Saturday, March 28, 2009

ABOVE ALL (ARMOR OF GOD Cont.)


Eph 6:16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.

Now, we come to the piece of armor that Paul says we need to take above everything else, the shield of faith.

Two basic questions:

"What is a shield used for?"

And

"What is faith?"

Well, a shield blocks incoming arrows. Paul calls them the fiery darts of the wicked. Satan and his minions are constantly throwing their fiery darts at us: Lust, Greed, Anger, Bitterness, Unforgiveness, Disease, Hatred, Ungodliness, Doubt, Deception, and you name it, it is coming at us. Anything that will separate us from the center of God's will and fellowship with Christ, they are going to hurl at us to keep us from living up to our God-given potential and high calling in Christ. So, how do we overcome?

That is where faith comes in. 1 John 5:4 states, "For whatever is born of God, overcomes the world. And this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith." Faith simply is believing in something we can't yet see, because we know that we soon will see it. Hebrews 11:1 says, "Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." The great Preacher Manley Beasley used to say that faith was not praying God give me, but God open my eyes to see that I already have it! True faith is seeing what is not their, as if it is there, because it is there!

AND THAT IS EXACTLY HOW WE ARE TO LIVE OUR LIVES!

When it comes to prayer - pray in faith. If it's a genuine and true need, God's already promised to supply it, so believe that it is already on the way.

When it comes to temptation, believe you're going to escape it, and start looking for the way of escape that God promises in 1 Corinthians 10:13 that he would supply!

When it comes to trials and tribulations, start believing to see the good that God has promised to work in it. And in doing so, we will overcome the world, and quench all the fiery darts that our enemy has to throw our way!

This week, let's walk by faith and not by sight. Let us live life to the fullest by faith in Christ!

2 comments:

Colvin5776 said...

As I read this, I was reminded about the Roman Army. One of there tacktics was they would use the sheild in such a way that the person behind you would put there sheild over your head, and would make a unbrakeable defence...like a turtle shell.

We need to have faith...but how much more do we need the faith of others that we are around.

In fact one of the neatest storys of Jesus is when he healed a little girl...it said that the people told jesus it was to late....and Jesus told them to get out of the room. Many times we are hindered by the lack of faith in other peoples lives.

Also I thought of something else...as a person would train with his sword and sheild...I am sure it would have been terifing when faced with an attack of Arrows....but when you use your sheild and you are protected....I am sure that would boost your confidence and encorage you to keep on fighting!

In the same way our faith must be used...we must faithfully trust the Lord in the small things, so it will prepair us in the big things to come. Some times the reason why we are unable to handle problems in our life...is because we have failed to faithfuly trust God in the small things...and so we failed to build our faith.

Nathan Wilkerson said...

Amen Brother! Awesome insight! we need one another in the body of Christ to fight along side of us. They would also lock their shields and move forward as one. In the body, we need to be locking shields with one another, instead of fighting against one another.