SPEAKER_00: Hey, I'm Steve Holt, the senior pastor of The Road at Chapel Hills.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Road Podcast.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_00: My heart is to empower you to change the world.
SPEAKER_00: I hope this message impacts you.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we're on the invisible war, you guys, and we're in Ephesians 6.
SPEAKER_00: So if you're a guest with us today, you're coming into the fourth message in a series called The Invisible War.
SPEAKER_00: The first one, part one, was Satan, Demons, and the Fourth Dimension.
SPEAKER_00: And it took us back into Times Immemorial.
SPEAKER_00: I talked about sort of who Lucifer was, how he was raised up with pride in his heart, and there was a spontaneous generation of pride within him that led to sin.
SPEAKER_00: And then we talked about how demons also were kicked out of heaven along with him.
SPEAKER_00: We looked at passages, Ezekiel 28, Isaiah 14.
SPEAKER_00: And then the next message in the invisible war, I talked about the Great Reset.
SPEAKER_00: I talked about Klaus Schwab.
SPEAKER_00: I talked about the World Economic Forum.
SPEAKER_00: And I felt like that following the first was important so that you understand that this is spiritual warfare.
SPEAKER_00: We're not just dealing with flesh and blood, but we're dealing with demons.
SPEAKER_00: We're dealing with spiritual entities that are out to destroy your kids, out to destroy your family, and out to destroy our country.
SPEAKER_00: Then in the third message, I talked about taking up the whole armor of God, and we started marching through Ephesians 6 with the armor of God and what it means to go to battle.
SPEAKER_00: And so today I want to talk about God as a warrior, that our God is a warrior.
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to look real quickly, just go to your Bibles.
SPEAKER_00: If you're in Ephesians already, keep going to the right, and you're going to come to 2 Thessalonians.
SPEAKER_00: It's right before 1 Timothy.
SPEAKER_00: So just keep turning to the right.
SPEAKER_00: You'll come to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2.
SPEAKER_00: And this is one of those passages that really gives us a glimpse into the last days and what will be happening in the last days.
SPEAKER_00: And all I can say is, I don't know if we're in the last days, but I do know this that these have, these days have the character qualities of the last days.
SPEAKER_00: So this admonition is for us today, and it will lead us back into Ephesians 6.
SPEAKER_00: It's verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: So look at verse 9 and 10.
SPEAKER_00: The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan with all power, signs, and lying wonders.
SPEAKER_00: And with all unrighteous deception, and in my Bible I have that circled, unrighteous deception, among those who perish.
SPEAKER_00: And this is really important.
SPEAKER_00: Comma, because they did not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved.
SPEAKER_00: Church, you're here today, I hope, because you love the truth.
SPEAKER_00: I hope that you're rekindling a love for the truth every day by spending time in truth, which is this book.
SPEAKER_00: Spending time in this book, reading books, other books that talk about truth.
SPEAKER_00: Truth is so vital because deception is going to thicken.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to see more and more deception coming from the legacy media.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to see more and more deception coming from different political leaders.
SPEAKER_00: People are out for power, man.
SPEAKER_00: And they'll just about do anything.
SPEAKER_00: Either party.
SPEAKER_00: They'll do anything to win elections.
SPEAKER_00: They'll do anything to deceive you.
SPEAKER_00: And how are you going to know?
SPEAKER_00: How are you going to know what to do?
SPEAKER_00: How are you going to know whether that's true or this is true if you don't have truth in God's word guiding you?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so now turn to Ephesians 6.
SPEAKER_00: So as we look at Ephesians 6, I want to call this God is Warrior.
SPEAKER_00: I've taught through Ephesians before, and as I look at my notes of the past, I realize, man, I've really changed in my perspective of this particular passive.
SPEAKER_00: So look at verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
SPEAKER_00: That's the rubric we start from.
SPEAKER_00: That verse really defines everything else.
SPEAKER_00: So that's the point, is that you can't do it.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so he's going to talk about strength in the Lord, the power of his might.
