 Good morning, everybody. You guys doing good? Man, what a privilege it is to gather together, to worship together, to look at God's word together. I was talking to a friend of mine this last week who's a missionary in Asia, and he was talking about how in Asia and Algeria and some other places, China, where they've actually recently knocked down church buildings that the church was gathering in have posted sealed notifications from the government on the door that churches cannot meet together anymore. They've taken people's Bibles away from them, and still those churches are thriving and growing and loving Jesus and gathering together. And the reason why I bring that up is I think sometimes you and I could do really well to have reminders about how blessed we are to freely gather, to worship God, and to actually own our own copies of Scripture. So if you have your Bibles, take it out this morning. Honor it, treasure it, love it. I know that we live in a country where we stick them in hotel drawers and download them onto our smartphone devices, and however we gotta do it to get it, but we should always have a deep appreciation and honor for the word of God, and the privilege that we have of always getting together and worshiping with other saints. So, so glad to see you guys this morning, looking forward to seeing everybody tonight as part of Team Radiant at our gathering at 5 p.m. We're gonna pray together, we're gonna share vision for what God is about ready to do in Radiant Church. So if you're part of Team Radiant, look forward to seeing you tonight. Look with me at Ephesians chapter six, Ephesians chapter six. Title of the message this morning is arm yourself. Arm yourself. And this is a continuation of our battle series as we're looking at the subject of spiritual warfare. Look with me here, beginning in verse number 13. Paul writes this. 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, stand therefore having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness and shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish the flaming darts of the evil one, and take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God praying at all times in the spirit with all prayer and supplication. So as we've said at the beginning of every message, this entire series, let's do it again. The Christian life is not like a battle. The Christian life, it is a battle. There is no demilitarized zone if you are a follower of Jesus. You can't wave the white flag and say, I'm like Switzerland. I don't wanna be in the fight. Can't we all get along? Now, if you're on the Enneagram and you're on number nine and you don't like conflict and you're the peacemaker, I wanna remind you that Jesus said, blessed are the peacemakers, but he didn't say blessed are the peacekeepers. Sometimes the way that you make peace is you have to win battles. And the way that we step into the peace of God is we have to turn our back on the enemy and towards our face, turn our face towards the Lord. And the other thing that we've said in this entire series of this, that we are not wrestling against flesh and blood. People are not our enemies, but we are wrestling against principalities and powers and spiritual hosts of wickedness. So our enemy is not people. It's not people that look like us. It's not people that are different from us. It's not people that think they're our enemy. How many know in this world there will be people, even if you say they're not your enemy, they will say, no, I'm your enemy. But we see from an eternal perspective, when we say, even when they say that they're our enemy, we say, well, you might wanna be my enemy, but you see, Jesus called me to love my enemies and to pray for those who persecute me and spitefully use me. So I'm going to wrestle in the spiritual battle that is being fought in the heavenlies so that God is able to rescue those who self-identify as my physical enemies on this earth so they can find freedom like I found freedom. Like 14 people think that's a good idea and kind of nodded and the rest of us are like, I don't get that, I wanna fight. Listen, if you're a fighter, it's good, but you gotta fight the right battles. You gotta fight the right enemy. We gotta know the battlefields that we are engaged in. And let me just communicate this because we need to know this, that every believer, whether you like it or not, you are in a spiritual battle. You have a Jesus-sized target on your back. Jesus said, you are either for me or you are against me. There's no in the middle, there's no demilitarized zone. And there are several different battlefields that every single one of us find ourselves engaged in a battle in. Number one, the first battlefield that you are engaged in is your flesh. It's your old sinful human nature. The Bible calls it flesh. It's not talking about physical flesh and blood. It's not your body is not the enemy. This physical body someday will be redeemed by Jesus when he returns at resurrection. This mortal body will put on immortality. But when the Bible is talking about flesh, it's talking about, I think the NIV says it's your sinful human nature. Your sinful human nature. When you get born again and you are saved and you become a Christian because