Returning this evening to the book of Ephesians chapter number six, we welcome you, glad to see you in the house of God. And so we're in Ephesians chapter six, we'll come into the chapter, the verse number 10, Paul's closing out his letter to the believers, the Christians in the city of Ephesus. And he writes these words, finally, my brethren, Be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. 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. take on to you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the hamlet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all sins. And for me, that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in bonds, that therein I may speak boldly as I ought to speak. We'll conclude our reading at the verse number 20 of Ephesians chapter 6. The Christian depicted as a soldier is one that the Apostle Paul comes to repeatedly write about in his epistles. Now, that makes perfect sense whenever you consider that the Apostle Paul spent quite a bit of his time interacting with the military forces off the Roman Empire. In Acts chapter 21, we find that it was Roman soldiers who rescued Paul from the mob there in the city of Jerusalem. He would be later escorted by Roman soldiers to the seaport of Caesarea for his own protection in Acts chapter 23. Whereas in Acts chapter 28, the centurion Julius gave custody of Paul to the captain of the guard who was most likely the commander of the Patorian guard. These interactions with the occupying forces of the Roman Empire would have meant that the apostle Paul was very familiar not only with the duties of a soldier, but also the dress, as in the form of armor and weaponry, of the Roman soldiers. And thus, the Apostle Paul comes to use imagery and also terminology connected with a soldier repeatedly when he comes to write his various epistles. For example, he speaks about the trumpet or the bugle in 1 Corinthians chapter 14, verse 8. For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to battle. It's a military term. The military bugle was used to, as it were, rally, muster, I think is the term, muster the troops in order to prepare them for the battle. And if that bugle or that trumpet sounded an uncertain sound, then the soldiers would have been in disarray with regard to what they were to do. and when they were to prepare themselves. In the book of Philemon, Paul includes in his greetings, a greeting to a man called Archipicus. He describes him as our fellow soldier. And that same terminology is used in Philippians 2, verse 25. Epaphroditus, he is given that exact same title. He is called a fellow soldier. In 1 Corinthians 9 verse 7, Paul asks the question, who goeth to warfare at any time at his own charges? While when he wrote to Timothy, Paul encouraged his understudy and his son in the faith to be a good soldier of Jesus Christ. 2 Timothy 2, verses 3 and 4. Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that woreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. As Paul comes to write his final letter, 2 Timothy, he spoke about himself as someone who had fought a good fight. I have fought a good fight. I have finished the course. is a book in the New Testament where military terminology and imagery is very much to the fore of the penman's mind. Why such an emphasis, you may ask, with regard to this epistle on all things military? Well, the book of Ephesians, as you may well know, is one of Paul's prison epistles. This was one of the letters that he wrote whenever he found himself under house arrest he didn't sit down and pity himself and say poor old me but Paul and redeemed the time we thought about that last Wednesday evening about redeeming our time as good stewards we have been entrusted with time and we are to redeem our time and Paul redeemed his time even when he found himself in prison and so he uses that time to write letters epistles to certain churches and the letter that he writes to the saints in ephesus is one such prison epistle and paul speaks of himself as being a prisoner if you look there at the chapter 3 and the opening verse we read there for this cause i paul the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles. Chapter 4, verse 1, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called. And in this chapter, in the verse number 20, he speaks about being in bonds, an ambassador in bonds, or the word is chains, for which I am an ambassador in bonds. For the gospel's sake, Paul found himself in prison and so as a prisoner Paul would have been and would have had many an opportunity to see and also to converse with Roman military personnel. And so tonight we're going to consider in this meeting the Christian as a soldier as we continue to think about our Christian identity. Now the word of God has a lot to say about this particular subject matter, and so we're not going to get through everything tonight. God willing, next week I'll remind you of some things that I've said before regarding the qualities of a good soldier of Jesus Christ and the qualities that a soldier ought to possess. But tonight we want to consider some other matters as we think about ourselves as being soldiers of Jesus Christ. I want to think first of all about the soldier's enlistment, the soldier's enlistment. How does one become a soldier in God's army? Well, the simple answer is we must enlist. We must enlist. Only by enlisting can we become soldiers in the army of God. And that is what happens whenever we come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Our salvation automatically leads to our enlistment into the ranks of God's army. Salvation, redemption automatically