SPEAKER_00: Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
SPEAKER_00: For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, and against the rulers of the darkness of the age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly place.
SPEAKER_00: We talked about that two weeks ago.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand.
SPEAKER_00: So there's this idea that there's an evil day.
SPEAKER_00: You guys, there's an evil day that you go through in your lives.
SPEAKER_00: I think there's many evil days, and then there's the big evil day.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if we're in that, but the armor is primarily for us when we go through an evil day.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm in an evil day.
SPEAKER_00: Personally.
SPEAKER_00: The church is in an evil day.
SPEAKER_00: And if you don't feel it, you will.
SPEAKER_00: Because the more we press into stuff, whether it's economics, which we're talking about a little bit at the end of each message here, is if we, listen, if we start to really become a city on a hill, and we really are forced to be reckoned with with the devil, we are going to be in the evil day.
SPEAKER_00: The enemy is not going to sit back and let things happen.
SPEAKER_00: There will be pushback.
SPEAKER_00: There will be persecution.
SPEAKER_00: That's when you put on the armor more than ever.
SPEAKER_00: You put on, really, you put on God, not just the armor.
SPEAKER_00: Take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand.
SPEAKER_00: Stand, therefore, having girded your waist with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace.
SPEAKER_00: Above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 17.
SPEAKER_00: Take the helmet of salvation, and we're going to stop right there, because there's two more things I want to do as we move through this, and that is I want to talk about the sword of the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: That's going to be after Easter.
SPEAKER_00: And then I want to talk about prayer and the power of prayer to move mountains.
SPEAKER_00: And I feel like they have to stand alone.
SPEAKER_00: But here's so when I say God as warrior, okay, how many men have heard me talk about this at Tuesday morning?
SPEAKER_00: Wholehearted men.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so a lot of men have already heard this.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, it felt like you guys all need to hear this by virtue of being in Ephesians 6.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what I mean.
SPEAKER_00: Is that God in the Old Testament, actually, more than the New Testament, it's cloaked differently in the New Testament.
SPEAKER_00: I think Jesus going into the temple is pretty warrior-like.
SPEAKER_00: I think Jesus going to the cross is pretty warrior-like.
SPEAKER_00: But you actually have stories in the Old Testament.
SPEAKER_00: And Moses is the first one in Scripture that actually says it.
SPEAKER_00: So after all that he's been through with Pharaoh, in Exodus 15, he says this the Lord is a warrior, and the Lord is his name.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is not Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Rogers, folks.
SPEAKER_00: Tom Hanks did a really good job in acting that out, and I think Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Rogers is cool, and you go and you go, oh wow, I wish my dad was like Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Rogers.
SPEAKER_00: Do you really?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, seriously.
SPEAKER_00: You know, um, you know, so is God more like that?
SPEAKER_00: Everybody's happy in the neighborhood, or is he more like gladiator?
SPEAKER_00: Is he actually more like one who comes and contends for righteousness?
SPEAKER_00: I go more with God as warrior as Moses saw him, the greatest leader in scripture, outside of Jesus, in my opinion, as a warrior.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's that's what he says through inspiration of scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Joshua understood God as warrior in seeing the pre-incarnate Jesus as he crosses the Jordan River to go in and take the promised land.
SPEAKER_00: This is what he writes in Joshua 5.
SPEAKER_00: And it came to pass when Joshua was led was by Jericho that he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, a man stood up opposite him with a sword drawn in his hand.
SPEAKER_00: And Joshua went to him and said to him, Are you for us or for our adversaries?
SPEAKER_00: So he said, No.
SPEAKER_00: But as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.
SPEAKER_00: This is a pre-incarnate Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Every theologian will tell you that.
SPEAKER_00: A pre-incarnate form of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He comes with a sword in his hand, church.
SPEAKER_00: He comes as a commander of the armies of the Lord, church.
SPEAKER_00: Do you get that?