you've repented of your sins and placed your trust in Jesus, your spirit is saved. The inside of you, the deepest part of who you are, that's the part that's recreated in the image of God. Your heart becomes the Holy of Holies where the Holy Spirit dwells. But you still live in a flesh and blood reality and connected to that is you have an old sinful human nature. That's the part of you where temptation dwells. That's the part of you that has appetites and urges to do things that are contrary to the word of God. That's the part of you where you say, I know God says that, but I think my way is better. That's where pride gets elevated. And you know, that's the first battlefield that all of us engage in on a regular basis. It's the battle for giving dominance to the Holy Spirit and actually crucifying the flesh. It's what Paul meant when he said this in Galatians 2.20. I am crucified with Christ. And it is no longer I that live, but Jesus now lives in me and through me. And the life I now live, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. What does Jesus, or does Paul mean when he says I'm crucified and I don't live anymore? He means I've taken the old me, the old Paul, the fleshly me, and I've let Jesus win the battle. How many know that you're gonna fight the battle of the flesh almost every single day of your life? Because the flesh is a reality. It's a part of you that says I love Jesus, but I want my way. Anybody ever thought that? Nobody? I'm in a holy church. Can I just tell you all about your pastor for a minute? My flesh is loud. My flesh is like I want what I want and it thinks things. Sometimes it doubts things. Sometimes it wrestles with what God says and that's a battlefield. Second battlefield, the second front of your spiritual battle is you're fighting in the world. You are fighting against a way of thinking, a mindset, a grid, a construct, a foundation that is built on values, belief systems, priorities, pure pressure. It's like a matrix that the Bible calls the world's system. Now, John 3.16 says that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. So we love the world as far as the people that are in it because the people that are in this world are actually slaves to sin and the world's constructs that is under the control of Satan that Jesus, the Son of God, came to redeem out so that we would no longer be slaves, we would become sons in the kingdom of God. So we're in this world, God loves the world, so why shouldn't we love the world? Because there's a difference between the people in the world and the actual system and reality of the world. First John chapter two says this, do not love the world or the things that are in it for all that is in the world is not of the Father, it is the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and the pride of life and none of these things are from the Father and all of these things are fading away. In other words, the kingdom is coming. But it says don't love the world, lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, pride of life. We live in a world system that is, if you could see it, the invisibility of it, it's like steel girders building this broken and fallen world. It's why we have the problems, the systemic issues. It's why we have the spiritual battles that are going on because we're living in a world that right now is under the sway of the evil one. He's called the God of this world, the God of this age, the devil. And we're living in a world even though we are not of this world. How many of you have ever seen like on National Geographic channel, they have these shows on aliens. Anybody ever watched those shows on aliens? Come on, raise your hand, you know you have. I've watched them. And they talk about ancient aliens. Can I just tell you, there are aliens on this planet. It's Christians. You're an alien because you're from another world. Your citizenship is in heaven, according to Philippians chapter three. Second Corinthians says that you're an ambassador of Christ. Where is Christ? He's in heaven. Which means you are a political representative of a kingdom. Jesus, when he was standing before a pilot, said that if my kingdom were of this world, then my followers would take up arms and they would fight. But my kingdom is not of this world. If his kingdom isn't of this world, that means your kingdom isn't of this world. We are aliens, we are strangers, we are not of this world. So the next time you look in the mirror, realize you're looking at an alien. Your front room is area 51 because you are from the kingdom of God. You're not of this world, but you're in this world. And we gotta win the battle against the spirit of this world so that we walk in the fullness of the kingdom of God. Third battlefield that we fight against is the devil himself. Jesus described the devil in John chapter 10. He says, the thief comes to steal, to kill and to destroy. There is a real devil. There are real demons. He is a created being by God. He is not God's equal. He fell, he was thrown out of heaven because pride and arrogance and rebellion were found in him. There's coming a day when God is going to judge the devil and put him away along with all the other demons. But in the meantime, evil spirits are