leads to our enlistment into God's army. And that is beautifully pictured for us with regard to the children of Israel in the book of Exodus. Remember those individuals who were there for many years under oppression. And in the house of bondage, they were slaves to their Egyptian capturers and those who were over them. But no sooner had they been delivered, no sooner had they been redeemed, no sooner had they been saved from the house of bondage that they find themselves fighting in a battle, Exodus chapter 17. They fought in the battle in the valley with Joshua leading the troops in the valley and Moses and her and Aaron standing with him on the mountainside. And so these former slaves, now redeemed, have now automatically become soldiers. That's a natural progression. Redemption leads to the enlistment into the army of God. And we who were once slaves to Satan, and we who were once enslaved to our sin, are now soldiers in the army of the King of Kings, having been redeemed from sin's bondage and from Satan's slavery. Now in today's world, whenever a soldier joins an army, they must deny any previous allegiance that they've had to another army or to another country. You can only serve as a soldier in one army at a time. And so it is whenever you join the army of God, we have to renounce our allegiance to sin and to the kingdom of Satan. And that is done by our repentance. Repentance being that inward change of mind that results in an outward change of life when we turn from sin to God and on to righteousness. And so repentance results in a change of allegiance from the kingdom of Satan to the kingdom of God. We are delivered from the power of darkness and we are translated into the kingdom of God's dear Son. And so our repentance and our redemption leads to our induction into God's army. I trust that everyone here and all who are watching and all who are listening in have been, as it were, to God's recruiting office to sign up as a soldier in God's army. I trust that we've all renounced our allegiance to sin and to Satan and we've come to enlist ourselves by faith under the bloodstained banner of the cross. You see, the Christian in some way is a turncoat. I'm sure you've heard that statement before, someone who is a turncoat. Someone who's a turncoat is someone who switches side and changes allegiance. Well, the Christian is a turncoat because having been born a sinner and being a child of wrath, we have come by the new birth to switch allegiance and to side with Christ in salvation. having redeemed us from sin and from Satan and from death, God has enlisted us as soldiers in his army, calling us to wage warfare against the enemy until his son returns for us from heaven or death, calls us to lay down our swords, and then for us to pick up the palm of victory in heaven and in glory itself. We have been enlisted. into God's army. It is the army of the Lord of hosts, the King of kings, the all-conquering Christ who goes forth to conquer and to conquer. And so we have been As we read this evening, we have been chosen. We have been chosen by God with regard to salvation, and we have been chosen to be a good soldier of Jesus Christ. God has chosen us. That's what we read in 2 Timothy. That he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. We are chosen ones, and we have been chosen to become. an individual who belongs to the army of God. And so that is the soldier's enlistment. Consider secondly, then, the soldier's enemy. The soldier's enemy. Today, soldiers in the British army are sent by the king to face down the aggressor and the enemy. And as soldiers of Jesus Christ, we have a foe to face in this world, the God of this world. the prince of the power of the air, the wicked one, the father of lies, Beelzebub, Abaddon, Apollogon, the accuser of the brethren, son of the morning, Lucifer, the old serpent, The devil, Satan, these are just some of the names that are given to the adversary that we have to contend with on a daily basis. But not only do we contend with him, but we also have to wage war with the world and with the flesh. And so the Christian soldier is being attacked from at least three different sides. I put in three different quarters, but you can't have three different quarters, I don't think. Three different thirds, possibly. But then I thought about another quarter in which we are attacked. And sadly, brethren and sisters, we can be attacked from a fourth quarter because we can be attacked from those inside the church of Jesus Christ. and within the family of God. And those attacks can inflict some of the deepest wounds on a Christian soldier. The Savior himself experienced such a wounding. We read about that in the prophecy of Zechariah chapter 13 in the verse 6, and one shall say unto him, what are these wounds in thine hands? And he shall answer, those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends. It's sad whenever God's soldiers start to fight among themselves. What victory will be secured by an infighting army? None. And yet sadly, sometimes we're badly wounded. We're badly wounded by those within the family of God. Oh, may we not be engaged in such wounding. And so Satan can attack us. Can I say that he can attack us physically? That is on the permission of God. I need to add that little caveat. Is that not what happened when it came to that righteous God-fearing man, Job? The devil inflicted bodily sickness on Job in the form of boils. We're told in Job 2 verse 7 that Satan went forth from the presence of God the Lord and smoked Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot onto his crown. In Luke chapter 18, we meet a woman