Lesson 26 - Walking in Strength
Read Ephesians 6:10-17 - https://www.bible.com/bible/59/eph.6.esv
The next way God wants us to walk is in strength. Verse 10 in our passage begins with “be strong in the Lord.” But, notice it doesn’t end there. If it did, we’d think we could do this on our own. The verse continues with, “and in the strength of His might.”
When we accept Jesus as our Savior and join His family, all the things He asks us to do are things impossible for us to accomplish. When we try, we get discouraged and want to quit. God gave us the solution to this a long time before Jesus ever became human, and it’s found in Zechariah 4:6 – “‘not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit’ says the Lord of hosts.” How do we do that? The next two verses give us two basic things we need to be able to do things by His Spirit.
First, verse 11 says we have to be equipped for the battle. No soldier goes out to fight without his protection in place. To try to stand in a battlefield without proper protections means we lose before we have begun. A bullet or any other weapon can catch us even if it’s not aimed at us. We will look at this armor in much greater detail in the next two lessons.
Being prepared for battle also means simply that we are expecting battle. We don’t let it catch us by surprise at every turn. We don’t just blindly walk our life’s path thinking that all is wonderful and beautiful with the world around us. We must be on the look-out for enemy activity.
The second thing we desperately need is to know who our enemy is. If we don’t know who the enemy is, we might be in a position of throwing weapons at those who are with us – in modern language that’s called friendly fire or civilian casualties. Under no circumstances do we want to damage the wrong target.
Verse 12 tells us who our true enemy is – “we do not wrestle against flesh and blood” tells us who our enemy is NOT. Our enemy is not someone who is flesh and blood – in other words our enemy is never another human being. Our true enemy is “the rulers, the authorities, the cosmic powers over this present darkness, the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Our true enemy is Satan.
Can we see Satan? No. We fight a battle with someone we can’t see. Therefore it is doubly important that we let our Commander, Jesus Christ, call our actions. We must depend on Him to make sure we have the right target coordinates. Trust Him. Walk in “the strength of His might” knowing He can see.
*We must be _____ for battle.
*We must be _____ for battle.
*Our true enemy is _____