Message 01-22-06

Series: Narnia - Behind the Scenes

Scripture: Ephesians 6:10-20

Title: Putting on Armor

Intro:

I was invited to come and speak to an African-American men’s group called "Men of Destiny" one day, back when I was working in Philadelphia. There were 300 plus men gathered for dinner, numerous presentations and discussion. These were men who lived on the edge of the city but who knew the city. Most of them were family men who still felt a pull to do something for their old neighborhoods. It was an inspiring evening and I had a small part to play.

Part of what I wanted to do was to recruit men from this group to work with the inner-city ministry in which I worked then. I started out my remarks to them by saying, "Now you may not be able to tell this, just by looking at me, but I’m a white kid who was raised in the suburbs." They enjoyed that, but I went on to talk with them about the difference between my bringing the good news of Jesus, of being a mentor to teenagers in the city and their possible work. My encouragement to them was that they would be more authentically and easily accepted and trusted.

It was after I sat down that one of the men at my table taught me about my own subtle prejudice. He said to me, "Don’t sell yourself short. "Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."

And what I did I do at that moment? I actually argued with him about it. But he was kind and waited for me to get it. And I did after a little. There was a time when I was sure of what I could do and what I couldn’t do. I’ve come to trust myself a little less and God a little more. I’ve changed. I’ve learned something about the difference between dealing with just what my eyes see and my ears here and seeing God’s point of view and hearing God’s guidance.

"The kingdom of God is at hand," Jesus said. Right here. It’s right at the end of your fingertips. When you enter it, everything changes. The world, our world, becomes much bigger. I thought that flesh and blood were the bigger problems at one time. I learned that wasn’t even the battle to fight. The real battles are much bigger. And the good news is that we have more help than we sometimes realize.

Study

When we enter the kingdom of God we realize there’s more to life than we knew. Like the children entering Narnia – all of a sudden the world becomes more, bigger. One of the first things we learn though is that on the other side of the doorway is a White Witch. And the bigger problem beyond that is that the White Witch rules.

We’re looking behind the scenes of "Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" and just to bring you up to speed, this is the story by CS Lewis that was just turned into a motion picture. In it we see four children, Lucy, Edmund, Susan and Peter – the Pevensie children – find a doorway into a world called Narnia. Narnia is also a land. [IMAGE – MAP] And in this land it is always winter, but never Christmas.

Just as a reminder, when CS Lewis wrote the story of Narnia he said he didn’t intend to retell the story of Christianity, but to instead imagine what would it be like for God to work in another world. As a man who had been an atheist for a large part of his life, he came into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and came to understand that the world was a bigger place than just what he saw and experienced with his senses. So he explored that and one way he did it was through these books – The Chronicles of Narnia.

Something he realized right away is that discovering the work of God and the goodness of God doesn’t make the evil around us disappear. If anything we realize even more just how strong it is. And then we realize just how little we are.

When we enter the kingdom of God we see life more clearly. That’s when we realize there’s a white witch running around. [IMAGE -Witch] And the White Witch seems unbeatable. She has incredible power and she seems to have all the answers. [IMAGE – Witch and Edmund] Edmund falls into her clutches and he betrays his family, his friends. He betrays people he hasn’t even met.

When we face evil in the world – and evil can be as simple as a job that takes you away from your family to the level of greed that corrupts the work of world-wide corporations. Evil can be as simple as a wayward glance to the kind of destructive craving that destroys marriages because it just can’t be satisfied. Evil can be as simple as fudging on your taxes and as immense as destroying the livelihood of others because you want a tax break. Evil can be as simple as cheating by copying someone’s homework to creating a resume out of air so you can get a job. Evil can be as simple as having some body part changed – just for vanity’s sake – to demanding your children act a certain way so that you don’t look bad to the people who’s opinion "makes a difference" in society. When we face evil in the world we realize that it is very large, it is everywhere and it’s hard to fight against.

When we face evil we should realize that it isn’t something to joke about. It is very strong and it grabs hold of us and demands that we do what it says. How do you fight against something that is so pervasive that you can’t even tell that it’s grabbed you? We excuse ourselves when it’s a "little thing." We tell ourselves that it’s not a big deal. We convince ourselves that everyone does this kind of thing at some point. We’re no better or worse than anyone. We say we’ll stop. We say no one’s getting hurt. We say we don’t really have another choice. We say it’s too big and this is just the way the world works. We say I’m actually a good person and I’m doing the best that I can. We say it’s because of other people, it’s their fault that we have to do it.

