SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 10/7/2019
10:11 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
The Victory: In Standing Firm
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Ephesians
6:13
Message of the verses: “13 Therefore, take up the full armor of God,
that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm.”
It
is easier for most believers who live in the Western World not to understand
the kind of battle that is going on, that is if they are not truly walking with
the Lord, for living in the West and being a believer means victories that involve
no battles and in a kind of peace that is merely the absence of conflict. It is kind of like the victory and peace that
a draft dodger has. However with this
said in our country Christianity is under attack from the radicals on the left,
and if they get their way then all true believers will be greatly under attack. I have said before that I have good news and
bad news for radicals on the left in our country. Good news is that they will eventually win;
bad news is that they will win.
I
have a different prayer list that I use on Saturday’s as that list is only for
our Pastors and one of the things that is in it goes along with what we are
studying at this point in Ephesians: “Fifth: His Spiritual Strength: Putting on the Spiritual Armor
given in Ephesians is not only for Pastors, but for all believers, but
especially for Pastors who when they are following all of the other things
listed above they will surely come under attack.” I must also include everyone who has a desire
to follow the Lord seriously will also come under attack from the demons and
perhaps even Satan.
Paul’s point in this verse is that we should
all “take up the full armor of God.”
MacArthur writes “We have His provision in being His children, in having
His Word, in possessing His indwelling Holy Spirit, of having every resource of
our heavenly Father. God is our
strength, but His strength is appropriated only through obedience; His mighty
armor must be put on (v. 11) and taken up (v. 13).
God
made the world perfect, but since the fall of man every day has been an evil day and every day
will continue to be an evil day until God’s prophet Word about Satan will be fulfilled
where Satan and all of his evil forces are thrown into the Lake of Fire, and
that will not happen until the end of the Millennial Kingdom.
John
MacArthur writes the following paragraph:
“Our responsibility is to ‘resist and stand firm.’ When Martin Luther stood before the Diet of
Worms he was accused of heresy. After
being condemned for declaring that men are saved by faith along in Christ
along, he declared, ‘My conscience is captive to the Word of God….Here I stand,
I cannot do otherwise.’ Every believer
who is faithful to God’s Word cannot do otherwise than ‘stand firm.’”
There
is a story that happened about 80 years ago in Ireland where three men had much
fruit in preaching the Word of God and many were saved. There was a man saved during these meetings
who became a Pastor and years later wondered what became of the three men. He was told that there was only one who was
faithful to the Lord as one became an apostate, and the other drank himself to
death. There are some believers who have
done everything well in the Lord’s work, however they do not continue to “stand
firm.” The issue is not in what a
believer has done, but when the battle is over and then all of the smoke clears
is whether he is found stand true to the Savior. One of the things that I think about and pray
about is that I will never be unfaithful to the Lord if persecution comes to
where I live at.
The
“Seniors Pastor” at our church, who is an amazing man, a man who has been in
the ministry for fifty years and still going strong, has a statement that he
tells to us seniors and that is “To Finish Strong.” The apostle John writes in 2 John 8 “Watch yourselves, that you might not lose what we have
accomplished, but that you may receive a full reward.” John is saying the same thing that our Senior’s
Pastor is saying, and that is we all must finish strong.
Paul
also had a fear that is seen in 1 Corinthians 9:27 in which he states “but I
buffet my body and make it my slave, lest possibly, after I have preached to
others, I myself should be disqualified.”
It seems that Paul was not afraid of losing his salvation but his reward
and, even more importantly, his usefulness to the Lord. MacArthur adds “Countless men and women have
faithfully taught Sunday school for years, led many people to Jesus Christ, pastured
a church, led Bible studies, ministered to the sick, and done every sort of
service in the Lord’s name—only to one day give up, turn their backs on His
work, and disappear into the world. The
circumstances differ, but the underlying reason is always the same: they too God’s armor off and thereby lost the
courage, the power, and the desire to ‘stand firm.’
“In
the great spiritual warfare in which we do battle, we are only called to ‘resist’
and to ‘stand firm.’ As noted earlier,
James says, ‘Resist the devil and he will flee from you’ (James 4:7). Peter counsels us to ‘be of sober spirit, be
on the alert. Your adversary, the devil,
prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith’ (1 Peter
5:8-9).”
Think
about the following statement from MacArthur’s commentary “The greatest joys
come in the greatest victories, and the greatest victories come from the
greatest battles—when they are fought in the power and with the armor of the
Lord.”
Keep
standing firm in the Lord with your armor on!
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I have mentioned that there is a battle going
on in my life at this time, and the battle has been going on for some time, and
I think that the battle has to do with humility and the things that go along
with what the Lord is teaching me through humility. I know one thing for sure and that is that I
must stand in the strength of the Lord, and I must keep my armor on and
continue to study His Word, trusting that the Holy Spirit will give me the
victory that I desire as I go through this battle.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Stand Firm
in the Lord as He teaches me more about humility.
Today’s rather long quotation that goes
along with yesterday’s series of verses from “Love in Action.”
“We
are encouraged by what we feel from others.
Have you ever noticed how often in the New Testament Jesus touched
people? God put our being into the
envelope we call skin, and the skin is the sensory receiver of many of the
messages we receive. Something special
happens when someone touches us. Why are
we so afraid to touch? Probably because
so often touching is misunderstood. That’s
unfortunate, but I believe there is a way to touch people and communicate love,
warmth, and encouragement. We encourage
people when we touch them with the love of God.”
10/7/2019 11:05 AM
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