SPEAKER_00: So look, if you're going into prayer, I'm going into 40 days of fasting and prayer, um, starting tomorrow, about just a bunch of stuff, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And it's not a complete fast, so you'll see me, uh, it'll it'll be more like a Daniel fast.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll talk more about that later at another time.
SPEAKER_00: But the point is, when I go into a fast to fast and pray, I don't want Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Rogers next to me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_00: I want a warrior.
SPEAKER_00: And I see Jesus more of a gang leader than a boys' club, neighborhood, build a fort together and a tree type guy.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: So we're the gang.
SPEAKER_00: And he's called us to take over the world.
SPEAKER_00: He's called us to make a difference.
SPEAKER_00: He's he's told, go to every nation and preach the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: He says, No weapons formed against us.
SPEAKER_00: We'll prosper.
SPEAKER_00: You know, that's Isaiah 54.
SPEAKER_00: Do you realize there were no chapter titles when Isaiah wrote that?
SPEAKER_00: So I say Isaiah 54.
SPEAKER_00: That's only a tab in your Bible so you can go find it.
SPEAKER_00: But but look at the context of Isaiah 54 and 55.
SPEAKER_00: You can't have the last verse of chapter 54 that all of the instruments of the enemy formed against you will not prosper without the rest of chapter 55, which is about hungering and thirsting for God.
SPEAKER_00: So I see God as warrior, and so when I see us looking through Ephesians 6, we're dressing up like God.
SPEAKER_00: This is his might, this is his power.
SPEAKER_00: So you're not just putting on the armor, you're putting on him, you're putting on his helmet of salvation, you're putting on his breastplate of righteousness, you're putting on his shield of faith, his sword of that's really important.
SPEAKER_00: It's not up to you.
SPEAKER_00: What's up to you is to choose are you going to put on Christ or not?
SPEAKER_00: Because you don't have what it takes.
SPEAKER_00: If you have what it takes, then Jesus died needlessly.
SPEAKER_00: He came to the cross and he died for us because we don't have what it takes.
SPEAKER_00: But when he's in us, when he's living in his Holy Spirit, in a holy partnership with Christ, with the Holy Spirit living within us, we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.
SPEAKER_00: And we can move mountains in our life.
SPEAKER_00: So let's just do a quick review.
SPEAKER_00: Um first of all, um, let's look at verse 13.
SPEAKER_00: We talked about standing and withstanding in the evil day.
SPEAKER_00: I already explained that.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth.
SPEAKER_00: So the first one was stand on truth.
SPEAKER_00: And that's really important.
SPEAKER_00: That everything we're saying is about truth.
SPEAKER_00: If you give up truth, you give up everything.
SPEAKER_00: It was Alexander Solsenitsyn, the great Russian dissident, who said, live not by lies.
SPEAKER_00: And so I did a lot on that.
SPEAKER_00: Um, the last time I talked about this, two weeks ago.
SPEAKER_00: I talked about live not by lies, live by truth.
SPEAKER_00: When you live by truth, it just goes better for you.
SPEAKER_00: And no parent sits down with their kids and says, honey, it's a rough world out there.
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of corruption, a lot of bad people, a lot of lying, a lot of manipulation, a lot of cheating.
SPEAKER_00: I want to teach you to be the best liar ever.
SPEAKER_00: I want to teach you how to manipulate people.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be happy if you'll learn how to just screw people left and right.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody does that.
SPEAKER_00: Because we know in our heart that you're supposed to live by truth.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's why he starts there.
SPEAKER_00: He talks about the belt of truth.
SPEAKER_00: And I explained that uh more at that time.
SPEAKER_00: So, number two, stand on righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: Uh the breastplate.
SPEAKER_00: And so, what I was talking about that, I talked about that righteousness in Scripture means right relationships.
SPEAKER_00: Having right relationships.
SPEAKER_00: If you haven't apologized at least once this week, I would challenge you to start practicing that.
SPEAKER_00: Because you're always making mistakes.
