The Word of God then is described
as a sword. In Hebrews it tells us that it
is a two-edged sword. Hebrews chapter 4. Verse 12. For the word of God
is quick or it is alive, it is a living word, it is powerful,
sharper than any two-edged sword. piercing even to dividing asunder
of the soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow and is
a discerner of the thoughts and the intent of the heart. In the
book of Revelation we have an image of the Lord Jesus Christ
and it says out of his mouth is coming a sharp two-edged sword. The word of God is as a sword
able to divide and pierce the soul and the spirit. And so the
word of God has a twofold effect. It delivers and it brings judgment. It delivers people from that
power of Satan. It delivers them from the kingdom
of darkness. It delivers them from the chains
of sin and sorrow. And it brings them to the Lord
Jesus Christ. The wonderful gospel is the word
of God. We preach the word of God. We
preach the Lord Jesus Christ and that word goes forth as a
sharp two edged sword to snatch people from that kingdom of darkness. It is a sword of deliverance.
but it's also a sword of judgment. The same gospel that we preach
is a salvation to some and a judgment to others. He that believes not
is condemned already and so with the same sword he delivers and
with the same sword he brings judgment. He releases those to
himself and he releases others into eternal judgment. In the chapter that we read in
Matthew 4 as Jesus is dealing with Satan by quoting the Word of God then
after he is finished It says the angels came and ministered
to him. We know that the angels are messengers
of God. They were created to be God's
messengers. They bring the message that God
has from heaven down and they assist the people of God and
they came to assist the Lord Jesus Christ. They ministered
to him. as Christ has been using his
sword as a means of judgment against Satan by quoting the
Word of God, so these angels now are sent with a message to
the Lord Jesus Christ not to destroy him but to build him
up, to encourage him to go on and to press on in that work
that had been given to him by the Lord. so the word of God
it cuts down but it also it builds up. We go on in that same chapter
Christ uses his word again he speaks to those first apostles
and he tells them follow me saw them going about their daily
business they were fishermen and he says to them follow me
and I will make you fishers of men and so with the one word
he's speaking to satan and bringing judgment and then with the next
word he is saying follow me I'm going to make you a fisher of
men. Turn away from your old pathway and come I'm going to
give you another job. I'm going to give you another
pathway to walk. Come and follow me. And so with
one swipe of the sword it's judgment and with another swipe of the
sword it's deliverance and he brings people behind him to follow
him on the way to life. And so the word of God is quick.
It's a living word. It's an alive word. It has a
power that accomplishes it and it breathes life into dead souls. These men, by their nature, were
dead in trespasses and sins. Yet they hear the voice of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Come, follow me. that word accompanied
with the spirit brings life into those men they are born again
as we saw in the bible study regenerated and they're now walking
in holiness they're seeking to follow the Lord Jesus Christ
and so it is that living word the word is a sword to bring
judgment and then to bring deliverance Think of the Apostle Paul on that road to Damascus going
to persecute the Christians. Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting
me? That swipe of the word, that
swipe of the Lord now severed him from his initial plan and put him on a pathway to serve
Christ. I wonder if the Word of God has
had any effect upon us. Is it a sword of deliverance?
Has it been a sword of deliverance to us? To sever us from our sin
and separate us to the Lord Jesus Christ? To sever us from the
darkness and bring us into the light? Or is it still a sword
of judgment? as God still has his hand up
as it were in judgment against us because our sins have separated
us from God. The sword of the spirit which
is the word of God and that sword he gives to his soldiers. We need to use it. We need to pick it up. We need
to read it. We need to meditate upon it.
We need to be saturated in it to be able to be like the Lord
Jesus Christ. It is written. When those doubts
are fired, that fear is fired, it is written. We have our shield
of faith. We have those stickers that are
on the back of it to remind us of all the promises of God, those
ones that have been applied to us and encouraged us. We have
the sword in our hand to go forward, to resist and we can say it is
written. I am loved with an everlasting
love. We can say it is written. I am thy strength. in the power
of the might of the Lord. You can say it is written. Jesus used the sword. How much more then do you and
I have to use it? The truth of the word of God.
They open up the lies of this world. They open up the lies
of Satan. The truth of this book sheds
light upon the darkness. The truth of this book helps
believers to walk in the pathway that Christ has given them to
walk. And so he says take the helmet
of salvation and the sword of the spirit which is the word
of God and so every part of this armour is essential. We must
pick it up, we must wear it and we cannot rely just on the defensive armour that has been
given to us, we must pick up the sword. which is the Word
of God, to enable us to overcome all that is set before us. Now I in no way am a master swordsman,
as it were, of the Word. I am just as any other. I get
up late, rush off to work, too tired in the end of the day to
read and we suffer for it. Spiritually we suffer. As the soldier loves and is devoted
to his weapon to make sure that it's clean, oiled and ready to
use so we as believers need to make sure we are well acquainted
with this book as Psalm 1 tells us. Psalm 1 verse 2. But his delight
is in the law of the Lord and in his law does he meditate day
and night. He shall be like a tree planted
by the rivers of water that bringeth forth his fruit in his season.
His leaf also shall not wither and whatsoever he doth shall
prosper. And so the believer, the soldier
of the Lord Jesus Christ, his delight is in the law of the
Lord, his delight is in the word of God, his delight is in his
sword because he knows it is essential to the Christian pathway. So take the sword of the spirit,
which is the word of God. It's a powerful word. It's a
living word. It accomplishes what God sends
it forth for. It's able to break open hard
hearts. It's able to restore downcast saints. It's able to
take away fear of trembling believers. It's able to remove anxiety and
doubt and fear by its wonderful promises as God applies it to
our hearts. And so may we meditate upon it
and may we use it for the glory of the kingdom of God. May the
Lord add his blessing. Amen. May the Lord help us as we close
this service by singing hymn number 139 from hymns of worship. May the mind of Christ my saviour
live in me from day to day by his love and power controlling
all I do and say. Hymn number 139 from hymns of
worship. ? Living in me from day to day
? ? Thy is love and power controlling ? ? All I do and say ? ? May
the word of God well-wishing ? ? In my heart from heav'n ? so that all may see our triumph,
only through it first. May the peace of God, my Father,
all my life The time may be come to comfort
sick and sore away. May the love of Jesus fill thee
as the waters fill the sea. Exalting self, the basic, this
is victory. May I run the race fearfully,
strong and brave to face the foe. Looking only unto Jesus
as I overcome. May His beauty rest upon me as
I seek the lost May they forget the channel,
see it only. Once again, dear Lord, we do
thank Thee for Thy Word that Thou has given to us, the sword
of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. We thank Thee, O Lord,
and we pray that we may be taught how to use Thy Word as the weapon
to overcome those oppositions of Satan and the doubts and fears
and the anxieties of our lives do enable us, Lord, to be skilled
masters of the word, to be swordsmen, always ready to be able to resist
all that is placed in our way. Do be with us now, we pray, as
we depart from each other. Forgive us, Lord, of our many
sins. And now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the
love of God the Father with the fellowship and the communion
of the Holy Spirit, to be with us each now and for evermore.
Amen.