who for 18 years was inflicted with a physical ailment that led to her being, we would talk about being bent over double. What did Jesus say about that woman? He said this, he said, Satan hath bound, speaking about that woman, Satan hath bound though these 18 years. The Savior said that. And then Paul, he spoke about his thorn in the flesh. And how did he describe it? He described his thorn in the flesh that many believe was a physical ailment as being a messenger of Satan. sent to buffet him, lest he should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations that was given unto him. You know, there can be times when sickness can be traced back to the enemy of the child of God. Now, that's not to say that all sickness is from the devil, but at least in these three specific cases, we see the enemy's hand in afflicting sickness on the bodies of human beings. It cannot be denied. He did it for Job, he did it with regard to this woman, the Savior said, and he did it with regard to the Apostle Paul. And so God can attack the child of God physically, he can attack the child of God mentally. The mind is the great battleground in which many a skirmish between the Christian and the devil is had. It's no wonder then that Peter writes in 1 Peter 1, verse 18, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober and hope to the end for the grace that is brought onto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. You know, at times the devil can come to the mind of the Christian and can make the Christian paranoid. Have you ever experienced that in your life? Make you paranoid. I tell you ministers are the most paranoid people that you'll ever meet on this face of the earth. They are the most paranoid people. They see people talking. What are they talking about? Who are they talking about? Are they talking about me? Paranoid. And I believe that that is one way that Satan can come. Are the people talking about me? Are the people scheming behind my back? At other times he causes the mind to be depressed. All is doom and gloom. God is dead. We may as well lock ourselves in the bedroom and never go out again and do nothing for God. We can attack the mind. We need to be careful with regard to our minds. Make sure that they're girded up and protected. We seek God's protection. And then he deals with us. He attacks us spiritually. You know, it really isn't physical warfare that we're engaged in. Paul writes here about this warfare, we wrestle not against flesh and blood. This isn't, as it were, we're going down the street to pick a fight with someone, but rather our battle, our warfare is against principalities, things unseen, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of the world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. The devil, you know, is good at sowing seeds of doubt and fear and mistrust in our hearts and minds. He loves to cause disunity and division within the body of Christ. As I said, he's good at making us paranoid and suspicious of other believers, and he's quite happy whenever we isolate ourselves from others who belong to the household of faith, either by getting us to think that we are spiritually superior to people and we don't need their fellowship and we don't need their encouragement or to think that we are spiritually inferior to them and therefore that we have no right to the blessings and the privileges that the other children of God enjoy or possess. Oh, my dear friend, let us not be ignorant of Satan's devices. Let's be sober. Let's be vigilant. Let's be on our guard, knowing that we have an adversary who goes about seeking whom he may devour. He wants to put us out of the battle. He wants to disable us, to wound us in such a way that we just give up. But we're not to do that, brethren and sisters. The third consideration to think about, not only our enlistment and not only the soldier's enemy, but what about the soldier's enablement? The soldier's enablement. To meet such a formidable foe as the devil in her own strength would be foolish, naive, and unwise on our part. And as for the world and the flesh. Well, there are no lesser enemies for the child of God that we have to face. And again, we can never know victory over such things and such enemies in our own strength. However, the Christian soldier does not need to face the foe in their own strength. They can be enabled and, thank God, empowered by God to withstand and conquer over every foe that comes against them. And this is why Paul writes in Ephesians chapter 6 in the verse number 10, Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. We must face the enemy not in our own strength or power, but in the strength and in the power of God. And this is what Paul comes to highlight at the very commencement of his exhortation with regard to warfare for the Christian. The apostle Paul reminds us that it is only through Christ that we can hope for victory over the foe who seeks our downfall. And thank God, child of God, we can be more than conquerors through Him that loved us. That's what the Scripture says. It is God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. The child of God can do all things through Christ which strengthens them, including securing victory over their enemies. You see, we must remember, child of God, that we're not fighting for victory, we're fighting from victory. From victory. The victory of Christ. the victory that Christ secured by His death upon the cross. And so by faith we can say with the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 2 verse 14, now thanks be unto God which always causes us to triumph in Christ. Christ has triumphed and