In the sixth chapter of his letter to the Church at Ephesus, the Apostle Paul makes reference to “the cosmic powers” that are always against us. These powers, writes Paul, are spiritual rulers and spiritual authorities and spiritual forces of evil. They are real. They are unrelenting. They are allies of Satan.
Have you ever seen such a lack of reasonableness in the public square, and in government?
Have you ever seen such confusion about the basic nature of human beings?
Have you ever seen such distrust in the structures of science, education, medicine, and law?
Have you ever seen such delight in wickedness, or such vitriol toward any voice of moral clarity?
Have you ever seen such rapid defection from the claims of Christ?
Have you ever seen such widespread bitterness and anger and rage?
Have you ever seen such chaos on the world stage?
Have you ever seen such rampant disregard for human life?
Have you ever seen such darkness?
I don’t point out these things in order to frighten you, but to make you alert for the present hour. I want to be alert as well. In fact, you and I must be on high alert at all times. That is why we have been instructed to “take up the whole armor of God.” Only soldiers who have been recruited for battle need armor. Such are we.
I know that we live in an enlightened and sophisticated age, an age that seduces us into believing that spiritual forces of evil are ancient relics of primitive peoples who lived long ago. But such is not the case, friends. The Word of God is as true as ever. We must, as the Scriptures remind us, stand firm in the evil day.
What does that mean?
It means that our enemy charges against us, and that we must hold fast. We must not rely upon human resources alone, thus Paul’s clarion admonition. It is we who need God’s holy armor. Without His spiritual protection, you and I are sitting ducks. Per C.S. Lewis: “There is an enemy. He seeks my destruction. And this is war.”
if we realize that absolute evil is mounting here and now on Planet Earth, then how are we to live as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ? This is no time for an attitude of fatalism. It’s no time for shrugging our shoulders and giving up. It’s no time for you and me to be deemed AWOL. No! We must not give up on ourselves. We must not give up on our neighbors. We must not give up on our God. As believers, we are not called to withdraw from the culture or from the fight; instead, we are called to engage like never before! You and I have been enlisted by the One who will never leave us to fight on our own. We have been empowered for a cosmic battle for the hearts and minds and lives of this generation.
The enemy of God and humankind is endeavoring aggressively to destroy our faith, and our families, as well as the faith and families of everyone around us. The devil is actively targeting the next generation unlike anything that we (or our parents, or our grandparents) have ever witnessed. But, while this spiritual war is raging, God has not left us defenseless. The belt of truth is ours! The breastplate of righteousness is ours! The gospel shoes are ours! The shield of faith is ours! The helmet of salvation is ours! The sword of the Spirit is ours in Christ!
So we must not give up.
We battle in prayer. On our knees before the Lord, we find our desperately needed strength and hope and joy. We come clean about our tendency to trust in ourselves, and we exchange our foolish and futile pride for weapons that really work.
We battle in truth. We renew our minds in God’s Word. We refill our tanks with His energy. His clarity. His resourcefulness. His thoughts. His ways. His Word is the light upon which you and I are always dependent. With it, we step forward by faith. With it, defying the darkness, we proclaim the light of the gospel.
We battle in love. In our entire arsenal, there is nothing more powerful than the grace of Christ which has come to us in Him! By Christ’s grace, and in His name, and after His example, and by His all-powerful Spirit, we fight the good fight by loving neighbors and strangers … and even our enemies. We love because we’ve been loved extravagantly.
On September 23, 1779, during the Revolutionary War, the Royal Navy was overwhelming the American battleships. Tattered and torn, and with defeat looming in the air, it did not appear that the Americans had any hope of prevailing on the high seas. But, when the British demanded that John Paul Jones surrender his fleet, he yelled, “I have not yet begun to fight!”
For far higher honor and glory, may the same be true of us.
Pastor Charles
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