still functioning in this world to deceive, to tempt, to infirm and to destroy human beings. And his greatest tactic is convincing human beings that he does not exist. Oh, he's not real. That's just an old fairy tale. You know, there's no devil. Well, Jesus dealt with the devil. Jesus confronted the devil. Jesus cast out the devil. The devil is a very real spiritual entity. And just because you don't believe in him doesn't stop him from working in your life. You can say, oh, you want, well, I don't believe in the devil. I'm boycotting the devil. Well, guess what? It doesn't mean he's gonna leave you alone. Satan doesn't go, wow, they don't believe in us anymore. So let's move on down the road to Africa where there's still, you know, super naturalists or let's go to India or let's, you know, let's go to South America where they still believe in supernatural things. In America, they don't put up with us. Guess what? He doesn't need your permission. He's camouflaged in a whole lot of other things. And that is the third battlefield. Now, let me ask you a question. Has anybody who's listening to me ever shown up at an event in which you were dressed inappropriately for? If you ever shown up at like a restaurant where there's like, excuse me, sir, you have to wear a jacket. And so we just happened to have one and it's 14 sizes too big for you and it's plaid. And they actually want to humiliate you by forcing you to wear it as you sit down for dinner so that the rest of the room all goes, that guy didn't know. He showed up in a T-shirt and jeans. But now he has a plaid tweed size 52 jacket on. And have you ever shown up at a Halloween party that was a non-costume Halloween party? You showed up and you're in your Spider-Man tights and nobody else is dressed in an outfit and may happen to you this week, I don't know. Have you ever shown up at that? Jane and I were at a wedding one time where somebody showed up wearing a white dress. It's like, don't you know, you don't wear a white dress at somebody else's wedding. Even I know that. Do you know, the worst thing that can happen to you is to show up every single day of your life, a follower of Jesus and not be dressed for battle. To assume that your life is meant to be a country club when in reality it's a battlefield. Imagine yourself walking onto a battlefield where there's armies and there's barbed wire and there's ditches and there's landmines and you show up in your flip-flops in your bathing suit and your sunglasses on because you just think that this is vacation time. What's gonna happen when you walk out onto the battlefield? You are gonna become a casualty because here's what happens. When we take the battle casually, we end up a casualty. We have got to put on the armor of God. That's what Paul's talking about here. Putting on the full armor of God so that we can stand against the enemy so that we'll be able to stand firm in the evil day. Make no mistake about it, we are living in evil days. If you wanna be able to stand firm, if you wanna win the war, if you wanna stand strong against the strategies and the schemes of the enemy on any one of these three battlefields, you've gotta have the armor of God on. You've gotta be dressed appropriately. What's interesting is that Paul wrote this of all of this teaching about the armor of God. He wrote it most likely from jail. See, Paul was arrested multiple times but he was in jail for a lengthy period of time for one cause. Was it theft? No, was it murder? No. Was Paul arrested and jailed because he did something illegal? Yes, what did he do that was so bad that caused him to be arrested and put in chains? Well, what he did in the first century in the midst of the Roman Empire is he preached Jesus Christ as king. He said this, Jesus is Lord. We all say that because that's something that's common to say in church. We sing it. I want everybody to say it with me. No matter where you are, just say it out loud. Say, Jesus is Lord. Go ahead. Jesus is Lord. I'm gonna say it one more time. Say, Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. Now we say that and we write it under our eyes in our football makeup or whatever guys do and we put it on billboards, but do you know that in first century if you would have said that to the wrong person that could send you to jail? Because it was a politically subversive statement. In Rome, there was a belief that Caesar was called in fact there are coins that are minted that say Caesar is the savior of the world. That the message of the Roman Imperial Army was Pax Romana, which meant the peace of Rome. They believed that when their soldiers and their armies went and conquered lands they were bringing peace with them. The message that was announced in a community when the Roman army was coming was called the gospel. Somebody would come and proclaim good news. Rome is about ready to come in and conquer you and bring their culture with them. And if you lived in a Roman province like in modern or an ancient Turkey they would actually have bronze busts of heads and shoulders of the emperor that you would burn incense to and you had to make a declaration to get a business license and it said, Caesar is Lord. You did that, they stamped your papers, you