Suit Up 2 Series

Video Introduction: Clip from Glory before the men go into battle wingclips.com

Sermon Series: Suit Up!

Thesis: We as Christians need to recognize that we are in a spiritual war for the souls of our family, for ourselves and for our community. We need to suit up! If we don’t suit up and enter the fight we will lose everything! We may not see the war with our natural eyes but it is raging all around us so we need to see with our spiritual eyes and attack the enemy of our soul.

Scripture Text series: Ephesians 6:10-20:

10Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

11Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.

12For 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.

13Therefore 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.

14Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place,

15and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.

16In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.

17Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

18And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints.

19Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel,

20for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.

Key verse of series: Ephesians 6:12 “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 spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”

Introduction to Series:

I established the fact last week that we are in a spiritual war whether we want to admit it or not and we need to suit up to defend our families, our community and even our own souls. Yes, there are spiritual forces of evil seeking to kill, steal and destroy and we the church are the ones God has placed here to stand in their way and to stop them.

Summary of Sermon one:

The first thing I highlighted last week was we wrestle not against flesh and blood so we need to use what God has given us spiritually to fight this war (Verse 10-12)

• We do not have the weapons to defeat this spiritual enemy in the flesh because it is a spiritual battle.

o We need God’s power and strength to win this war for the soul.

• We must use the weapons and equipment provided by the Lord to us for us to win and fight this war.

o We need God’s Wisdom and Revelation Ephesians 1:17.

o We need to suit up with the armor of God Ephesians 6:10-20.

• The other dimension that the Bible warns us about is to make sure we understand who we are fighting against.

o We need to know who our enemy is.

? Good generals will tell you that if you want to defeat your enemy then you need to understand your enemy. You need to learn their tactics and their strategies for doing battle. We should learn this lesson well because Ephesians tells us to take our stand and fight against “The Devil’s Schemes”.

• Satan is a deceiver, a liar.

• He seeks to kill steal and destroy with deception and lies.

• He will come even as an Angel of light to deceive people into thinking he is speaking from God and give direction contrary to the word of God.

o Saddam did this and was used by the enemy this way by saying people who commit terrorist’s acts will be guaranteed a place in heaven.

o Many did this years ago with the Crusades to the Middle East. So much was done under the name of God which was not God.

o The enemy appeared to Christians and deceived them into thinking they were speaking and doing things for God.

o The Crusades got so bad they believed that the Lord told them to send children into battle because they would win but they were annihilated on the way to war.