So, in other words, what Paul is saying here, this isn't a battle where we roll up our sleeves and we duke it out to see who's going to come out on top. And that's not how we win this battle. You can't win this battle by repaying evil for evil or insult for insult. That's not how we win this battle. On the contrary. Actually, he says, This battle is fought completely the other way around.
[00:37:01]
I think this is definitely not an easy thing to do. This is really challenging. At times, this is really challenging when someone has really wronged you and then to just repay that with good. That is very hard to do. But if you want to come out on top, if you want to win this battle, then that's how you would respond. You would respond with good when evil comes your way.
[00:38:17]
We don't oftentimes, we don't see what's going on in the background, but we just, you know, we see it sometimes that all of a sudden, somebody experiences that too. Where it just seems like, like bad things just happened to the same household. Actually, one after another. And sometimes, sometimes I think, what we do is we then, we then look and say, well, well, God is doing this or that, or we tend to, to somehow attach what we think is the reason why so and so is going through what he's going through. When the reality of it is, we have no idea what's going on in the background.
[00:44:08]
I don't think it's safe, I don't think it's fair for us to speak into someone else's life when they're going through something and saying, this is why. This is why you're going through that. Because really, we don't know why people or things happen the way they happen. All I can tell you is that sometimes the spiritual battle that's happening in the background, it affects our physical way of life.
[00:45:26]
Sometimes these spiritual battles that are happening in the background, they do affect us in a physical way, in some different way. And we don't see it. We don't understand it. We don't know how.
[00:46:49]
Job responded like this when he heard that all these things had happened to him. He had just lost everything he had, including his family. He responded like this. He said in verse 20 of the first chapter, at this Job got up, tore his robe and shaved his beard. Then he fell to the ground and worshiped and said, naked I came from my mother's womb and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. May, check this out, may the name of the Lord be praised. That's how he responded. May the name of the Lord be praised. And it says in all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.
[00:47:01]
So what are these strongholds, these powers, these spiritual forces that we're up against? Well, they're evil spirits. They're evil spirits that we cannot see with our physical eyes. We cannot see these spirits. Which means, if we can't see these spirits, which means that if we wave our hands around and throw punches at each other, that's never going to win the war. That's never going to work. That's not how we're going to win this battle.
[00:48:09]
How do we win this battle if we can't see where the punches are coming from? We go back to Ephesians, that's where our text is out of, Ephesians chapter 6, and we'll read a couple of verses here. We'll start in verse 10 and go all the way through 18, so eight verses. It says, Finally be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.
[00:49:04]
This is how the enemy shoots these fiery arrows at us. Say it's, it's an arrow that comes at you that might come, um, and, and in this disguise of, of offense. May we all experience offense sometimes, we're all offended at, at one point or another in our lives, but, but, but some are easily offended than others. Some of you may have inherited this, this from a previous generation to where it doesn't take much to, to offend you. And so, so say this arrow comes at you and you're offended. And so it looks something like this. If you don't deal with it, it looks something like this. You know, you're never invited anyways. You're never invited for anything anyways. They always seem to overlook you. I don't think they want you there. Or you're never valued. You're never appreciated. Someone else always seems to get the credit for something you've done. You're always overlooked. So you start to play with these thoughts of being offended.
[00:51:38]
If you have this story and there's these blank lines in the story, if you have this storybook and there's these blank lines in there, and if you then fill in those blank lines, those blank lines, I can tell you that they're almost always going to be inaccurate. Those lines were meant to be filled by the storyteller, not you. And so a lot of times when we fill in blanks, we get it wrong. And so then we start to wrestle with something that wasn't even accurate to begin with.
[00:52:56]
So maybe now you're dealing with offense, filling in all these blanks, where the reality of it might be that it's completely different than what you're assuming. So now that offense can maybe lead you to anger. You're starting to get angry because of all of this. Forget them. You know what? Forget everyone. I'm done. You know what? I don't care. I don't need people. I don't need church. I don't need no one. You start to get angry. You start to get tempted. After anger, you're starting to get tempted. I'm going to take this into my own hands. Nobody messes with me like that. I'm going to show them. I'm going to show them. You don't play with me. So you're starting to get tempted. You're going to take vengeance. You're going to repay insult for insult. You want them to feel exactly the way you felt. Actually, you want them to feel way worse. They're going to regret they ever said that. You see how that one arrow went from impact to splattering all over and making a big mess, and it's burning your house down if you don't deal with it. And so we've got to learn to deal with these things properly.