could do business, you could be, whatever the case might be. The only people in the empire that refused to do that were Christians. And Paul turned it around and he says, let me tell you who's Lord, Jesus is Lord. And when he preached that, you read the book of Acts it says that they preached another king. It was a subversive message. That's why Paul got sent to prison. So as he's sitting in a prison and he's riding through one of his assistants to the churches that he had started, Ephesus, one of them, he writes to them, or he's having his assistant write to them because he's probably chained up. He's trying to find a way to communicate to believers about the darkness that they are enduring, the persecution they are going through, the loss that they are feeling, the fear that is crippling to them. And he's trying to get through to them about we're engaged in a spiritual battle. How do we need to prepare ourselves? And he looks and most likely he's within two to three feet away from a Roman soldier who's watching guard over him. A Roman soldier is the most intimidating soldier of his day. The Roman army was the most intimidating, most powerful, authoritative military machine that the world had ever seen. They had warfare down to a science. And here Paul is in jail, chained to a wall for preaching the gospel and he looks up as he's trying to write the Holy Spirit, grabs a hole in his heart and says, tell him to put the full armor of God on. Not the armor of a Roman soldier, but the armor of God. And he looks at the soldier that's next to him and he says, that's exactly it. And then he writes under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, not just to them but to us even to this day, about the importance of armoring up, of arming ourselves for the battle that we're engaged in. And he starts this list by talking about the belt of truth. Look at how he says, therefore take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand. And then he says, having fastened on the belt of truth. The belt of truth. Here's where Paul starts. He's looking at the soldier and he starts at the belt. And it's interesting to me that he starts with the belt because that's not where most of us would start. But Paul understood the significance of the belt. I actually like the King James translation better here. I know it's old and archaic, but that, I mean, sometimes old and ancient and archaic just has some teeth to it. He says, gird up your loins. I'm gonna try that on for size. It's really politically nice to just say, put your belt of truth down. No, I like, gird up, gird yourself with the belt of truth, gird up your loins. We don't use that kind of language in our day, but maybe we need to. Because the loins was actually the abdominal part of a human where it was believed that your seat of your personality and your affections was held. That's why if you've ever read the King James Bible or grew up hearing the King James that talks about the bowels of your affections. Ha, write that in your next Valentine card to your wife, honey, my bowels are filled with affection towards you. It'll thrill her heart. They believed that the heart, the center of a person was actually in their bowels, your kidneys, your liver. That's why when you read Proverbs and it talks about an arrow penetrating your liver, it's talking about literally taking your life, your essence. Peter uses the same type of language about girding up the loins of your mind, talking about the center of your affections. That's why Paul starts here. It's at the center of your being, we need to put on the most important pivotal piece of armor, which is this girdle, this belt, that a soldier wore that protected the abdominals, of which every other piece of the fixed armor, the breastplate of righteousness and even the boots are connected. It becomes the lynchpin, the anchor by which everything else is connected. Even a shield would be latched to it so that you could lift it up. And if you had to let go of it, it would just hang. The sword would be put into the belt of truth. The boots were connected all the way up into the girdle. And the reason why it's called a girding is because in ancient times, people wore gowns in tunics. But when you wanted to run, you had to pull it up so that you ran, you didn't trip over it. But when a soldier went into battle, he put this whole contraption on a girdle, a belt of truth, so that all of it would be held together and it would be bunched up so he was free to move, free to fight and not be encumbered. That's what Paul starts here with, belt of truth. You see, a belt has a lot more to do with functionality than just looks. I know in art today, belts just are kind of a afterthought. They're kind of a fashion statement. Ladies, you guys will put on belts. They're not even attached to anything. It's like, just shift them and got it over here and we've got beaded belts and braided belts and we've got like star-skinned hutch belts. When I was a kid, there was two rules in my stepdad when you dress. Number one, you tuck your shirt in at all times. Even to this day, it's always like, why are your shirts always untucked? So you just always tucked your shirt in. He was military. Second thing is if it has belt