Our associate pastor, Rupert Loyd, and I own 22-caliber rifles. A couple of weeks ago Rupert came over to our house and we did some target shooting. We both have scopes on our guns, and we were both fairly accurate in hitting the targets we set up. (No, we didn’t write people’s names on the targets!)

We’re in the midst of a sermon series dealing with the fact that life’s a battle. I wish I could say that your well-armed pastors can lead you with their weaponry to win your battles. Unfortunately, rifles are the wrong weapons for our battles: 22-caliber ammo is useless, because the battles we face are essentially spiritual battles.

“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.” (Ephesians 6:12) The battle is a cosmic one of epic proportions. Dark forces are fighting against the holy, righteous, loving God of the universe.

The spiritual battle’s primary war zone is the place where God’s most precious creation exists. We’re that precious creation: the people He made in His own image, and for whom He shed the blood of His own Son to redeem back into His image. To put it another way, life is the ultimate game of marbles! Some of you remember playing marbles; you always wanted to win your opponent’s very best marbles. In this ultimate game of marbles, the most sought-after marble is a blue and white one called Earth! We’re in the middle of the war zone, and because we’re spiritual creatures the war zone isn’t just around us; it’s in us, too!

THE BATTLE OF TEMPTATION
Many battles have names. There’s the Battle of Gettysburg, the Battle of Wounded Knee, the Battle of Midway, and so on. Battles are usually known by the locations where they occurred. The battles you and I face could be called the Battle over Addiction, the Battle over Money, the Battle over a Disease, the Battle over an Alienated Relationship, the Battle with a Job, and so on. However, they all boil down to the same battle: the Battle with Temptation!

Whatever battle you and I are facing — and they’re many and varied — we’re all really fighting the same battle. That battle is deciding whether we’ll handle our struggles the way God wants us to, so that we carry out His grand purposes, or whether we’ll handle them some way other than God’s way. That’s the ultimate battle.

No matter what the issue or circumstance, we ultimately must respond in one of two ways: in accordance with God’s will and plan or against His will and plan. God wants us to deal with every situation according to His will, and doing otherwise is sin. We’re often tempted to do otherwise, and this is where the real battle takes place. Whatever name you give to your struggle (or battle), it’s ultimately just a variation of the Battle of Temptation.

Illness is a battle to keep from blaming God for that condition and/or to keep from feeling sorry for yourself, and it’s a struggle to ask how can God be glorified through the illness. The battle of a broken relationship isn’t a battle with another person: it’s ultimately our battle over whether we handle our end of it as Jesus would if He were in our position. The battle can be trying to keep from playing the blame game, to keep from escaping, or to keep from depending on our own resources instead of on God. Whatever battle you’re facing, the greatest battle is behind the scenes. It involves the temptation to handle the situation in other than a God-glorifying, God-pleasing way.

How can we win the battle over temptation? Paul wrote, “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.” (Ephesians 6:10-11) Paul gave two battle plans here. First, we should depend on God’s help (“be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power”), and second, we should be proactive (“Put on the full armor of God”). In other words, we should depend on God’s grace and our gumption!

GOD’S GRACE
We can’t fight temptation on our own, because we’re too weak and ineffective. Paul wrote, “And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.” (Ephesians 6:18) Jesus told His disciples in the garden of Gethsemane, while He was doing battle with Satan, “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.” (Matthew 26:41)

When we’re facing a difficult situation, having a serious conversation with God is extremely important because we’re always tempted to NOT do things the Lord’s way. We need God’s help during our struggles. The psalmist affirmed, “The Lord gives strength to his people.” (Psalm 29:11)

We not only need the Lord’s help to resist temptation, we need His wisdom to help us see the true danger in the temptation we’re facing. Paul wrote about the “devil’s schemes” (Ephesians 6:11), and Jesus said of Satan that “he is a liar and the father of lies.” (John 8:44)

That’s why Jesus wants His followers to pray and to watch. Satan almost always uses subtle strategies. He’ll get us to think, “Oh, that’s no so bad; a lot of people do worse” or “I’ll just give in one more time; then I’m through with it” or “Because of what I’ve been through, I deserve to break the rules a little” or “This is no big deal” — or some other lie. We’re never tempted to really mess up our lives. We don’t think, “This is going to destroy my life. It’s so attractive, though, that I’m going through with it.” People rarely set out to sabotage their own lives and happiness or to hurt other people. We’re tempted because some way of thinking, speaking, or acting seems attractive at the time, and we don’t see the full ramifications of our actions.

