There certainly shouldn’t be any doubt by now that those of us who are followers of Jesus Christ are in a serious and difficult battle with the evil one. But if any of you discount the seriousness of that battle, the sixth and final piece of the armor of God should dispel any such doubts. Although we’re only going to focus on the last part of verse 17 this morning, let’s read out loud this entire section that begins in verse 10:
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. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Ephesians 6:10-17 (NIV)
I wanted us to read this entire passage again this morning for a couple reasons. First, we need to make sure that we understand the sword of the Spirit within the context of all the armor. Second, this is a good way for us to review all the armor, which I’ll come back and do at the end of the message this morning. With that in mind let’s concentrate on this last piece of armor that Paul describes at the end of verse 17:
Take…the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Up until now, every piece of the armor has been strictly defensive. Each of those five pieces of armor – the belt, the breastplate, the shoes, the shield and the helmet – were intended to protect the soldier from the attacks of the enemy. But this last piece of armor, while it can be used to ward off the blows of the enemy, also has some offensive capabilities. And we need that sword because our enemy is real and powerful and we need to be able to fight back when he attacks.
Roman soldiers used two different types of swords. Last week, we talked about the broadsword, which was a heavy weapon, usually about four feet long which was swung with both hands in a manner similar to the way we would swing a baseball bat. And that sword was used primarily to try to split open the head of the enemy as it came down upon the head. The Greek word for that broadsword, ”romphaia”, is used in the New Testament, primarily in the book of Revelation, where it is an instrument of God’s judgment against those who have chosen not to commit their lives to Jesus.
But the Greek word that Paul uses here, “makaira”, and which is used frequently throughout the New Testament is a much smaller sword. The word described a sword that was worn in a sheath or scabbard by the Roman soldier that could be anywhere from about six inches to 20 inches long. In Matthew 26 we read that the Roman soldiers who came to Jesus carried that type of sword and that Peter used a similar sword to cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest.
The most significant characteristic of this sword for us as we consider the armor of God is that it was a weapon that was used for close hand-to-hand combat. Because of its short length, it was only effective when the enemy was close and engaged in a fight. And when Paul commands us to take the sword of the Spirit, he is emphasizing once again the seriousness of the battle and the danger our enemy, the devil, presents.
But before we go any further, I want to remind us that our responsibility when it comes to our spiritual battle is to stand firm and maintain the ground that Jesus has already secured on our behalf and not take new ground. That’s why Paul repeats the command to stand throughout this section. But since, as we’ve seen, the sword is also an offensive weapon, how do we reconcile those two seemingly contradictory ideas? Given the entire context of this section, I think we can rightly conclude that…
• For followers of Jesus the sword is an offensive weapon that is used for defensive purposes.
That’s actually very easy to illustrate. Perhaps some of you may have one or more guns at home. And I think we would all agree that a gun is an offensive weapon. For instance, if you go out hunting, you would use it as an offensive weapon. But if an intruder were to enter you house and you shot that person with your gun, you would be using it in a defensive manner, and you would be justified in doing so. On the other hand, if you found out that someone was going to try and break into your home and you went out and found them and shot them in their own home to try to prevent them from breaking into your home, that use of your weapon would not be justified and you would be charged with a crime.
When Satan comes into our territory and attacks us, then we are not only justified in using the sword of the Spirit against him, but we must do so. On the other hand, that doesn’t mean that we are to go out looking for Satan in his own territory in order to try and attack him with the sword.
Having placed the sword of the Spirit in its proper context, let’s spend the rest of our time discovering how we can effectively use that sword in our battle with the devil.
As the first step in that process, we need to determine…
WHAT IS THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT?
