Blessed fellowship. Seek it out. Take refuge in it. Dwell in it at any cost. Fellowship is when Christians spend time together and talk about God. This is what Margie and I were blessed to rest in last night.
Three years ago, a newlywed couple walked into Lahaina Baptist Church in Maui to worship the Lord on their honeymoon, Theron and Kim. I met this couple and had a chance to pray with them after the service. Life can be tough, and God can give us seemingly insurmountable challenges. We take those to Him in prayer. The prayer we had that morning was truly one where the Holy Spirit led. It was one where you could feel the presence of the Lord, standing near, listening in to every heart-felt request. I have never forgotten that prayer.
Three days ago we got a message from Kim. She is in Dallas from North Carolina for a seminar and sought us out. Now its important to note, this visit did not just happen. Kim initiated, took time out of her busy schedule and drove half way across the metroplex to meet us. We made time and drove through traffic to meet her. Satan had many opportunities to derail this blessed fellowship. The point? Be prepared to sacrifice for blessed fellowship.
We met last night for some Texas BBQ and my friends, we talked about God for 2 ½ hours. It seemed like 15 minutes. We laughed, we cried, we wondered about God’s next steps in our lives. You see, true fellowship is not just hooray talk. It’s not just back-patting and smiles. True blessed fellowship gets down in the ditches of life. It deals with hardship, trials and pain. Blessed fellowship is sharing each other’s burdens. Thank you, Kim for the blessed fellowship. It’s moments like this that cause my soul to soar like an eagle and help me to continue on in this spiritual battle. Today, I pray that you who are reading this have someone that you can share true blessed fellowship with. Seek it out. Take refuge in it. Dwell in it at any cost.
Let’s continue on in this vein of ‘spiritual warfare.’ We’re in 2 Corinthians 10 today and Paul is authenticating His apostleship to the church at Corinth. Remember back in 1 Corinthians 1:11, Paul addressed a split in the church. "Some followed Paul, some followed Peter and some followed Apollos." They had picked their ‘favorite’ pastor and were rejecting the rest. (That still happens today as most people choose a church on how dynamic the pastor preaches) In most of this chapter Paul is defending himself to the minority who opposed him.
But let’s specifically look at 2 Cor. 10:4 (ha 10-4 good buddy...get it)
“The weapons of our warfare are not the weapons of the world. Instead, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.” (BSB)
Paul is using amazingly strong language here. Weapons, warfare, demolish. It sounds more like a Michael Bay Transformers movie than it does a letter from Paul to a church. The imagery though, paints the picture of what we can expect when it comes to the battle for our hearts.
When I think of weapons and warfare I think of a Marine all packed out for battle. The average battle-ready marine carries over 60 pounds of gear. Body armor, helmet, eye protection, combat boots, weapon, ammo, radio w/ earset, flashlight and nowadays various electronic equipment such as GPS, night vision, digital range finder, and surprisingly a total of 70 batteries of 7 different sizes. I think its safe to say that these men and women are the epitamy of “battle-ready.”
Interesting side note on the this topic. Every time we have services at Southcliff we have a Fort Worth Police officer on campus for security. (sometimes several) One of them is a super friendly guy and he stops in to say hi to our Wednesday night small group. A few weeks back it was just me, him and a few other guys so we got into discussing all the cool gadgets on his ‘Batman utility belt.’ My friends, the world today demands that our police officers equip for battle. His gear almost mirrored that of a Marine going to the front lines. Bullet-proof vest, combat boots, side-arm, ammo, commercial taser, stun gun, radio w/ earset, flashlight, handcuffs, zip-tie cuffs, mace and optionally a backup side-arm. Think about this, the next time you see a police officer, you are seeing a battle ready marine that is prepared for war. And all this is on American soil right in YOUR neighborhood! This is true evidence that the evils of sin are indeed tearing America apart.
Paul is clear in his statement that we are at war. So who are we at war with? Listen to what Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus:
“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this world's darkness, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” (Eph 6:12)
My friends this war is real and our enemy is real. The devil is not some little red guy carrying a pitchfork. He is real and he is engaged in warfare for your heart. Don’t kid yourself, this battle is being waged as I write this. One of my favorite books on this topic is ‘The Screwtape Letters’ by CS Lewis. (the same Christian author that wrote the Chronicles of Narnia and others) It’s the story of 2 demons, one senior, one junior and their journey to claim the soul of ‘their human’ by any crafty means they can concoct. It helped me to fully understand the lengths that Satan will go to keep us from walking closely with God.