He has secured the spoils of battle. Isaiah 53 verse 12, Speaking of the Messiah, therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he hath poured out his soul unto death, and he was numbered with the transgression, and he bared the sin of many, and he made intercession for the transgressors. A spoil was won by Christ at the cross. That spoil was given to Him, and as a result of our union with Jesus Christ, we come to share in the victory of the cross. We come to stand into that victory, and we enjoy the spoils that He has won on our behalf. His victory over our enemies is our victory, child of God. And the spoils that He won is our spoils. We are joint heirs with Jesus Christ and what is His is ours through our union with Jesus Christ and thereby we are enabled and we can be enabled to face down the foe. What about the soldier's equipment? I went through every piece of the armor of God in this church. I've been nowhere else, so that's where it's been. We went through Ephesians chapter 6. So I don't have time this evening, and I don't intend to go into depth on each piece of the armor tonight. But needless to say, God does not send his soldiers into the battle ill-equipped. Whenever the British troops were sent into Iraq the second time, They were sent into that arena of battle without proper protection against chemical or biological weapons. Soldiers were issued with dangerously ill-fitting protective suits and respirators and detection alarms that did not work. Thousands of troops went in without desert clothing and even the proper boots. and life-saving body armor, while hundreds of machine guns and grenade launchers ordered in a hurry arrived too late for them. They went in ill-equipped, and it was all down to the government and those who were over them. But child of God, the Christian soldier is not left with deficient armor or weaponry to defend themselves on the field of battle. God has furnished His soldiers with the best of equipment. Now, we don't use literal weapons to fight the Lord's battles. Our warfare, as I've said, is spiritual, and so our weaponry is spiritual too. Paul reminds us of that in 2 Corinthians 10 verse 4, that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but are mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. So then what does he provide for his soldiers as they go forth to war? Well, he gives to those who have enlisted into his armor, he has given to them the girdle of truth. God's revealed truth, whenever properly understood and sincerely believed. and applied to the life is like a belt, a girdle for the believer. It holds everything together, the truth. Truth holds it all together. Now, as a father of lies, Satan's lies, they must be refuted by what? The truth. You see, all of these pieces of weaponry and all of these pieces of armor are used to counteract the attack of the devil. And the devil is the father of lies, and so how do we counteract lies? We proclaim the truth, the gospel of truth, the truth of God's word. And so God has given us the girdle of truth to answer the lies of the devil. Secondly, there is the breastplate of righteousness. The breastplate of righteousness, verse number 14. Now that righteousness is Christ's righteousness. And the devil attacks. And how does he attack us? How has he attacked you? Maybe this weak child of God. I'll tell you how he's attacked you. He's attacked you in a way that has caused you to doubt your salvation. Or maybe he has reminded you of past sins. Or maybe he has shown you your failures. Maybe he's accused you whenever you have sinned against God. But the breastplate of righteousness protects us against his accusations, because by that, as we look at the righteousness of Christ that we're now clothed in, we are now reminded that our acceptance with God is founded on the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Christ's righteousness answers all the accusations off the devil. Now, that does not mean that we are to sin. And just to simply say, well, I'm clothed in the righteousness of Christ, I'll just live any way I like. No, the one who is clothed in righteousness will live righteously and will seek after righteousness. And so we have the breastplate of righteousness. It answers the accusations of the devil with regard to our standing and our acceptance with God. Our acceptance with God is not in our performance, but rather it is on the basis of the righteousness of Jesus Christ. There are the shoes of peace. What is Satan? Is Satan not the great disturber? Is Satan not the great troubler? Is he not the great agitator? Those who have been justified by faith, thank God we have peace with God. And so we go forth publishing the gospel of peace to a world that is in turmoil, to a world that lieth in the lap of the wicked one. A world that is like the troubled sea, that cannot rest. And so these shoes, they represent a readiness, a quickness, a sure-footedness to respond to the devil's subtle attacks. The shield of faith, the only way to quench the fiery darts of the devil, whether those be the darts of doubt or fear or lust or temptation. Our evil thoughts is by taking up the shield of faith. Faith means applying what we believe as an answer to the devil's attacks. And holding up the shield of faith reminds ourselves of God's character and of God's promises. We're relying on God's grace in Christ, clinging to God in our weakness. Then there is the helmet of salvation. As I've said, many of Satan's attacks are towards the mind of the believer. But God has given to us a hemlet of salvation to protect the mind from confusion, despair, error that the devil would want to