On the surface, that seems like a very easy question to answer. Paul clearly defines the sword of the Spirit for us:
…the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God
That seems to be pretty straight forward doesn’t it? The sword of the Spirit is the word of God – it’s the Bible. In simple terms, yes. But there is a little more here than meets the eye. And in order for us to see that, we need to examine the…
• Two Greek words for “word”
o “logos” = the general revelation of God
This is the familiar word used in John 1, where Jesus is described as the “Word” of God. It is also used frequently by Jesus Himself to refer to all the Scriptures. For instance, in Matthew 15, he condemned the Pharisees for invalidating the “word of God” by their traditions.
…Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition.
Matthew 15:6 (NIV)
He was speaking there of the overall revelation of God in the Scriptures. The same word is also used frequently in the Book of Acts when describing the preaching of the early church that was based on the entire Bible. Even Paul uses that term frequently when he writes about the word of God as the general revelation of God found in the Scriptures. But that’s not the word Paul uses here. Here in Ephesians 6, he uses the Greek word…
o “rhema” = spoken word, specific revelation of God
One example of the use of this word in the New Testament is in Luke 9. After Jesus reveals to His disciples that He is going to be delivered into the hands of men, we find this response of the disciples:
But they did not understand this statement, and it was concealed from them so that they might not perceive it; and they were afraid to ask Him about this statement.
Luke 9:45 (NASB)
The word “statement” which appears twice in that verse is the Greek word “rhema”. It is a reference to a specific statement, a specific revelation, made by Jesus.
So Paul is not writing here about the Bible in general, but about specific statements and principles that are contained in the Scriptures. When we combine that fact with the nature of the sword itself and the fact that it was used in close hand-to-hand combat, we find that the sword of the Spirit can be defined as follows:
The sword of the Spirit involves applying specific Biblical principles to specific circumstances in my life.
In other words, we don’t use the Bible like a broadsword, just swinging the whole thing around hoping to get lucky and ward off the evil one. Instead, we are to use it with surgical-like precision, finding specific portions of Scripture that apply to the specific temptation that we’re facing or the specific doubt that comes into our minds or the specific emotion that we’re dealing with.
Obviously, the best example of how the sword of the Spirit is to operate like that is with Jesus Himself. When he faced the temptations of the devil in the wilderness, Jesus didn’t just flail around the Word of God indiscriminately. He used specific passages of Scripture to defend against specific temptations.
First, Satan tried to tempt Jesus to not trust God. “Don’t wait for God to supply your needs, just turn these stones into bread.” And Jesus defends against that temptation by quoting a verse from Deuteronomy that directly addressed that specific temptation.
Satan comes back again and tempts Jesus to put God to the test in an area where He had no business doing that. “Dive off the Temple and let the angels catch you.” And again Jesus quotes a specific passage from Deuteronomy that deals with that temptation.
Satan attacks one last time, tempting Jesus to bow down and worship him right then rather than wait on God’s timing. And once again, Jesus used the Scriptures to address that specific temptation.
In other words Jesus used the “makaira” of the Spirit, the “rhema” of God. He used the Bible in a precise manner to deal with specific temptations.
That’s why when I preach, I don’t just attempt to make this some academic exercise to impart information to you. Every time I share a message from God’s Word, my goal is to give you something practical that you can apply in your life. And sometimes, maybe it’s not necessarily something that you can use right at that moment. But hopefully, you can add it to your arsenal, so that when Satan attacks you in that area, you can use your sword against him and stand firm.
So let’s do that with this passage. What are some practical principles that I can put into practice to help me use the sword of the Spirit effectively?
HOW TO USE THE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT EFFECTIVELY
I know what some of you are thinking right now. Here comes another one of those messages that tells me I need to read and study my Bible more. That is certainly true. You can’t use God’s Word effectively unless you know what’s in there. But you all know that. So let’s see if we can’t go a little deeper this morning.
• Predetermine that the Bible is God’s Word
When Paul describes the Word of God as the sword of the Sprit, he is conveying the idea that it is the sword that is supplied by the Holy Spirit. That idea is confirmed by both Paul and Peter:
All Scripture is God-breathed…
2 Timothy 3:16 (NIV)
Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.