loops, you wear a belt. So my swimsuit had belt loops. So I had a swimsuit that had belt loops and I had one of those elastic belts with the magnet buckles. You guys remember those? That I had to wear with my swimsuit. My friends were always like, why are you wearing a belt? Cause it's got loops. The belt Paul is writing about is called the belt of truth. It's called the belt of truth. It protects the center of our being and it's which all the other pieces of armor connect to. That's why Paul starts here. The importance of truth. What's he talking about? He's not just talking about philosophical truth. He's talking about foundational truth by which we build everything else in our life. You see all these pieces of armor that Paul's talking about have to do with our minds just like in 1 Peter where it says, gird up the loins of your mind. I love this particular scripture. 1 Peter 4 once is since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourself with the same way of thinking, with the same mind. So it has all of these pieces of armor have to do with our mind, with our attitude, with our posture, which the way that we see the world, the way that we live our lives, they're not just physical pieces. What I don't want you doing is tomorrow getting on Amazon and ordering literal pieces of Roman centurion armor, getting dressed in the morning and going to work and it's like I'm a Christian and I got my armor on. You will be safe from physical attack, but you will still be vulnerable to demonic attack. Now this is armor that has to do with our heart, with our belief systems, with the foundations of our life. That's why he starts at the place called truth. Gird yourself up, protect who you are and set a foundation so that all the other attitudes and the things that you need to arm yourself with are steady, are fixed, are in place. And he says this belt is, we've got to make a determination that truth is going to be the belt that we wrap ourselves in and steady ourselves with. Listen to what Jesus had to say about truth. John 8 verse 32 through 33, he says, if you abide in my truth or in my word, if you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples and you will know the truth and the truth will. Jesus said this, if you abide in my word, then you are truly my disciples. Notice Jesus didn't say, if you pray a prayer, if you go to church, if you sing a couple songs, if you have a devotional on your iPhone, he says, no, if you abide in my word, what's he talking about? He's talking about his word that this is truth. He says, if you abide in this, you are my disciple and then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. You see, it's not just knowing the Bible, but it's submitting our lives. It's abiding in his word, abiding in Jesus who is the living word that causes us to be his disciple. Because here's what happens in every facet of our life. When we see something that we immerse ourselves into because we see value in it, we become a student of that thing and the more you become a student of that thing, it begins to shape you and affect the way that you see the world, see yourself and how you make decisions and ultimately it will lead you down a path and that path will either lead to freedom or it will lead to bondage. A doctor starts off with a desire to be a medical doctor. So he goes and gets his pre-rex, but then a doctor has to go and do a residency where they actually apply what they've learned and another doctor who's further down the road who's actually an MD, takes a resident and says, now let's take this information that you have and let me show you how to apply it and to make sure that it's true. To prove it out, to see the good, to see when you diagnose somebody like this and you treat them like this and you do it for long enough, then it brings healing in their life. So now it's gone from textbook to practical and practice and ultimately you come to a place where the fruit of it is that you've now become the teacher and you know how in any situation to apply knowledge and make it truth that produces health. Now Jesus said, if you wanna be my disciple, my student, then you'll bide in my word. In other words, you get into God's word and you immerse yourself in this. This is God's word, this is God's truth. Jesus said I am the way, the truth and the life. When we immerse ourselves in God's thoughts, in God's word, not for the sake of just theological arguments, but we actually take that and then we begin to follow the living Jesus in a daily relationship where he shows us application and we submit to that. And then he shows us another truth out of his word and we begin to apply that and we submit to that. That's when Jesus said you'll be my disciples and when you're my disciple, you'll know the truth and the truth will set you free. Now a doctor when he's in college also takes math classes and science classes but he doesn't become an expert and he doesn't become a doctor in math or in science. He becomes an expert in the thing he gives us focus to. My concern is that we as followers of Jesus Christ are mastering other disciplines or being taught by other teachers and we're giving cursory attention and diligence to the one who wants us to be his disciple. Listen, let