SPEAKER_00: I'm always making mistakes.
SPEAKER_00: And learning to apologize, learn to say you're sorry with things that you say or you do, it's really a good habit.
SPEAKER_00: Because what it does is it keeps good relationships, and people know that you're humble, and they know that you love them and that you care about them, and you make that a point that you're not, you know, the answer to everybody's ills, and that you actually have an element of care about having right relationships.
SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, stand, verse 15, stand on the gospel of peace.
SPEAKER_00: So these were the boots.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, you know, you can't be a peace keeper, but you can be a peacemaker.
SPEAKER_00: So we walk in and we bring peace, but we can't keep the peace.
SPEAKER_00: Man, people are just, I mean, being in the political realm, I am amazed at the dumb stuff that people do all the time.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's really amazing to me.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, man, seriously, you're running for office, you've got 48 cards at best.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: And to try to bring peace, even when you disagree, is a good thing.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's good in a family, it's good in society, it's good in culture, so we talked about that.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: Above all, take the shield of faith.
SPEAKER_00: So that's where I want to start today.
SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about standing on faith, the shield of faith.
SPEAKER_00: And let me just, you know, as you guys know, I grew up with Campus Crusade for Christ in college.
SPEAKER_00: At the University of Georgia, you got saved, and then 10 years on staff with him.
SPEAKER_00: And the four spiritual laws was this little gospel mustard color booklet that we used.
SPEAKER_00: And it starts off with just as there are physical laws that govern the physical universe, for the spiritual laws that govern the spiritual universe.
SPEAKER_00: I think that's true of faith.
SPEAKER_00: That just as there are physical laws like gravity, and there's spirit, and there's physical laws like uh like your body needs food, um, your body needs water, those are physical laws, they're true wherever you go in the world.
SPEAKER_00: Those physical laws are true.
SPEAKER_00: There's also laws of faith that govern even the physical universe.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: So we used to say physical laws govern the physical, spiritual laws govern the spiritual universe.
SPEAKER_00: I would say physical laws govern the physical universe, and the spiritual law of faith covers it all.
SPEAKER_00: You see, that was the spiritual law of faith was what created the heavens and the earth.
SPEAKER_00: When God began to speak light and began to speak creation into existence after Genesis 1, 2, and he began to move.
SPEAKER_00: That's the law of faith transforming the physical world from God into this earth in a mighty way.
SPEAKER_00: And so the kingdom law of faith governs the entire universe.
SPEAKER_00: It's all listen, it's always somebody's faith that believes that God moves.
SPEAKER_00: God does not move just randomly.
SPEAKER_00: He has given us the earth, he has told us to have dominion on the earth, and he always works through, listen, courageous people.
SPEAKER_00: God has a hard time working through cowards.
SPEAKER_00: God has a really fine time and does miraculous things through courageous people.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Well, I don't have much courage.
SPEAKER_00: Well, good.
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly where you should be.
SPEAKER_00: If you realize you don't have courage, then this passage is for you today.
SPEAKER_00: Because I'm not asking you to have courage.
SPEAKER_00: I'm asking you to have courage and a courageous God and you become courageous.
SPEAKER_00: So it's putting on God in your life.
SPEAKER_00: It's putting on God's.
SPEAKER_00: I love Matthew 14.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, Matthew 14 is where Jesus comes walking on the water to his disciples in a storm on the lake.
SPEAKER_00: Lake Gennesaret.
SPEAKER_00: So he's right there, Sea of Galilee, right there.
SPEAKER_00: Comes along, walking.
SPEAKER_00: What does Peter do?
SPEAKER_00: Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Spontaneous, foot in the mouth, Peter.
SPEAKER_00: Brushes his teeth with shoe polish every day.
SPEAKER_00: Peter.
SPEAKER_00: But he's got faith, you guys.
SPEAKER_00: The dude's got faith.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, Well, I want to come to you.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, Well, come on.
SPEAKER_00: And he starts walking on the water.
SPEAKER_00: Because what did he do?
