Living a Life Worthy of the Calling:

Be Strong in the Lord

Ephesians 6:10-20

Sunday, September 17, 2006

Georgetown Presbyterian Church

Rev. Stephen H. Wilkins

In his preface to that delightful book, The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis says that "there are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves (the demons, that is) are equally pleased by both errors..." Mr. Lewis is right, isn’t he? We really don’t know what to do with talk about the devil, or the demonic, do we?

Some want to dismiss any talk of the devil as irrational jibberish with no basis in reality. Some will laugh at the notion of demons and claim that they are a result of unenlightened minds. The other day I was looking into a religious group that someone had told me about, and the group doesn’t believe in the devil per se, but that the devil is simply a manifestation of all our fears; according to that group, evil is simply the result of ignorance, or our failure to know God who is the perfect good.

Others will go to the opposite extreme. They are those who will claim that every decision we make has in the background a battle between invisible spirits of good and evil. They are the ones who wouldn’t laugh at Flip Wilson’s famous line, "The Devil made me do it," because they believe it to be literally true. Still others go even further. Not only do they acknowledge the existence and the power of Satan, but they even worship him.

I remember back in the late 1980s author Frank Peretti wrote two novels that had spiritual warfare as their central theme. I would credit Peretti’s novels for putting the notion of spiritual warfare back on the forefront of mainstream North American Protestant Christianity. In his novels, Peretti would narrate a scene with human characters, and then he would unveil for us the battles between demons and angels that were going on behind the scene.

And so as we come to this text in the sixth chapter of Ephesians this morning, we run the risk of falling into either of the two traps that C.S. Lewis described--either we raise a skeptical eyebrow concerning the existence of invisible spiritual forces, or we might go overboard and attribute everything we say or do to forces beyond ourselves. The problem with the first alternative is that we take too lightly that which is in all truth a very serious reality; the problem with the second alternative is that we absolve ourselves of all responsibility for our own actions, attributing them instead to spiritual forces beyond our control.

In the midst of the confusion surrounding the contemporary discussion of the demonic, I would like to lift out two things that Paul affirms for us in this morning’s text. The first is the reality of evil that the Christian--and indeed, every person--must face in the world today. The second is the source of the strength by which we can stand in the face of evil.

Paul says, "Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 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 the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." And with that statement Paul reminds us of something of which we are all too aware--that evil is a potent and ever-present enemy that is always ready to attack us.

It doesn’t take much to confirm the conclusion that evil is on the move in our world today. Let me share with you just a few reminders that I encountered this past week.

As we’re all aware, Monday was the fifth anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks on American soil. You simply cannot look at images of the smoke billowing from the twin towers, or the dust racing through the streets of New York City, or the smoldering ruins of the World Trade Center, and deny the reality of evil. The heart-rending tales of family and friends, of rescue workers who were killed in the line of duty, the stories of the heroes who made one of the terrorist crews fail in their mission still bring tears to our eyes today, because they remind us of the very real battle that we fight against the forces of evil. And we both know that the evil behind terrorism is greater than Osama Bin Laden; we’re fooling ourselves if we believe that the elimination of all the top terrorist leaders will eliminate the evil of terrorism.

This past Wednesday at the Men’s Breakfast we heard from Wayne Powell, who is the director of Teen Challenge of South Carolina. Teen Challenge is a wonderful ministry around the world. It exists because of the insidious power of addiction and substance abuse that is so pervasive in our society. Because of our proximity to I-95, which is one of the most active drug corridors in the nation, drugs and addiction are a huge problem in this part of the state. Yet more evidence of the reality of evil.

On Thursday I attended a meeting of the Georgetown Ministerial Association. At that meeting was a woman who has just started a ministry in Pawleys Island called Martha’s House. The preface to the literature that she handed out stated that Martha’s House is named after a woman who "found jail a better home than the streets, her fellow inmates a more loving family than her own. Martha died this summer never realizing she could have a better life." It must be a dark world indeed when a jail is the best home that a woman knows, or her fellow inmates her closest family.

You get the picture, don’t you? Evil is all around us. And it is more than just the sensational things like drugs and crime and terrorism. Evil is behind virtually every form of brokenness that you will encounter. Scratch beneath the surface of abuse in the home, and you will find evil. Scratch beneath the surface of discord in the workplace, and you will find evil. Scratch beneath the surface of pollution in our waterways, and you will find evidence of evil. Scratch beneath the surface of poverty, and you will find many forms of evil.

My friends, evil is everywhere. It’s greater than the people who manifest it. It is a spiritual reality that underlies virtually every problem we encounter. Paul is right: our struggle is not against flesh and blood; it’s against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil...