2 Peter 2:20, 21 (NIV)
We tend to use the term “word of God” as a synonym for the Bible. But the issue is this. Do we really believe that this Bible is indeed the very word of God? Not just that we say we believe that and we include it in our doctrine and our Statement of Faith. But have we made the determination once and for all that this is indeed the word of God and that therefore it deserves my full attention?
If you truly believe that this is the word of God, then there is no way that an hour or two on Sunday morning is going to satisfy your hunger for what’s on these pages.
• Provide for the role of the Holy Spirit in applying God’s Word
It’s not enough to just have God’s Word. In fact, even an unbeliever can have the Bible and read and even study it. But those who are followers of Christ have a resource that unbelievers don’t have – God’s Holy Spirit. The word of God is called the sword of the Spirit not just because the Holy Spirit provides it for us, but also because he makes it alive to us and equips us to use it in the right way at the right time. In his second letter to the Corinthians Paul very clearly addressed the crucial role of the Holy Spirit in helping us to apply the Word of God
However, as it is written: "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him" - but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.
2 Corinthians 2:9-14 (NIV)
Without the help of the Holy Spirit, we are incapable of understanding and applying the Word of God in our lives. We’ve all seen evidence of this, maybe even in our own lives. Before we committed our lives to Jesus and received the Holy Spirit how many of us tried to read the Bible and make sense out of it to no avail? We are completely dependent on the Holy Spirit to make effective use of God’s Word in our battle against Satan. So how do I make sure that I allow the Holy Spirit to do His work in this area? Let’s go back to an earlier verse here in Ephesians:
…Instead, be filled with the Spirit.
Ephesians 5:18 (NIV)
I’m convinced that the structure of Paul’s letter is no accident. And here in chapter 6, verse 17, there is a sense in which he is bringing to a conclusion a large section of writing that began all the way back in chapter 5, verse 18. Being filled with the Holy Spirit is the key to everything Paul writes about between those two verses – family relationships, work relationships and spiritual warfare.
And, as we determined when we looked at that verse in chapter 5, the key to being filled with the Holy Spirit is to be controlled by Him as we saturate our lives with God’s Word. So we come full circle. In order to give the Holy Spirit an opportunity to guide me in applying God’s Word, I have to saturate my life with God’s Word. It’s actually pretty simple. If I want to provide for the role of the Holy Spirit in applying God’s Word then I need to spend as much time as possible in His word. I need to give Him something to work with.
• Practice God’s Word
The Roman soldier would have never thought about going into battle without spending many hours practicing with his sword. The very best soldiers would try all different types of thrusts from different positions in order to determine what would work best in various situations. Even today, soldiers and police officers and others who depend on their weapons practice with them over and over. The idea is that when they get in the heat of the battle, they will not have to think about how to use their weapons. They can just react based on all their training and practice.
The same thing is true with the sword of the Spirit. If we want to be able to effectively use God’s Word in the heat of the battle, then we need to practice with it over and over. It’s not enough to just read the Bible, or even study it. It is only effective if we put it into practice. This passage from James is only one of many places in the Bible where this principle is revealed.
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it - he will be blessed in what he does.
James 1:22-25 (NIV)
I remember when I first became a volleyball referee. I signed up with the Arizona Interscholastic Association and paid my fees and they sent me a rule book and an officials’ manual and instructed me to read them. But even after many hours of reading and studying those books, I was certainly not ready to officiate a match. I had to actually get some on the court instruction from more experienced officials and then practice what I learned during scrimmages. And even then I still wasn’t a very good official. It has taken many years of putting everything I’ve learned into practice in order to become a better official.
As important as that is for my officiating career, it is much more crucial that I put in an even greater effort to put God’s Word into practice in my life. And in much that same way that others have been instrumental in helping me to become a better official, this is an area where all of us need the help of others within the body of Christ. By now, I shouldn’t have to remind you that all the armor is only effective as it is used within the body, but it seems that is particularly true when it comes to the sword of the Spirit.