We’re being duped by the devil; it’s a trap, and we need to watch and pray. In a recent Christianity Today magazine article about the wrong desires we can have, author Agnieszka Tennant wrote, “Once an honest conversation takes place between me and God, the misguided desire loses its intensity.” (Christianity Today, April 2007, p.80) We need to go to God — especially when things are challenging. We’ll mess things up for sure without His strength and wisdom. With them, we can resist the temptation to give in to something that seems to be an attractive way to go but that will eventually lead to disaster.

OUR GUMPTION
We need to depend on God’s grace, and that’s why we’re supposed to watch and pray, as both Jesus and Paul told us. However, we’re also supposed to depend on our own gumption. Paul used the phrase “put on…” which is certainly not a passive activity: it implies action. We’re not supposed to sit passively and go wherever our desires take us. That’s why Paul used a phrase like “put on…”. What are we supposed to put on? Paul used imagery from the military as he wrote about fighting temptation. He talked about equipping ourselves to fight the battles of temptation by putting on armor, and he referred to real armor used by the military of his day to illustrate the spiritual armor we’re to utilize.

“...the belt of truth buckled around your waist…” The belt held the sword, and it also may have included the part the protects the soldier from someone’s hitting below the belt! Satan is a deceiver and a liar. We need to be proactive about searching for the truth — especially about ourselves and our desires and motivations. We’ve all wished that we knew at an earlier time what we know now! It helps if we actively seek the truth about the situation we’re struggling with.

“...with the breastplate of righteousness in place…” A breastplate is the hard vest that covered the vital organs of the soldier. We need to know in our hearts that we have the right relationship with God — with an absolute, unwavering confidence so that we can face our struggles with that confidence. Doubts about God’s acceptance of us will cause us to waver.

“...with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace…” Have you ever tried to hike in flip-flops or high heels? You couldn’t go far if you did. Good soldiers need good footwear, and the Roman soldiers had good, sturdy footwear. We really don’t get far on the journey of life through this far-from-peaceful world unless we operate from a position within ourselves that’s at peace. This ultimate peace comes from the good news that we can have peace with God through Jesus.

“...the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one…” Picture flaming arrows being shot skyward; they rain down on their target and can only be effectively stopped by a heavy shield. Our faith and trust in God can keep us from being knocked out of the battle of life.

“...the helmet of salvation…” The head needs to be protected most of all; that’s why most states have helmet laws for motorcyclists. We’re supposed to protect and guard our thoughts — our decision-making capacity — from being influenced by the Evil One. We’re saved by the Lord, and the fact that He has rescued us should always be uppermost in our minds. A soldier whose life has been saved by someone who gave his life in the process is really motivated to fight, because his own life was saved by the price someone else paid. Jesus did this for us!

“...the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God…” This weapon of choice in fighting the battle of temptation is God’s Word. When Jesus was tempted three times in a short period of time in the wilderness, He quoted God’s Word each time. Gordon MacDonald, a popular Christian speaker and writer, stated, “A steady diet of television, cheap publications, and shallow literature will make us dreadfully inadequate people. A daily exposure to the Scriptures and to literature that focuses on Scripture is a necessary part of the diet.” (A Resilient Life, p.65) Think about what you’ve read in the last week. What percentage of it was the Bible or a Christian book or magazine or internet page? This would be a good place to start if we want to defeat the struggles in our lives.

This is the spiritual armor Paul listed that we should cover ourselves with: the truth, rightness with God, peace with God, salvation in Christ, and God’s Word. We can only face the battles in life — and not give in to the temptation to handle them all wrong — when we depend on God’s grace to help us and when we also express our own gumption by doing something about them.

The good news is that we can defeat whatever temptation we’re dealing with! Listen to this encouraging promise from God: “No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” (1 Corinthians 10:13) We can defeat the temptation to handle our battles in the wrong way. With God’s help we really can win!