So as Paul talks of spiritual warfare and our weapons, it makes me think of what a strong Christian might look like going into battle. If the Marine and the police officer are equipped for warfare, what do prepared Christians look like? Well, if your going into battle you’ll definitely need weapons and fortunately Paul tells us we have them. “the weapons of our warfare are not of this world.” So what are these 'other-worldly' weapons?
Weapon 1 - The Almighty Holy Word of God. The sword of the Spirit. (Eph 6:17) In the day of Paul, a great broadsword would be the equivalent of an M-16 today. It would be essential to your survival in battle. Can you claim today that you wield the Word of God like a sword? This is one of the biggest problems I have witnessed as we have travelled tens of thousands of miles to give out the Word of God. The average Christian does not know the Word of God, does not spend time in the Word of God and does not tell others about the Word of God. They’re heading directly into battle without their sword. This is not a pretty picture. My friends, if you head into battle against a prepared enemy with no weapon you can well imagine the outcome.
So how do I ‘claim’ my sword? It’s oh, so simple yet oh, so hard. SPEND DAILY TIME IN THE WORD OF GOD. That’s the whole point of the 5 minute challenge, the reason God brought it into existence. It’s the home page banner of the website. TO ENCOURAGE ALL TO SPEND DAILY TIME IN THE WORD OF GOD. To get your sword simply start spending 5 minutes in God’s Word every day. Use the the5mc.com as tool, follow the guidelines and as Nike says, just do it. So whats the hard part? Well, it’s war. Your foe, Satan is not going to idly sit by and let you go get your sword. he will do anything and everything to keep you from even 5 minutes in God’s Word each day. These are some of the obstacles you can expect: longer work hours, kid’s soccer practice, illness, depression, busyness, Netflix, indifference, hobbies, family issues, school demands, alcohol, video games, exhaustion, Facebook. I could go on and on. It all comes down to priority in your life. How bad do you want it? Unfortunately, I meet a lot of people that just don’t value daily time in God’s Word. They’re heading into war everyday without their sword.
Weapon 2 - The Holy Spirt. “Confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead and you will be saved.” (Rom 10:9) If you have confessed in your heart that Jesus Christ is Lord then you have the Holy Spirit of God living within you. You are walking today with the Spirit of God guiding you. Equipping you. Preparing you. You can kinda think of it as if you’re the soldier and He is your General. He can guide you through the battlefield that is wrought with enemies, obstacles, mines and danger. You NEED the Holy Spirit. Without a good General, battles are easily lost. And what a General He is! He can see the battlefield in its entirety. He can see your entire life. He is God, He created it all and He created you. Praise God for the mighty gift of His Holy Spirit.
Weapon 3 - Prayer. I’ve heard it said that God speaks to us through His Word and we speak to Him through prayer. So true. I’ve also heard it said that we spend most of our time telling God what we want in prayer and not enough time hearing from Him through His Word. Even more true. Prayer is the gift that God has granted us to share our hearts directly with Him. Before I start my 5MC every morning I get on my knees in prayer. I pour out my heart to my maker. I try not to pray too much for myself but for others. There is unbelievable power in prayer. Think of it as you talking to your General in the midst of the battle. He might be telling you to flank left but you want to flank right. You can go to Him in prayer. You might be out of ammo. You can go to Him in prayer. You might have encountered and enemy that is bigger than you can handle. You can go to Him in prayer. Of course, God being the perfect wartime General knows these things, but through prayer and your admittance of your dire need for His direction and guidance, a beautiful thing happens. Dependence. Rely on the Lord for all. “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” (Phil 4:6)
Well good friends, I pray that today you will suit up for battle and take these weapons with you. God makes them readily available, but He will not force you to take them. It’s a choice He gives us. God bless you all today, and may your walk be one of peace and joy in the midst of the battle.
Encourage others with the Word of God.
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