Do you see the problem with this? Everything is about us. It’s all about me. When we do things that are wrong it’s all about taking care of ourselves. Edmund goes off into the world of Narnia and it’s all about him. He totally misses out on the only way to fight against this. Not being able to fight this by focusing on ourselves should reveal how we can fight. There is only one thing that works.

Let’s look at this another way. Think about Alcoholics Anonymous. If the issue was seen as one that is right and wrong, I believe alcoholics would remain alcoholics. The only thing that helps alcoholics escape the grip of alcohol is relationship. We have people in this room who know that’s the truth. A relationship that walks alongside you in the hardest times without judging you just for having a craving, just because you feel like you can’t live without it… when someone walks alongside us because they love us and we can love them… that’s the only thing that makes a difference. The only thing that gets us out is love.

Love is a spiritual force. You know that right? Love is a spiritual force. God is love. Love is a personal spiritual force. And love gives us the tools to fight against evil. Loves gives us armor.

Putting on armor – is a tough concept for some people these days. [IMAGE – armor] It’s tough, not because armor is an old idea that brings up images of knights and kings. It’s tough because it sounds like war. We had a crowd of pastors and church leaders in our place here yesterday. In our worship service – that was led by our worship band – we sang "Onward Christian Soldiers". One of the folks in our church noticed a woman who sat down – decidedly sat down – and didn’t sing. People look at "Onward Christian Soldiers" as a problem – as a war song. It is a war song. But it is warfare of a spiritual kind.

The problem with war is we have to have an enemy. The problem with war is that we can’t just say we have an enemy we have to make sure that everyone knows how bad this enemy is so we can get angry enough to fight against them. It’s hard work to get angry enough to want to go to war. But there’s an even greater problem… as Christians how were we told to treat our enemies. Man… how do we do this? Do we just become doormats? Do we just let evil walk all over us.

This is difficult. We can’t just sum this up in 20 minutes. This is something we need to talk about, to think about. We need each other. We need a community to understand together how we are going to handle this kind of problem. I mean – I’m not a pacifist. I know that. I have shared with you before that I come from an angry past. I come from a destructive past. I know what rage is and satisfying it feels to break and destroy and crush. That is not a happy thing.

I want to strike out on my own. I want to react quick and respond with power. How many times did I have to learn that I was destroying the wrong thing before I began to stop?

As Christ followers we are under someone else’s orders. We are marching as to war, but we have a standard leading us, a standard we are supposed to live up to. It’s the cross of Jesus. [IMAGE – Stone Table] There are only two ways to deal with this kind of problem. We have to become humble enough to receive and we have to fight with the weapons that will work in the kind of fight that will actually make a difference.

Our Scripture tells us that we need to be humble enough to receive:

Receive direction – Be strong in the Lord

Receive power – and in his might. {Not our own]

Receive the tools needed – the armor of God

Receive protection – because the enemy is stronger than we are

And these are the weapons that we fight with:

Truth

Righteousness

Gospel peace

Faith

Salvation

The Word of God

Prayer

These are the only weapons that will make a difference. Desmond Tutu came to town the other day and brought a message. Without forgiveness there is no future. The enemies were very clear to the people of South Africa in the times of apartheid. The enemies were very clear after the time of apartheid, but the people of that country will never be able to build a country until they are able to forgive. How do they pray without forgiving? How do they work with each other without forgiving? How do they forgive the people who tortured and killed and segregated their people for years? How do they fight against the kind of evil that should produce retribution?

Only with

Truth – you can’t pretend it didn’t happen

Righteousness – not our own, but the gift of God

Gospel peace – the power that beat evil

Faith – that abiding relationship that allows you to move ahead

Salvation – that protection that keeps you safe even if you die

The Word of God – that guidance of Love

Prayer – that line of communication

We will face evil today. We will face it every day. We will face it every day, perhaps, for the rest of our lives. The only way to fight it that makes a difference is with the armor of God. Because "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.

There was a deeper magic in Narnia. It was a deeper magic than the witch could know or even understand. And so the Lion comes back to life. The only thing that could break the spell, or save Edmund or win the battle was Love.

If you’re a pacifist and can live that way I heartily salute you. But if you’re one of the people who struggles, like I struggle, then I welcome you as a friend. We have to join together. We have to work and struggle together, alongside each other, because if we don’t… we won’t pull this thing off at all.