[00:53:36]
So here's what we do. When a thought enters into your mind, and you don't even have the full story of it, you're just assuming. You're filling in blank lines. You're not sure, but it sounds right. When a thought enters into your mind, you take it captive. You don't let it play all over the place and run all over and where it creates a really messy story that leads you to really get all messed up in the head. You take it captive, and you make it obedient to Christ. You take that thought, and you take it, and you pray over that thought, and you demolish that thought, and you find out what's the real...story here.
[00:55:14]
Sometimes, the words that, that come across, weren't actually meant to hurt us. They were just taken that way. You know, if we want to defend ourselves, we need to take up the helmet of salvation is what it says in verse 17 of, of Ephesians 6. And the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. We're fighting, we're fighting spirits. We're fighting a force that we cannot see, that we cannot touch. And so we need weapons. That will penetrate these, these forces, these spirits that can defeat these spirits, that can take these spirits down. And that is the word of God.
[00:58:41]
The challenging thing here is, the, the, the challenging thing here is, with this very powerful word, that, that, that we handle it correctly. That, that, that we handle God's word correctly. That's, that's the challenge here to, to, to all of us. The word of God is supposed to deliver us from the enemy. It's supposed to, to, to separate us from the enemy, set us free from the enemy, and then bring us to God. That's the way around. But sometimes, the word of God is misused, and it does that. It pushes people away from God, instead of bringing them closer. If we, if we handle God's word correctly, we can rebuke and correct those that need rebuking, that need correcting, without damaging them, without hurting them.
[00:59:42]
He really didn't know what was happening to him. But one thing that he didn't do in all this, when, when he was going through all of this, is blame God for it. He never blamed God for any of this. He continued to praise God. Honor God.
[01:02:19]
If you, if you accept the idea that it's okay to be mad at God, that's going with, I think God was holding out. I think God could have done a better job than what he did. I don't trust God anymore. I'm going to be mad at God. That's how, how, how Eve was tempted in the garden too. Did God, I think God's holding out. God's holding out. And so I don't, I don't think it's, it's, it's, it's right for us to, to, to be able to, to, yeah, I'm mad at God because things didn't turn out. You're, you're mad at God for something the enemy did. You're blaming God for something the enemy did. Your anger is to the wrong direction.
[01:03:14]
Instead, what we need to do, this is what, what, what I really much try to do is, is to pick up that shield of faith. It says in, in verse 16, Ephesians 6, it says, in addition to all this, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows. Remember that arrows that we talked about earlier of the evil one. And so what I'm saying is take up the shield of faith. You're going through something that's very difficult and you don't understand it. And it seems like this is unfair. You take up that, that shield of faith and you say, God, I really don't know what's going on right now. This is very hard, but, but, but I'm choosing to put my faith in you. I'm choosing to trust that, that you only have your very best interest at heart when it comes to my life. And even though right now it doesn't feel that way, I'm choosing to believe that that's what's happening. And so I trust in you.
[01:04:04]
He didn't understand what was going on, but he chose to believe that God had his best interest in mind. So we take up that shield of faith. It's like, I don't get it, but God, I trust you. I trust you.
[01:06:04]
At the beginning, it says, pray in the spirit. This is very important that we pray in the spirit, that we don't just pray recited prayers or, or rehearsed prayers or learned prayers or, or religious praying of that, that really aren't from the heart. But that we pray in the spirit and whatever it is that you're battling, whatever it is that you're up against at different times, when you take these things to prayer, the enemy is going to flee.
[01:06:46]
If you're fighting these spiritual battles and you start praying, the enemy does not like it. So at first, the enemy is going to try to distract you while you're praying. Let me tell you, when I have some serious prayer time, I got to really, really set some, some, some precautions. I got to make sure my phones are muted. Really, I need to have earplugs in because the doorbell will ring. Some thoughts will enter. All kinds of things just to distract me from praying. But then if I continue to push on and push through in prayer, the enemy has to flee. The enemy does not like it when you seriously have communion with God. When you have a relationship with God. When you're actually talking to God. When you're not giving up and you continually to pray, the enemy has to flee.
[01:08:21]
Remember in our story, remember in our story when this old Indian was telling the young boy that this, this battle that's going to be fought is going to be a battle inside of me is also going on inside of you and inside of everyone else. The young boy asked the grandpa, so which wolf will win? Which wolf will win? And the grandpa said, the one you feed, the one you feed. So as you go from here today, I want you to think about that. Which wolf are you choosing to feed? Are you choosing to feed love? Are you choosing to feed anger and hatred? Are you choosing to feed joy? Or are you choosing to be grumpy and feed that? Are you choosing to feed truth or deception? Which wolf will you feed?
[01:09:30]
