Spiritual Warfare- Your Weapon of Choice

In the medieval days, knights were given swords, those who had proven skill with bows were given bows and a quiver full of arrows, and then there were weapons such as maces, clubs, crossbows, and different swords; each used for different things. In modern times, different types of weapons (grenades, sniper rifles, machine guns, pistols) are given to different soldiers according to their rank and purpose. I don’t know the ins-and-outs of weapons, but I know that shotguns are big strong guns, but they are extremely loud. I also know that sniper rifles are big strong guns, but they are quieter. So you wouldn’t use a shotgun if your mission required stealth, right? In this article, we will focus mainly on what each weapon does; that way, we can be better equipped when it comes time to select and use a weapon.

     

More than likely, you knew everything I just said (and may even be pointing out technical flaws), and you may be wondering just how that relates to the Bible. The Bible is the ultimate armory for spiritual warfare. Look at Hebrews 4:12. I’m not typing out the verse here for a reason, so go and grab your Bible if you didn’t when I just asked you to look up Hebrews 4:12. Now, once you’ve read the verse, fan through the pages of your Bible, not necessarily reading anything, but just noticing the words in it. Think of the Bible as an armory with different weapons in it. Whenever we face a trial, it is like we have been ambushed by the enemy. Which weapon are you going to pull out at that point?

     

When I talk of the different weapons, I mean a verse or a passage that will help you fight the temptation, along with prayer. Did you see all of those pages in your Bible when you (if you) flipped through your Bible? Well, we have a lot of options, so how do we choose?* Just to illustrate my answer to this question, read this illustration:

     

A man walks through the jungle, on guard duty during the Vietnam War. He has two pistols, a grenade, and a knife strapped to his belt and a rifle strapped to his back. He is suddenly ambushed. What does he do? Well, he has several options, and none of them are really “better” than the other.

     

Despite all of his weapons, I’m going to say that he basically has three options:

1. Fight

2. Call for help

3. Both

     

In the article entitled “Spiritual Warfare-Making Allies”, we will talk a bit more about these options, and how we should handle it. For now, just imagine that he chose to fight instead of option two or three. You’re probably scrolling down on your computer or iPad to see how much longer this article is*. Not much longer. Did you catch what I was trying to say with that illustration? No weapon is “better” than another, but I’m going to leave you with a cliff hanger here and say that how we choose our weapon is based on three things:

1. Where you are in your battle

2. What weapon the enemy is using

3. What each weapon does

*Please note that not all passages will apply to us or at least not to where we are in life, but most are applicable in different situations.

*I do that too J

Spiritual Warfare

     Our hearts are the biggest battleground ever. The battle going on there is not between Axis and Allies, but it is a spiritual battle between God and Satan. In the next several articles, I just want you to picture this as a real battle, because even though we cannot see it, it is more real and more important than any war ever fought on earth. I’m just going to run through and give you a quick run-down on the topics of my next few blog articles.

Spiritual Warfare-Your Weapon of Choice

     We are blessed with an entire armory full of weapons for any situation; the Bible. None are necessarily “better” than the others, but it all depends on what you need at that moment. We will just do a quick overview of your weapon choices and other “add-ons”.

Spiritual Warfare-Knowing Your Weapon

     In this article, we’ll look at how to use each one effectively and at the right times. We’ll also have some practical examples of how to use the weapons, and look at what weapons work best in whatever situation you may be in right now.

Spiritual Warfare-Knowing Your Enemy

     We don’t even need a spy to figure out our enemy’s plans, because we have a book of all of his tactics, weapons, and how he uses his tools. With this, we can know how to counter him using our tools.

Spiritual Warfare-Making Allies

     If you are a Christian, the commander of your army is God, and your fellow infantry men (and women) are other Christians, but you have to make close allies, and this means accountability partners, Bible study groups, and the like, which help you in your spiritual fight.

Spiritual Warfare-Fighting the Battle

     How many years old are you? Well your battle has been going on for that long. But how well are you doing in your battle? It won’t be over until you die. So how do we effectively use the tools we have to fight the battle?

     This five-part series will hopefully put a slight dent in the issue of spiritual warfare. The literal sense of warfare helps us picture this a bit more practically, and that is why I have chosen that form. 

Character Qualities of a Christian- Faith

I like starting off my articles with simple questions that turn out to be not so simple, so I mustn’t stop now. What is faith? These three words have challenged me recently to discover the answer to this seemingly simple question. Jim Cymbala describes faith as “total dependence upon God that becomes supernatural in its working”¹. Just to give you a couple visuals, think of faith as an invisible bridge over a canyon that you must leap out onto. If you take that leap, that is faith. For me, it’d take a whole lot of faith to jump out of a plane in the sport known as skydiving. I’d be trusting the guide who was with me, but more importantly the parachute holding me up.

            The popular band Kutless released a song in 2011 called “What Faith Can Do”, and it is just a vivid description of the power of faith. That is just one example of many, many songs written about faith, and even in secular circles, the word and concept of faith is popular. Everybody has faith in something, in fact, we often have faith without even knowing it. Imagine you are out running and get a painful cramp, so you decide to sit down for a moment on a park bench. Stop. Did you see what you just did? You didn’t even examine the park bench to make sure that it was assembled correctly, with every screw in the correct place, you just plopped down on it. Pastor Johnny Aseltine uses this equation to describe faith: faith=dependence.

            Open up your Bible to Hebrews 11, a popular place of reference when talking about faith, but I just want to look two verses here, the first being verse 6. Hebrews 11:6 says “But without faith it is impossible to pleas Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” The second is Hebrew 11:1, “How faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” The word ‘substance’ can be used interchangeably in this instance with the word ‘realization’. Realization, in its most basic form is basically the process of something becoming real. So faith is what makes hopes become reality. The second half of that verse is interesting as well. Faith is the ‘evidence’ or ‘confidence’ of things not seen. So faith fills us with confidence about things that are not seen, such as God, although His work is very evident.

            Before moving forward, let’s just take a second and look back over what all that information that I just threw at you was. Let’s just make a small list here:

Faith is _______.

1. Total dependence

2. What makes hopes become reality

3. What gives us confidence about things that cannot be seen

            There you go, that’s my rambling condensed into three points. Now if I can just have two more minutes of your time, I would just like to expand on something I mentioned previously. Everyone has faith in something. Like sitting on a park bench and depending on it not to crumble underneath you, faith in God renders you powerless. Your life is like the control room of a rocket, someone has to be in control. Faith is when we surrender ever button, lever, joystick, and control to God. It doesn’t take a lot of faith to ride in a car with someone else driving, especially if they’re experienced, so… NEWS FLASH! God has way more experience with the controls of lives than any person could possibly have driving a car. When we ride in a car with someone else driving, our temporal/earthly lives are in their hands, but when we let God have the controls, our eternal lives are in his hands. So why is it so hard to have faith in Him?

            Staying with the car idea, imagine that the driver of the car that you are in is speeding and the cop stops you and writes the speeding ticket out. Is he going to give the ticket to you or the driver? The driver gets it, of course, because the driver of a car is responsible for any illegal actions. Well, let me tell you, everyone is going to be given something even worse than a speeding ticket… death. We all will have to pay the price, so are you going to let God be the driver and pay that price for you, or are you going to try to take the price by yourself? As Christians, we need to be totally depending on God for everything we need. So who’s driving your car?

¹ Fresh Faith, Jim Cymbala (1999) page 16