me tell you one of your pastor's prayers. This is my prayer on a daily basis. As I do this thing, I've talked about it before where it's like physically or spiritually, I x-ray my heart and I sit in the presence of God and I say, God, I do not want to be a professional preacher in an amateur disciple and I appraise my life and I say, Lord, if people from the outside or some other source from the outside was to take all the evidence of my life, the decisions I make, the words I say, the way I spend my time, the way I spend my resources, how I instruct other people, how I love my wife, how I raise my kids. If all of that evidence were to be put together and formulated, what kind of truth would it be and would it look like you? Or would somebody take all of that stuff and add it all up? The values, the things I say I believe, the way I live my life, would they add that up and would they deduct that I am a disciple of somebody else or of something else? Would somebody look at my life and go, oh man, there, he's a hedonist. He lives his life for pleasure, he puts self first and he takes no thought about eternity. You see, if that's what people say, then I'm not really a disciple of Jesus. I might believe in Jesus, but I'm just like a doctor who's taken math classes, I'm not majoring in Jesus. It's possible for us to come to Jesus, to come to church and we minor in Jesus, but we're majoring in other things. Jesus said, if you want to put the belt of truth on, if you want to win the battle, then you got to abide in his word. Think about all the things we saturate ourselves in. Has anybody in here ever, I mean, because we live in the internet age, have you ever Googled something on YouTube that's like a conspiracy theory and just got sucked into it, like Bigfoot? Has anybody ever done this before? Like, oh, you're on YouTube, you're just like Bigfoot, Sighting's a Bigfoot. Have you ever done this? Nobody? Okay, just me. Totally intrigued by Bigfoot, by the way. So I'm like, and there's all these sightings and things and then as soon as that video's done, it leads to another one and another one and another one. Mixing in, you can order books. I've done it on Bigfoot, Loch Ness Monster and all kinds of stuff like this and you get sucked into it. It's amazing how you can saturate yourself with something to where, in the middle of a conversation, because you know that you've done this, you're at dinner with somebody and somebody brings up Bigfoot and all of a sudden all the stuff that you've taken in, go, hey, well, wait a second, before you dismiss Bigfoot, do you realize that in Alaska they found a footprint that looks human and it's like 18 inches long, nobody has an 18 inch foot, they've done a diagnosis and everybody's looking at you like, how do you know this? And why do you know this? You only do things that you've immersed yourself in. Have we immersed ourselves in Jesus? Have we immersed ourselves? That's what Jesus means when he says, abide in my word and you will be my disciples and then you will know the truth. Let me tell you what truth is. Truth is the outcome of wisdom applied. Truth is the application of wisdom that has been applied. When we take God's word and we actually walk it out, then we step into truth and it says, and truth sets us free. But there are a lot of things if you become a disciple of them, if you strap them on, they are not truth. They are not the gospel, they are not Jesus and you will see the fruit of what those things produce but instead of you knowing the truth, you will know bondage and the bondage will take you captive. There are a lot of things in this world, beloved, that wanna take you captive and they look good and they say, hey, make this your truth. Immerse yourself in this, become a student of this. And if you do it, you will see the fruit of that thing when it comes to an end. We have this thing called the gospel, which is good news, it's powerful. Paul said, I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ for it is the power of God unto salvation, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. We can use this gospel for protection. It's a gift that God has given to us. It's truth that is foundational in our life. But we are the ones who've gotta put it on because let me just tell you this morning, there are some things that only God can do for you. How many know that there's some things only God can do? You need a miracle in your life, only God can do that. You can't manufacture a miracle. You can want a miracle, you can need a miracle but only God can do a miracle. That's the definition of a miracle. How many know that you can't save yourself? You better know that, you can't save you. You are lost in your sins far away from God but when you were weak and without strength in that moment God sent Jesus into the world and salvation is the free gift of God. You can't earn it, you can't save yourself. Only God can do that. You can't change yourself. Philippians chapter one says, he who began a good work in you, salvation will be faithful to complete it until the day of the Lord Jesus Christ which means when God starts genuinely in your heart he will be the one who faithfully finishes it in your life. He will sanctify you, make