SPEAKER_00: He had faith in the faith of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't have personal faith.
SPEAKER_00: He had faith in the faith of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And in so doing, he did what Jesus did.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus had to model it for Peter to believe it.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is always modeling before us, both scripturally as well as in our experience in life, who he is, how he wants to work in your life, and it's usually not you the first time you see it in somebody else.
SPEAKER_00: And then you go, man, I don't want to be like that.
SPEAKER_00: Man, I can't believe they did that.
SPEAKER_00: I can't believe that nut, that guy, is being used by God so mightily, and that does something to you, right?
SPEAKER_00: And you go, I can do that.
SPEAKER_00: Because then that's why biographies are so important.
SPEAKER_00: I just finished a biography on Shackleton, and it's not a Christian biography, but I see that, man, the endurance, the resiliency, the uh creativity for these guys to be at the South Pole fighting the elements for two years and how every one of them lived and how they survived.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's like, whoa, I can fast and pray for 40 days.
SPEAKER_00: I think I can handle that.
SPEAKER_00: Because of their testimony.
SPEAKER_00: So Peter sees Jesus walking on the water.
SPEAKER_00: He wants Jesus' faith.
SPEAKER_00: That's the shield of faith.
SPEAKER_00: The shield of faith is not your faith, it's your faith in God's faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith.
SPEAKER_00: And so he walks out, and remember, he starts to sink.
SPEAKER_00: And what does the Lord say to him?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you of little faith, why do you doubt?
SPEAKER_00: That's a clear indicator, men and women, that it was the faith that Peter had for a brief span of time that got him on that water.
SPEAKER_00: That's why the law of the kingdom of faith supersedes physical laws sometimes.
SPEAKER_00: That's called a miracle.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we see miracles, that's why we believe in miracles.
SPEAKER_00: It's because it supersedes the physical laws, and sometimes God comes in when we pray for people who have cancer, or we pray for an autoimmune disease, we pray for something in their life, and they suddenly get healed.
SPEAKER_00: We just broke through a physical law, a medical law, with the law of faith by you picking up God's faith and then believing that God can do that.
SPEAKER_00: And so sometimes it's good for us to ask ourselves, well, I don't have faith for that.
SPEAKER_00: No, that's okay.
SPEAKER_00: Good start.
SPEAKER_00: Great starting point.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have faith for that.
SPEAKER_00: But does God have faith for that?
SPEAKER_00: Does God want us to just stand by and let socialists, great resetters, and communists take over our country?
SPEAKER_00: We just want to let that happen and be okay with it because we're the church.
SPEAKER_00: And we just take care of spiritual needs.
SPEAKER_00: There will be no church.
SPEAKER_00: There will be no Bible if we don't battle.
SPEAKER_00: And so we battle.
SPEAKER_00: You're just gonna let them come into the schools and just teach some of the stuff that is coming down from Polis?
SPEAKER_00: You just gonna let that happen?
SPEAKER_00: You okay with that?
SPEAKER_00: It's our watch.
SPEAKER_00: These are our kids.
SPEAKER_00: You say, well, I don't have faith for that, I don't know how to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Again, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: That's the best place to start, is you don't have what it takes.
SPEAKER_00: I have been crucified with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
SPEAKER_00: And the life that I live in the flesh, the here and the now, I live by faith in the Son of God who died for me and loves me and passionate for me.
SPEAKER_00: That means that it's surrender, it's surrender to Christ that we do these things and we walk in that kind of faith.
SPEAKER_00: So Liz is starting a prayer meeting.
SPEAKER_00: So I wanted you guys to know.
SPEAKER_00: This Tuesday, 8 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: It'll be 8 to 8.45 every Tuesday morning called Cherish the Children Prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Cherish the Children Prayer.
SPEAKER_00: And it will be in probably one of these classrooms back here.
SPEAKER_00: No, it's the library.
SPEAKER_00: I think we're going to do it in the library.
