The First Rule of Fight Club: What is Spiritual Warfare and why is it Good News? ~ Ephesians 6:10-17 (Sermon Two of Four Part Series)

¹⁰ Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. ¹¹ Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. ¹² For 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. ¹³ Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. ¹⁴ Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, ¹⁵ and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. ¹⁶ In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. ¹⁷ Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. ~ Ephesians 6:10-17

In the 1999 movie Fight Club, two men disillusioned by the world they live in begin hosting fighting clubs where members brawl as a way to reclaim their humanity amidst aimlessness, dreary jobs, and pointless consumerism (It’s more complicated than that but I don’t want to give too much of the movie away). Despite the raw physical character of the fist-fights, they consider what they’re doing a “spiritual war” and begin every meeting with rules which, despite what they say, serve to make the group grow. Each meeting begins with the command: “Welcome to Fight Club. The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is: you DO NOT talk about Fight Club!” Well today we’re going to talk about Fight Club – no, not the movie, but the fight that we as Christians find ourselves in. A fight that I believe, like the movie, is a spiritual war that will help us reclaim our humanity and rightful place in God’s kingdom. A battle that will bring us hope and encouragement. So what is spiritual warfare and why is learning about it good news?

1.    First, spiritual warfare is good news because it's not “your” battle and not “my” battle but “God’s” battle and “our” battle. And the war has been won!

In spiritual warfare, everything is plural! The “you” in vs. 11 is plural. Vs. 12 tells us it’s “our struggle,” and all those verbs are plural – y’all stand, y’all put on, etc. We are not an army of one. We stand together. And our armor even the strength to wield it is not ours but God’s strength working through us. These facts will shape the rest of everything we will talk about. If you believe that you are alone, or imagine that you engage this battle on your own power, it will greatly impact what you believe is important, what you should be doing, and how you should be doing it. Illus. 56 Club and the hot lava game (go to the audio version of the sermon to hear the illus.)

And the battle is good news is because you are not being asked to win it because it has already been won. The decisive victory has already been won by God in Christ on the cross. Earlier in Ephesians, it says that we have been delivered from darkness (Eph. 5:8, 11). So Paul doesn’t even tell us to fight, but to “stand,” that is, to preserve and maintain what has been won. It is because God has won that believers are involved in the battle at all. So the call to stand is itself a reminder of our liberation from the tyranny of the powers. What ultimately protects believers is not our own alertness but that God has already rescued us from bondage and seated us with Christ in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 2:1-10). The battle therefore that we face on a day-to-day basis is understood in the NT as the in-between space between the defeat of powers and their final destruction. During this time, the powers of evil are still active, and so we cannot afford to be complacent but their end is secured.

A helpful analogy for what I’m talking about is the difference between D-Day and V-Day in World War II. D-Day was when the Allied forces landed in Normandy and established a beachhead in Europe. The Allies quickly recognized that the outcome of the war, defeating the Nazis, was decided in June, 1944. But between D-Day, which marked the Allied victory in Normandy, and V-Day, which marked the surrender of the enemy and the Allies' liberation of all of Europe—there were still many months of suffering and struggle. The cross and the resurrection were God's D-Day. God in Jesus by the power of the Spirit fought and won the decisive battle. Although Satan and powers of evil can raise havoc, their power have been broken, and Christ, through the church, is driving back the forces of darkness. God's V-Day isn't yet here. But because of God's triumph on D-Day, we know how it will end.

2.    Spiritual warfare is good news because though the battle is won the struggle is still real. 

Why is that good news? Well – because when you move away from this language of battle and struggle against powers which seek to do us harm the struggle of evil gets foisted upon God. If there’s no battle, no real enemy, then we turn the problem of evil into a problem about God’s goodness – “Why would God do this to me?”. But if there is a real battle then we don’t need to agonize over how some higher purpose might be served by any particular evil event. If the world is indeed caught up in the middle of a real struggle between good and evil forces, evil is to be expected – including evil that serves no higher end. The soldier in the midst of battle doesn’t trouble himself with “why?”. Without a real enemy, evil gets fundamentally framed as a problem of God’s providence and thus of God’s character. So we need to reclaim a theology of resistance rather than a theology of resignation. The former sees our job as standing and saying “no” to the wickedness of our world – to fight. The latter sees our job as often sitting around with our heads in our hands and simply wondering, “Why?” a question which the Bible doesn’t feel the need to answer because it assumes a struggle. Once we establish that a war is occurring, no other particular evils demand explanation. The philosophical perspective of resignation tends to frame the problem of evil as an intellectual problem to solve whereas the biblical one defines our response to the problem of evil as a revolt against “powers and principalities” that we are empowered to wage against. Thus evil should be understood as being what God is unequivocably against and thus what God’s people must fight. This frees us from needing to explain away evil but also allows us also to weep for things that simply aren’t right and the casualties of the fight, e.g. Sixth grader and the Holocaust (go to the audio version of the sermon to hear the illus.).