attack our minds with. And this hemlet also speaks about the hope of salvation, which lies ahead for the child of God. You know, the Christian soldier should keep that hope before them as they fight the Lord's battles. It'll enable us to continue to stand the heat of the battle, knowing that soon the battle will be over, that the crown will be won, the hope of salvation. What lies ahead for us in the whole bundle of salvation? Not just our redemption, but also our glorification. The hope of salvation. What lies ahead of us? Soldier of Christ, heaven. And so we are to fight and battle on. And then there is the sword of the spirit. By the word of God, we can repel the devil, just as the son of God did whenever he was tempted in the wilderness. Remember on each occasion how God answered the devil with that three-worded phrase, it is written. O brother, sister, do not underestimate the power of God's Word. Hide it in your heart. Wield it with confidence. It can cut chunks out of the devil and all of his enemies. Child of God, fight despondency and despair by wielding the sword of the Spirit. Child of God, slay your sins and lusts. by wielding the sword of the spirit. Child of God, drive out unbelief and faithlessness by wielding the sword of the spirit. Child of God, enter into the blessings and the privileges of the child of God by wielding the sword of the spirit. Get to know the promises and get to claim them. Oh, let us keep our armor bright. keeping every part free from dust and spoil and impurity. One last thought for this evening, the soldier's entanglement. Paul warned Timothy, I've read it before in this message, 2 Timothy 2 verse 4, no man that woreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a good soldier. The soldier in the battlefield, and not allow themselves to be distracted with other affairs. Because if they are, they'll be certainly wounded if not killed. Such would be fatal. And so the Christian soldier must be wary of anything that would distract or divert the mind from the task at hand. Matthew Henry said, if we have given up ourselves to be Christ's soldiers, we must sit loose to this world. Now undoubtedly there are legitimate affairs that we need to attend to in our lives, education, family, employment. However, we must be on our guard that we do not become entangled in such things that they come to restrict our engagement in the things of God and in the work of God. We shouldn't be so engrossed in education or in employment or in family life that we then simply set aside the things of God and the work of God. That comes well down on the list of priorities. We're not to become entangled with the affairs of this life. It doesn't say that we're not to be concerned about them. It's not that we are to forget about them and live without even considering them, but really the statement, the word is to become entangled, to become ensnared, so ensnared that we're not free to do anything else. Oh, how many of God's people have allowed the world to entangle them. Oh, let us hold loosely to the things of the world. You know, folks, it would do no harm, do no harm, now and again, just to do a little stalk take and see if there'd be anything in our lives that is making an incursion into our lives that hinders us from spending time with the Lord that we once spent. With regard to those things, with regard to being involved in the work of God and in the ministry of the local church. You just do a little stock check now and again to make sure that there's nothing making an incursion, encroaching in, stealing from us the time that we once gave to the Lord. Things that maybe just need to be checked, a reassessment, a reprioritizing. a rebalancing that needs to take place, or that I would not get entangled in the affairs of this life, holding loosely to all that we hold to even in this world, because someday we'll have to leave it all behind. And all that waits for us in heaven is that which we have laid up there. as we have served and as we have lived for Jesus Christ. God willing, next week we'll think, as I've said, about the qualities. God willing. about the qualities that a good soldier should possess. But I trust that what we've said in this Bible study will have been instructful and that it will also have been insightful to you as a soldier of Jesus Christ and as one who has come to enlist under the bloodstained banner of the cross. May God help us to be good soldiers of Jesus Christ. Let's bow our heads in prayer together. Thank you for listening. Our loving Father, we come now to Thee. We recognize, Lord, that at times the battle is hard and fierce. Lord, we understand that we cannot face the foe, such is the enemy. We cannot face the foe in our own strength, but we rejoice that we do not need to do so. We can stand into the victory of Christ. We can claim his victory as ours. And Lord, we rejoice that through him we can be more than conquerors. Help, Lord, us as thy people. Help us as an army to go forth together, unitedly, Lord, into the kingdom of darkness, treading the enemy down. And Lord, seeing, Lord, the kingdom of Satan, Lord, retreat and Christ's kingdom advance. We rejoice, dear God, that that is happening for the promises that Christ will build his church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. It's the evidence, O God, that the church is marching on. We praise thee across the land and across the nations. God's work is going on. God is saving souls. And God is working. Lord, work in our midst, we pray. And grant, dear Father, Lord, courage among us, Lord, we pray. For we offer prayer in and through the Savior's precious and worthy name.