you like Jesus. So we cooperate with that. So there's some things only God can do but let me tell you there's some things only you can do. There's some things only you can do. Only you can obey. You make that decision. Only you can arm yourself. He says, arm yourself. Take up the armor of God. Number one, put on the belt of truth. Number two, the breastplate of righteousness. Breastplate of righteousness. What is a breastplate of righteousness? Well, a soldier would put it on, hardened leather and wood and steel with the insignia of the Roman Empire in the center of it. You strapped it over your shoulders and it hooked into the belt of truth. And so when arrows came flying at you they would hit the breastplate that protected your vital organs, your lungs, your heart, javelins, swords, fists, feet, whatever the enemy came at you with the breastplate would protect your vital organs. Protect, keep your heart pumping. And he calls it the breastplate of righteousness. That is our position in Christ. Second Corinthians chapter five verse 21 says this. It's talking about what took place on the cross. A great exchange took place. It says that God made him, Jesus, who knew no sin to become sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ. A great exchange took place on the cross. Jesus who knew no sin. What do you think about that? God in the flesh, Jesus was tempted as a human in every way that you and I can be tempted. Hebrews says that we do not have a high priest who is not sympathetic and aware of our weaknesses. He knows our weaknesses. Jesus was tempted. It's easy to look at Jesus and say, well, he wasn't, it wasn't real temptation. No, it was, he hungered. Do you know that Jesus felt betrayal but he didn't get offended? Jesus felt hunger, but he didn't give in to his appetites. Jesus was tempted with power but he didn't surrender or take the shortcut. Jesus was mocked, ridiculed, but he didn't choose vengeance. He was sinless. Jesus knew nothing of shame or guilt or what it meant to be separated from the Father ever in eternity past and even in his physical life as a man who is also fully God. He never knew what it was like to have a moment of separation from the heart of the Father, never. He did not know the weight and the guilt of shame. He didn't know that when he was on the cross, completely innocent, the Bible says that God put all of our sin, our shame, our death sentence, our judgments. The very things that should send you to hell for eternity were put on Jesus. And it was the first time that he ever felt distance, separation, shame. He cried out, Father, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It says that in Hebrews, it was for the joy that was set before him that he endured the shame. Who's shame wasn't his shame, our shame. Our sin, our guilt was put on him. But when the Father turned away from him, turned his face away from Jesus, who had become sin, just think about that. Your sin, every human being's sin past, present, and future was put on Jesus in one moment. And the Father who's holy turned away, but when he sees you and I now, he doesn't see us through the lens of our shame and our sin and our guilt. Things that we've done wrong. He doesn't see us through our fears. He doesn't see us through our doubt and unbelief. See, the Bible says that he who knew no sin became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God and Jesus Christ. Jesus, when he was on the cross, willingly surrendered his right standing before God. His righteousness, his purity, his innocence was given to us if we believe by faith in Jesus. If we make him the Lord of our lives, we don't stand before God with any of our stuff anymore. That was on Jesus. Now we stand before God in robes of white, pure, spotless innocence. And when God the Father sees you now, he doesn't see your last mistake or any of your mistakes. He sees the blood of Jesus. He looks at you just like he looked at Jesus, the Son for all eternity. He sees you right before him. Because Jesus paid all, all to him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. The breastplate of righteousness is every day we get up and we put that on anchor to the truth because the only reason we believe that is because God's truth says it's true and we choose to believe that over our circumstances. We choose to believe that we're right with God over the temptations that we're facing. We choose to say my identity is not found in my sin or my temptation. I am in Christ. I am beloved. I am accepted. I am predestined towards good works. I am a child of God. I am clean. I am spotless. And we put on that breastplate of righteousness so that we can withstand against the onslaught of the tempter. We withstand against the onslaught of our past. We withstand against the voices of this age that try and deem us as something other than that. We put on the breastplate of righteousness and we say I am right before God because of what Jesus accomplished on the cross. That's how you win the battle. My God, I'm gonna preach myself happy today. Guys, he's so good. We're not just like preaching theory. This is real. God, would you open up our eyes? See this as reality. You realize this world has been lied to. It's like the world's been