SPEAKER_00: So Cherish the Children Prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Men and women, any of you want to come.
SPEAKER_00: Now, obviously, we've had the men's gathering, but we will be clearing out at that point.
SPEAKER_00: Any of you ladies that want to come, it's Cherish the Children.
SPEAKER_00: We'll be praying about abortion.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the Supreme Court's going to be voting on that pretty soon.
SPEAKER_00: So that it's about human trafficking.
SPEAKER_00: It's about the kind of policies coming out of Denver that our kids are going to have to deal with.
SPEAKER_00: And either you're going to learn how to fight and deal with it, or you need to pull them out and get them in a better school.
SPEAKER_00: But we're going to pray for God to intervene.
SPEAKER_00: So that's it, that's at 8, 8 to 9, 8 to 8:45 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: I think I said, did I say 7:30?
SPEAKER_00: Did I say 8?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, good.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, 8 to 8.45.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said in Mark 11, have faith in God.
SPEAKER_00: For assuredly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be removed and be cast into the sea, and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.
SPEAKER_00: Now, a couple things about this verse.
SPEAKER_00: First, it's not faith in faith.
SPEAKER_00: It's not faith in you.
SPEAKER_00: It's not faith in how powerful you are.
SPEAKER_00: It's faith in who?
SPEAKER_00: Who?
SPEAKER_00: Whose faith?
SPEAKER_00: God's faith.
SPEAKER_00: It's having faith in God's faith.
SPEAKER_00: It's having faith that God can move.
SPEAKER_00: Then you believe in your heart, but you gotta say it with your mouth.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is from Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Wow, Steve, that sounds like name it and claim it stuff.
SPEAKER_00: That sounds like word faith.
SPEAKER_00: I don't care what you call it.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus says, have faith in God.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus says you say to that mountain, it'll be removed.
SPEAKER_00: So if we would quit quibbling over dumb theological things that we all get hung up on and start believing God, we could change this nation, we could change this county, we could change this city.
SPEAKER_00: Shield of faith.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the shield of faith is, gang.
SPEAKER_00: Because you're gonna get fiery darts from the enemy.
SPEAKER_00: And you've got to put up the faith of God in your life to extinguish them.
SPEAKER_00: And the more you advance in your walk with God, in your finances, in your marriage, in your singleness, in your purity, in your job, political, educational, business, whatever it is, you are gonna get shot at, man.
SPEAKER_00: The arrows are coming your way.
SPEAKER_00: But your faith should extinguish them.
SPEAKER_00: The shield of faith should extinguish.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, you should come, when you see these things coming, we need to grow, guys.
SPEAKER_00: To be able to do exactly what Jesus is saying here, he will have whatever he says.
SPEAKER_00: To start growing in confidence, stop it! In the name of Jesus, you're not messing with my kids.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna put up with this anymore.
SPEAKER_00: I'm a warrior because Jesus is a warrior.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna fight that.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna battle that.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you guys, your your finances suck right now.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't want that.
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to start getting trained and equipped to handle money, to know how to run a business.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are being called by God to be entrepreneurs and start new things and do new creative stuff and you don't know how to do it.
SPEAKER_00: Well then get trained.
SPEAKER_00: You know, go back to school if you need to, but but but get with a mentor, look around the church here, who's really successful at something you want to be successful at.
SPEAKER_00: Ask them to go to coffee and start growing and start learning.
SPEAKER_00: Keep learning, keep growing.
SPEAKER_00: That's the shield of faith, too.
SPEAKER_00: You're not just gonna go into fasting and prayer and believe God and suddenly you've got this download from Him, this supernatural download, and you know how to run a multi-million dollar business.
SPEAKER_00: No, you gotta, you gotta, you, you, everything's step-by-step with faith.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's just it's just opening the next door, learning a little bit more, learning a little bit more.
SPEAKER_00: And then as we do, your faith enlarges.
SPEAKER_00: You start getting confident in God.
SPEAKER_00: And so God has given us the shield of faith.
SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
SPEAKER_00: As soon as you start to take steps of faith in something, the fiery darts are gonna come.
SPEAKER_00: The arrows, man, flaming arrows are coming.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna go to wholehearted men.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be there at 6 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: on Tuesday morning.
SPEAKER_00: And the alarm doesn't go off.
SPEAKER_00: Or the fiery dart of the enemy just knocked your alarm right off of that end table.
SPEAKER_00: Or that fiery dart of the enemy is meant to put a flat tire on your truck, whatever it might be.
SPEAKER_00: Just expect it.
SPEAKER_00: Just it's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go to church.
SPEAKER_00: How many of you had one thing, at least one thing this morning, that could have dissuaded you from coming to church this morning?
SPEAKER_00: Hello?
SPEAKER_00: But you're here! Yes! You're here.
SPEAKER_00: Shield of faith, man.
SPEAKER_00: Shield of faith.
SPEAKER_00: The shots from the enemy are always aimed at your relationship with God.
SPEAKER_00: That's where they're always aimed.
SPEAKER_00: Because if somehow the enemy can come and cause you to lose your intimacy and your closeness with the Lord, then he's got your faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: So, what I'm gonna do in these next 40 days, I'm gonna read the entire Bible.
SPEAKER_00: So I started last night with Genesis 1.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna sweep through it.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be one of these really fast reads, man.
SPEAKER_00: But I'm gonna go through the whole Bible in the next 40 days.
SPEAKER_00: Because I need greater faith for what's coming.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't have it.
SPEAKER_00: I'll be honest, I do not have it.
SPEAKER_00: I wish I could just go fly fish all the time and just be a pastor of a church and teach the Bible and just take it easy.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what we're called to do.
SPEAKER_00: This church is called to be a warrior for God, to be the warrior God leading us and guiding us.
SPEAKER_00: He's a senior pastor.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not ready, so I'm spending time in God's Word.
SPEAKER_00: If you feel not ready, then you need to be spending time, more time than you've ever spent, reading God's Word, waking up, getting in there, turning on the light, wherever you like to go, get your cup of coffee, whatever, and then say, God, light me up.
SPEAKER_00: God, light me up with fire from heaven.
SPEAKER_00: God, I've got my journal here.
SPEAKER_00: You tell me what to do today, I'm ready to go.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm telling you, you'll be fired up.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be so excited.
SPEAKER_00: And you'll be like, when, you know, you'll be counting the hours to get in here on Sunday morning to worship and hear God's word because you're fired up for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And that's most of you already, but you'll get more fired up and more excited for him.
SPEAKER_00: Alright, so look at verse 17.
SPEAKER_00: 17, and then I'm just gonna stop with the helmet of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Because we'll get into the sword of the Spirit next time, which is the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: There's just too much to say on that.
SPEAKER_00: So, fifth, stand on salvation, the helmet.
SPEAKER_00: Lots of helmets today.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody wears a helmet.
SPEAKER_00: Back when I was a kid, nobody wore a helmet except football players.
SPEAKER_00: You know, now everybody wears a helmet.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta you gotta wear a helmet to skateboard, man.
SPEAKER_00: And I skateboarded as a kid, and and I mean, I would go out at 11 p.m.
SPEAKER_00: at night with my best friend Brian Bidal, and I would, he had this TR6, and I had uh Opal GT, and man, we we'd gun it, and we'd go to these uh big North Lake Mall, which is outside, which is outside on the outskirts of Atlanta where I grew up.
SPEAKER_00: Big, big hilly uh parking lot.
SPEAKER_00: And um and then we would just skateboard until like 1 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: And we would just skateboard all through there and everything.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody wore a stupid helmet.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: But everybody wears a helmet now.
SPEAKER_00: And here's why.
SPEAKER_00: The reason is it's because of concussions.
SPEAKER_00: We didn't know about concussions back then, and now we know about concussions.
SPEAKER_00: It's a good thing.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying it's bad.
