Armor Of God

Armor Of God

Eph 6:10-17

10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.

Christians need to understand that Christ has already won the war. The only power satin has over us is what we give him. We as Christians belong to Christ nothing can change that. Christ conquered the power of sin and death when he rose 3 days after being crucified. Satin does not own Christians it can only annoy us. He can throw up temptations but Christ has already shown us we don’t have to fall in to these traps. Christ is our example, if we keep our eyes on him the worldly trials are minor problems.

11 Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.

Paul tells us to “put on the whole armor of God” this phrase in the Greek conveys the idea of permanence, put on and never taken off. A lifelong attire not as many preach to be put on when we see the enemy, have any of you ever seen the devil? Has he ever sent any of you a formal declaration of war? We have seen his traps mostly in hind site where it’s to late to put armor on. Paul uses the common roman solders armor to describe the Christians defenses.

12 For 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.

First rule of battle if you expect to win you need to know who you are fighting and what his normal tactics are. The word wrestle implies hand to hand combat, not standing off watching, a battle face to face. Not against people, although people will often be the pawns. Against satin and all his henchman. Against whom we have no power except what Christ has given us. If we are Christians we have everything we need to win the battle and it is the name of Jesus Christ and his seal upon us.

13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

Paul again emphasizes using the whole armor God has given us. Completely wrapped in Gods armor leaving nothing of ourselves exposed to the enemy.

A Roman soldier only wore the first three pieces mentioned all the time, The Girdle , Breastplate And Shoes, the last three the shield, helmet and sword were kept close and only put on when the actual fighting began. By paul telling us to put them on he is telling us whether we see it or not we are always in the battle.

14 Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness;

"Stand" the most important word here. As we go through the armor notice the back side is not covered. If you turn you are exposing yourself not standing behind what God has provided to protect you. This is why it bothers me so many Christians turn and run at the first sign of trouble. If Christ had run at the first sign of trouble he would have never made it to the cross and we would not have any hope of salvation. And we repay him by running when our feelings may be hurt. I’m glad he is bigger than us. I guess that’s why I like this church problems came some ran, but some stayed to represent Christ, some stayed to fight. Now lets find out how to win.

“having your loins girt about with truth” first time I studied this, I wondered why this was first in the list. The Greek always put the most important things first. They didn’t worry about sentence structure the way we do they were more concerned with order of importance. So why the girdle first?

To the roman solder the girdle was a belt to keep his robe tied out of the way during battle, when he needed to run the bottom of hit robe was brought up and tucked in the girdle to keep from tripping him. But most important all his armor hooked to the girdle with out the girdle the rest of the armor would fall off.

In the spiritual sense the girdle is “truth”

John 14:6

6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

(KJV)

The truth is Christ with out him the rest of the armor is useless and fake it would be as a roman solder went in to battle with the armor we buy our children at the toy store. Lots of people want to pretend to be Christians and the only reason their armor is holding is satin is not worried about them, their not in the battle there just playing army, but when it comes time for inspection their armor will not pass. They will be rejected for the lords army.