I’m certainly indebted to a group of men in this church who make the effort to get up early every Tuesday morning in order to help me understand the passage I’m going to preach on that week and to give me some ideas about how to apply that portion of the Bible to my own life and to communicate to others how they can apply it in their lives. That’s also the main reason why we have a “Connections” class each week after the Worship service so that we can all help each other understand God’s Word and apply it in our lives.
• Proclaim God’s Word
As we discovered earlier, the Greek word “rhema” refers to the spoken word. And the effective use of the sword of the Spirit requires us to be able to proclaim and share God’s Word appropriately. This familiar passage from Romans certainly confirms this principle:
Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.
Romans 10:17 (NIV)
When Paul uses the phrase “the word of Christ” in that passage, he is using the word “rhema”. So he is not just writing here about the proclamation of the gospel in general, but about sharing specific portions of the Scripture that can be used effectively as a sword in our battle with Satan.
It seems to me that Paul is imploring his readers to proclaim specific portions of God’s Word that will be useful in helping others deal with the specific situations they are dealing with in their lives.When you proclaim the Word of God to your kids and help them apply it to a situation they are facing at school, or you share it with a co-worker who is facing a problem in his or her life, or when you teach a class of students here at our church and help them to see how the Bible is relevant to their lives, you’re cutting your way through Satan’s dominion and using the sword of the Spirit effectively.
H.P. Barker shared this illustration that helps us to pull all these principles together and demonstrates the importance of the sword of the Spirit:
As I looked out into the garden one day, I saw three things.
First, I saw a butterfly. The butterfly was beautiful, and it would alight on a flower and then it would flutter to another flower and then to another, and only for a second or two it would sit and it would move on. It would touch as many lovely blossoms as it could, but derived absolutely no benefit from it.
Then I watched a little longer out my window and there came a botanist. And the botanist had a big notebook under his arm and a great big magnifying glass. The botanist would lean over a certain flower and he would look for a long time and then he would write notes in his notebook. He was there for hours writing notes, closed them, stuck them under his arm, tucked his `magnifying glass in his pocket and walked away.
The third thing I noticed was a bee, just a little bee. But the bee would light on a flower and it would sink down deep into the flower and it would extract all the nectar and pollen that it could carry. It went in empty every time and came out full.
So it is with people who approach the Bible. There are those who just flutter from lovely sermon to lovely sermon, from class to class, fluttering here, fluttering there, bringing nothing and gaining nothing but a nice feeling. Then there are the spiritual botanists who take copious notes and study the Greek and Hebrew grammar but they don’t have the capacity to draw anything out of the flowers - it is purely an academic exercise. Then there are the spiritual bees who draw out of every precious flower all that is there to make the honey that equips them to stand firm against the devil and his schemes. Which one are you?
We’ve spent seven weeks now looking at the armor of God. And when I look back over those messages, I find that there is a common thread that holds all the armor together.
When I put on the belt of truth, I put on Jesus Christ, who is the truth. But I do that based on the truth in God’s Word.
When I put on the breastplate of righteousness, I live out the righteousness that Jesus has already given to me. And I find out how to do that in the Word of God.
When I fit my feet with the gospel of peace, I find that peace with God, the peace of God and peace with others all comes from the Word of God.
When I take up the shield of faith, I put what I believe, which is based on solid evidence, into practice. And I find what to believe and the evidence that supports my belief in the Word of God.
When I take up the helmet of salvation, I protect my mind against the doubts and discouragement that Satan sends my way by being sure of my inheritance in Jesus. And I find that assurance in the Word of God.
We’ve covered a lot of material in the last seven weeks and I’ve hopefully shared with you a number of practical principles that you can apply as you put on the full armor of God. I encourage you to go back and review those principles again. But here’s the bottom line. Every piece of the armor depends on the Word of God. So if you really want to be effective in the spiritual warfare you’re engaged in, you absolutely must saturate your life with the Word of God.