SPEAKER_00: I did my kids were skateboarding, so you probably should wear a helmet.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I probably wouldn't, but I mean I should say that.
SPEAKER_00: Um but you wear a helmet, you know, and everything, and everybody wears a helmet for everything, and even hockey players wear helmets.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't wear helmets back when I was, nobody wore a helmet.
SPEAKER_00: But anyway, everybody wears a helmet because of concussions.
SPEAKER_00: Now, listen, some of you are having way too many spiritual concussions.
SPEAKER_00: You're forgetting who you are.
SPEAKER_00: You're forgetting you've had a few knocks, you've had a few hard things, and you're having a spiritual concussion because you're not putting on the helmet of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: You're not doing that.
SPEAKER_00: You need to put on the helmet of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: That means protect your mind.
SPEAKER_00: Now, helmets, physical helmets protect the brain, but a spiritual helmet is to protect your mind.
SPEAKER_00: Because there's a lot of arguments out there going against what we believe.
SPEAKER_00: And some of us here in this room, you are listening to these arguments, you're not renewing your mind, and you're gonna lose your faith in the process.
SPEAKER_00: I love this axiom.
SPEAKER_00: Sow a thought, reap an action.
SPEAKER_00: Sow an action, reap a habit.
SPEAKER_00: Sow a habit, reap a character, sow a character, reap a destiny.
SPEAKER_00: This is the law of sowing and reaping.
SPEAKER_00: That actually your destiny, if you took the very last word destiny, and you took the very first line, sow a thought.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, a thought can actually reap a destiny.
SPEAKER_00: That's the process of how it happens, but you see how powerful thoughts are?
SPEAKER_00: How powerful it is to think?
SPEAKER_00: It's the hardest thing to get Christians to do is to think.
SPEAKER_00: Think about what you're doing.
SPEAKER_00: Because we tend to be guided by our emotions more than our thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: In 2 Corinthians 10, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing, every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, bringing every thought, every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: This is super hard.
SPEAKER_00: Extremely hard to do.
SPEAKER_00: To take our thoughts to obedience to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: But winners do that, and losers don't.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, if you're losing a lot in your life, you're probably not renewing your mind enough.
SPEAKER_00: You're not renewing your thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: I really have enjoyed this series, I think it was seven or eight episodes called In the Arena about Tom Brady.
SPEAKER_00: And one thing you can say about Tom Brady is the guy knows how to renew his mind.
SPEAKER_00: He is so incredibly focused at being a great quarterback.
SPEAKER_00: Physically, mentally, emotionally.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that is that is his thing, you know?
SPEAKER_00: And it's and it's a shame that people in the world are often way better at this than people in the church.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to say, spirit of passivity, be gone in this church and put a warrior spirit upon the people of the road.
SPEAKER_00: May we have a warrior spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Renew your mind, renew your thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: You're getting bombarded with legacy media and all kinds of stuff all the time.
SPEAKER_00: It's lies, folks.
SPEAKER_00: It's deceptive.
SPEAKER_00: And if we don't renew our minds with the word and with promises and with truth and put on the belt of truth, we will gradually, gradually find ourselves losing our destiny.
SPEAKER_00: And I want us to fulfill our destiny in this church.
SPEAKER_00: I want us to be a church of destiny.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to be a person of destiny.
SPEAKER_00: But you gotta fight for it.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, thanks for listening to the Road Podcast.
SPEAKER_00: It's been my joy to be a part of your life today.
SPEAKER_00: And you know, that's part of what we do here at The Road, and this is what I do in having this Road Podcast, is to empower people to change their world.
SPEAKER_00: My passion and desire is that you would take God's word through the power of the Holy Spirit and make that relevant for your life.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the reality is that God has placed your life here on this earth to make a difference.
SPEAKER_00: And if you'd like more information about how to grow in Christ, if you need prayer, if you want more equipping in different areas of your life, go to the road.org.
SPEAKER_00: God bless you.