When I was first asked to speak before communion at church I honestly didn’t really want to. It wasn’t the public speaking that I had a problem with. I just didn’t know what I was supposed to say and didn’t really take it all too seriously. But in time that changed drastically. Now I spend a great deal of my time studying the Bible and thinking about what to say.
I have two lists of ideas to speak about. I write down things that inspire me for bible readings and commentaries. In fact this book started out as a list of ideas to teach my local church about what I have been learning about the spiritual battle ground all around us.
I now take the responsibility to teach very seriously. I spend a lot of time preparing for it. I apologize to those that heard me in the past when I didn’t do what I was supposed to do in teaching. James says that I will be judged by God for that. I am try to do the best that I can. Some I will get stuff wrong but I am listening to the guidance of the Holy Spirit the best I can and practicing to get better at that.
The whole armor of God
We are all soldiers in God’s army. Our battle field is not in flesh and blood. It’s a spiritual war. I want to make it clear that I’m not calling for violence. Violence is the weapon of our enemy. Jesus didn’t call down legislations of angels after his arrest. He didn’t strike them down with lightning. He did the opposite. In fact He told Peter to put away his sword and not fight the people that way.
So how are we supposed to fight this special war. Well every soldiers in the us has a different job. (Show a picture of an infinity man, a mechanic and a cook) Likewise we are all given gifts to fight with. For some of us our sword is to teach, others it to be a preacher. Some it to sing, and still others it’s to visit the sick. We MUST learn to use our gifts and wealth them agent the enemy as weapon. I can teach but I like the ability to have the compassionate counseling of a preacher. I can cook but I don’t have the skills to cook for a hole church of people and organizations a meal like that. I can sing but Jane would be the only that would like that because she can turn her hearing aids off.
Our goal in this spiritual war is not to inflict casualties. The church has a long history of that unfortunately. Our mission is to follow our leaders like Paul, Is jonah and especially Jesus. They fight the evil one and the false gods by leading people away from them and to God.
One of the things that all soldiers learned is who there enemies are and the tactics they use. But most importantly how to overcome those tactics and triumph. I feel that God has been leading me to among other things help prepare you and my self for spiritual battle. I have been spending a lot of time learning and praying about this over the last few years, now I feel it is time to start teaching more.
You think that Chris preaches long series. His first year he did only series. Well that was him doing it almost every Sunday. I only get a chance to teach once every 6 weeks or so and I may have written a short book. So buckle up, we are going to be on this journey with God for a long while.
But first I want you to know that Jesus has already won for us. If we stick with Him we can not be defeated. Our job is to use our gifts to go out and save as many people from the enemy as we can. But it’s not us that doesn’t the saving we just bring them to the one that does. Like a field medic bring an wounded soldier to a surgeon.
The belt of truth
John 14 (boy scout belt skit)
As we get ready for our spiritual battle we must get dressed in the whole armor of God. The first piece of this is the belt of truth. Now this is a physical belt that Indiana Jones can go looking for or something like Wonder Woman’s laso of truth. This is God’s truth that we rape around ourselves and helps to hold the rest of the armor together.
What is God’s truth? It is that Jesus is the son of God. He came to concern of the darkness, he has defend Satan and the other demons and has concord death. He hid this not through violence or force. He did it through submitting to the Father’s will. He offered himself a sin sacrifice so that we can be washed clean of our sins with his blood.
Inorder to stand against the enemy we must understand and seround ourselves with the truth that Jesus is God and throw his death and resection He has gand His victory. And though His victory we can be victorious too.
We can not defeat domains or death on our own. No one else can either. So when we rape around use His truth around us and let it be holding us together we can share in His victory but if we just hold the belt of truth and don’t let it be part of our life we will only know the truth and not be living by it.
The best peace of righteousness
Seeing the record straight
The books of the Torah were written by Moses when the Hebrew people were wandering in the wilderness. When they were in Egypt for 430 years they had become very Egyptian. They worship the gods of Egypt. If you don’t believe me Moses said it himself when he asked the burning bush which God He was.
Before they Egypt they had seen how God defended both the Egyptians and their gods. But then when times got tough they didn’t turn to God they whatever to go back. When they got to the promised land all but 2 whatever to give up and turn back and become slaves again.
God then made them wander through the desert until they learned. He had to teach them to how to be a set apart people that could not only leaf the world tourists God but also lead to the musical.
In order to do this He had Moses write the Torah. One of the thing the Torah does is to correct the pagan mythology and show how God is the only true God and the only one worth worshiping.
Genius and Exodus start with God creating everything and ruining over it. Then it shows how man falls and God turns them and the earth over to their wickedness and allows the falls gods to rule over them. The Exodus culminates with God calling his people to have a relationship with Him.
He does this by concurring and humiliating the false gods they worship and then teaching them how to become more like God.
The same Thing is true for us. Through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross Satan was defeated. Now He calls us to stop being like the world and to work everyday to be more Crist like.
Creation myths
All cultures have creation stories. The American culture is no different. This stories become part of the story of every person. If you were from Athens you thought your ancestors were created by Athena inorder to worship her. In Rome they thought they were descended from Romulus and Remes. Most Americans think they evolved from pond scum and monkeys.
The Church “forcefully and specifically exhorts all the Christian faithful. . . to learn the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ, by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures. Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.