pulled over people's eyes. Kanye West, I mean, everybody today is probably talking about that. But you know what? Everybody always talks about other celebrities when they do stupid stuff. So I love the fact that God has encountered Kanye West. It's not because, hey, now we're legit because we got a celebrity. No, it's because he is a walking testimony of at this point in his journey saying I am uncompromisingly choosing Jesus and I'm not gonna back down. I'm not gonna let culture shape me. I'm not gonna let somebody criticize me. I love the fact God takes somebody like that, pulls them out of darkness, puts them into the light, gives them a spotlight and they use it to declare that Jesus is king. But can I tell you something? God doesn't need a Kanye to declare the goodness of God. He's got you. What are you saying? If you could put out an album today, what would your album be? What would be the lyrics of your life? What would be the way that you would respond to the criticism, to the hashtags? What would be the lyrics of your life? Come on, we got a melody to sing. We have a song that's in our heart. We have a testimony to give. It's the power of God. We got to armor up, church. We got to armor up with the grace and the goodness of the Lord. He is here. I want to invite you to stand with me all over this room, all over wherever you are today watching. Would you bow your heads with me in the presence of our good God? Lord, today, help us to suit up, to walk in the spirit, not in the flesh. To walk by faith, not by sight. To prepare ourselves, knowing that the enemy will attack, but we don't fight for a victory. Today, in Jesus, we fight from a place of victory. We're already victorious. We're constantly being led forth in the triumph of Jesus. Lord, help us to remember who we are in you. Help us to keep our eyes on you, the author and the finisher of our faith. Jesus, thank you for your word. It is truth. Thank you for the righteousness that we have, not because of our works, but because of your grace. Lord, help us to walk in this world is light in the midst of darkness, as hope in the midst of hopelessness, as bearers and tellers of truth. Today, I want to invite our prayer ministry team and make their way down to the front, all across the front. And I want you to keep your heads bowed and your eyes closed for just one more moment. Because it seems in these moments of stillness is where God speaks to us the most. And today, there's two particular groups of people I want to address. Number one is, if you're here today and being honest with yourself, you know that you've never surrendered and personally invited Jesus Christ to be your Lord and your personal savior. Today, it's time for you to surrender to God, repent of your sins, acknowledge Jesus' Lord, and invite him to come in and save you. He will. You don't have to earn it today. He's waiting for you to receive it. Acknowledge your need of him to repent, which means to say, God, I've been living for myself and that's wrong and I'm sorry, I'm gonna change, I surrender, come in, save me, wash me, cleanse me, give me a new heart. Today, you may be here and you've never done that. Today is the beginning of a journey for you to walk with God. And in a moment, when everybody's dismissing, I'm gonna invite you to come down to one of our prayer partners and just tell him, just say today, today I need to acknowledge Jesus. I need a relationship with God and we'll pray with you. We believe that God will save each and every one who calls on his name. Second is this, you're already a believer today. You're here, you're a follower of Jesus, but you're in a battle. Jesus feel overwhelmed, you feel hopeless. The enemy's lied to you, he's stole your peace, he's stole your joy, maybe he's stole your health and you're just tempted to just take it. Today, you don't have to take it. God opens a window called prayer where we're able to reach in to the house of our father and receive from him whatever we need. If it's healing today, he's a healer. Freedom from an addiction, a bondage today, he's a deliverer. It's a miracle, he's a way maker. If it's hope, if it's peace, he has all of those things. Today I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna dismiss and when I do today, if you need prayer for anything, we're just gonna open the altars, you come. If you need to receive Christ, you come. You need prayer, you come and receive prayer. Lord today, fill us with joy, fill us with hope. Jesus save us, Jesus heal us, Jesus forgive us. Jesus meet us in this place of prayer today. And Lord as we leave this building, as we walk out of this service, pray that you would unite our hearts. In fact, would you just grab hold of the hands of the person next to you? You don't even need to know them. It's fine. I promise, they don't have cooties. We're one in the spirit. Lord, I pray and we pray for the person whose hands we're holding today. Lord, we need one another. Strengthen us, equip us, unite us. So we leave today, Lord, help us to be the gospel in human flesh for other people to see and hear and know you. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen, amen. God bless you, your dismiss. Come forward if you desire prayer this morning.