And it is in the face of this reality that Paul also points us to the source of the strength we need in order to be able to stand. He says, "be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power." Did you hear that? Paul said, "Be strong in the Lord, and in HIS mighty power." Sometimes I wonder if the weariness we may feel against the tide of evil is due to the fact that we’ve tried to face it by ourselves, that somehow forgotten about the power of God at our disposal.

The story is told about two young brothers that were little hellions in their home and school. They gave their parents fits. They gave their teachers fits. They were always getting into trouble, breaking things, getting sent to the principal’s office. One day, at the end of an exceptionally trying day, the father turned to the mother and said, "You know, there’s a new pastor at the church, and he seems to relate well to the young people. Maybe we ought to make an appointment for our two boys to go see him."

So they made the appointment, and they took the children to the church office. The pastor wanted to speak to the boys individually, so he took the younger one into his office, closed the door, and sat the boy in a chair. The pastor then looked directly into the eyes of the boy, and he asked, "Where is God?" The boy shrugged his shoulders and looked down at his feet. The pastor asked again, this time with a little more urgency in his voice, "Where is God?" The boy again said nothing, but he began to feel uncomfortable at where the conversation was headed. The pastor asked a third time, "WHERE IS GOD?" and he pointed directly at the boy.

The boy jumped up from his chair, let out a scream, and dashed out of the office. He kept on running and didn’t stop until he got to his house. He ran up the stairs, into his closet, and locked the door. After his brother and parents caught up, the brother went into the closet with the younger boy, and he asked, "What in the world did the pastor say to you?"

The younger boy replied, "God is missing, and they think we took him!"

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The first time I heard that story was in regard to a talk that a seminary president gave. It led into the question which he asked aloud, "Is God missing from the church?"

It’s a good question. I mentioned to the session the other night that it’s not unusual to detect a weariness within the Christian church. There are probably many reasons for the weariness, including the fact that a small portion of the people are doing the lion’s share of the work. But beyond that, could it also be that God is missing?

Maybe it’s not so much that God is missing, but that we are missing God? In other words, God is not missing, but do you think it could be that we fail to notice him by our side? Do you think that we forget about God, and so our weariness arises because we’re trying to go alone, that we’re trying to do God’s work without God?

Paul says, "be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power..." In this struggle against forces that are beyond flesh and blood, where do you get your strength? You see, how very often it is true that we forget about God, and we fail to seek the power of God to hold us up in the midst of our struggles.

Paul opened the epistle with the prayer that we would come to know God’s "incomparably great power for us who believe... [a power that] is like the working of his mighty strength..." And now, at the end of the letter, Paul reminds us that it is not enough simply to know about God’s power, but to seek it, as well. We live in a world that proclaims that God helps those who help themselves, when in reality precisely the opposite is true: God is in the business of helping those who cannot help themselves. In this battle against the spiritual forces of darkness, it is not you or your strength that will prevail; nor is it I or my strength that will prevail. It is only by the power and strength of God Almighty, working in us and through us, that we will be able to stand in the end.

Look at what Paul says. Whose armor is it that we are to wear? It’s the armor of God! Our strength will be found when we are girded up in God’s truth, when we are shielded by faith in God, when it is the righteousness of God and his salvation that cover our heart and our mind. It is by the strength and power of God that we are made able to withstand the onslaught of evil, and in the end, to stand.

It think it worth pointing out that virtually all the armor is defensive in nature. Even our use of prayer is seeking God’s protection against the onslaught of evil. The lone exception is the sword. The sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Paul is referring to more than scripture as the word of God. The word that Paul uses here means "utterance", or "proclamation." The only weapon that we have as an offensive response to evil is the proclamation, the utterance of God’s word to the world.

And God’s word to the world is that evil does not have the upper hand.

God’s word to the world is a word of love, and compassion, and mercy.

God’s word to the world is that evil has already been defeated by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. "Where, O death is your victory? Where, O death is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!"

Speak the word of God to the world. Enact the word of God to the world. Live the word of God in the world.

In just a few moments we will sing our closing hymn, "Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus." Take a close look at the third verse: "Stand up, stand up for Jesus, stand in his strength alone; the arm of flesh will fail you, ye dare not trust your own. Put on the gospel armor, each piece put on with prayer; where duty calls or danger, be never wanting there."

It is a dark, evil world. Satan is real, as are his legions. But God gives us the wherewithal to stand against anything that the devil throws our way. God gives us his armor.

Even better, God gives us himself.

Live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be strong in the Lord, and in his mighty power.

Amen.