Arming Yourself with God’s Heavy Metal

“This world is not my home, I’m just a-passing through…”

Recently, I heard my husband belt out that age old hymn over the sound of the lawn mower, his strong voice reverberating off our buildings and fading out over the neighboring hills.

I smiled as I paused from my garden duties and listened. I love hearing him sing.

Now, again I am reminded of these lyrics as we hear concerning reports of ever increasing terror around our world, more marriages becoming statistics, diseases remaining incurable, the list is endless.

There is much to be concerned about. A vast majority are feeling fearful, even living on the edge of defeat. 

And I won’t lie, I feel the sharp stabs of fear try to make its way deep into my heart and mind.

I recognize it by the ways it threatens to overtake my thoughts, paralyze my body, and multiply until it controls my heart and draws me to a place of constant fear and anxiety.

But, I also know the truth.

And the truth is God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. 2 Timothy 1:7

Fear is not from God. Period.

By process of elimination we can figure out who it’s really from and friends, that bad dude has already been defeated in Christ. Be gone, Satan!

Another truth is “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

My thoughts go to the popular saying, “Not my circus, not my monkeys.” But I’m not sure that apply’s here! 🙂

You see, it’s God’s circus and the monkeys He’s dealing with are trying to feed you and I bananas of fear. So we are in the circus.

But we not left defenseless. In fact, we are given a complete suit of heavy metal to put on so we can do effective battle against the fear feeder.

Look at the armor in Ephesians 6:13-18:

The belt of truth – the standard to which we align our lives. God’s standard. We come to know His standard by being well trained and knowledgeable in His word.

The breastplate of righteousness – being in right standing with the Lord by how we apply His standards to our lives. Faith accompanied by action equals righteousness.

The shoes of peace – Jesus Himself is the Prince of Peace.  Putting on the shoes of peace means no matter what we walk into, we do not need to be frightened by the situations and circumstances around us.

We may be going through a storm, but the storm does not need to live in us. Jesus does. There is no place for any other.

The shield of faith – being completely grounded in Who we believe in and living it out in practical everyday ways. This shield, held firmly in place deflects the arrows of the evil one. It boasts of a life lived in right standing with the Lord – the One who has already defeated the enemy.

The helmet of salvation – this is the hat that tells the enemy who you are: a child of God. It reminds him Who he’s messing with when he tries to immobilize you with fear, diseases, doubt…any kind of rotten banana he tries feeding you.

Don’t you dare take this hat off. It boasts of your identity in Christ.

Strap it on and claim your status.

The word of God – the Bible. It’s alive, fresh and new. It’s proven to be God’s and He speaks to us through it. Read it, memorize it, believe it, live it.

The Battle Plan

Right after giving us this a suit of heavy metal, the Lord gives us the battle plan: to “be alert and always keep praying”. (v.18)

The battle we’re in is of spiritual proportions and prayer is where we ask our greatest Warrior to show up to the scene of the greatest battle. 

Guess who wins that one!

Put on the armor of God, this perfect protecting heavy metal, draw your battle lines and pray big.

I’ll leave you now belting out the verses of that old hymn:

Also seen on Satisfaction Through Christ blog.