3.    Third, our battle is good news because it’s not against people.

But if it’s not people that we are fighting then what is it? What are “powers of this dark world” What are the “spiritual forces in the heavenly realms”?

What are “powers and principalities”?: a biblical tour

The phrase archai kai exousia which is translated as “powers and principalities” or “rulers and authorities” is used in the NT ten times. Only two occurrences are in the Gospels (Luke) and clearly reference human political institutions:

¹¹ “When you are brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities, do not worry about how you will defend yourselves or what you will say, ~ Luke 12:11

²⁰ Keeping a close watch on him, they sent spies, who pretended to be sincere. They hoped to catch Jesus in something he said, so that they might hand him over to the power and authority of the governor. ~ Luke 20:20

So when Jesus and Luke talk about conflict with “powers and principalities” they are talking about conflict with human legal and political authorities. The other eight occurrences of archai kai exousia in the NT occur in the Epistles.

²⁴ Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. ~ 1 Corinthians 15:24

¹⁶ For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invincible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. ~ Colossians 1:16

¹⁰ and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. ~ Colossians 2:10

¹⁵ And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. ~ Colossians 2:15

²¹ far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. ~ Ephesians 1:21

¹⁰ His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, ~ Ephesians 3:10

¹² For 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

Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, ~ Titus 3:1

A quick tour of these verses is instructive. The “powers and principalities . . . of the dark world” will be, in the end, “destroyed.” They were created by God and are both in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, and represent the power of government as well as the role or office of those in authority. Christ is spoken as being their “head” and over all of them, has disarmed them and triumphed over them by the cross, and we are told to struggle with them. The final verse, from Titus 3:1, is the only outlier in that it tells us to “be subject” and “obedient.” Now, are these only human political powers, only spiritual powers, or a mix of both? The most obvious answer to me is a “mix of both,” with the exception of Titus 3:1, which clearly points to human political authorities. The reason the Bible mixes and matches human and spiritual powers is because the writers of the Bible don’t think these were different sorts of powers. Rather, they are, manifestations of the same power of the one world. In the ancient mind, spiritual and political powers were always two sides of the same coin. Political power had a divine aspect and spiritual power shaped peoples social, political and cultural existence. This is true today as nations take over all of the cultural, even liturgical elements, of the church (songs, rituals, oaths, identity, etc). So it’s not surprising that the Bible associates these powers with the image of Babylon – the violent, bloody and spiritual symbol of empire that stands against God’s rule and exploits the poor and the weak.

Now we must proceed with a great deal of grace and humility at this point. Many Christians, on either side of the political divide, have jumped into the fray of partisan politics believing that this is what will save our world, transform our society, bring the kingdom. But friends, it’s all part of the same system for which our primary responsibility is to resist. And so if you believe that Donald Trump is the savior or Hillary Clinton is the devil, or vice versa, I encourage you to reaffirm your loyalty to where it should truly lie – with the God who is above both, who loves both, who has disarmed these powers and will sit in judgment over them. And we must call out evil in this system – at this is not always easy to see or do – but the measure or litmus test for how well we are doing it will always be the gospel message of love and forgiveness for all. Interestingly enough, Ephesians 4:26-27 will identify one of the schemes of the devil as “anger”. Our current politics of anger and outrage, the inability to have conversations, to ask questions, to listen critically, will not help us in this fight but are themselves the strategies, the wiles, of the devil. Our common enemy is the devil and his dark forces. We need to work really hard at seeing human beings, even politicians, as captives to larger unseen forces that trap us and manipulate us as pawns in a larger, devilish game, a game that is pushing us toward violence and hateful confrontation, racism, xenophobia, poverty, national exceptionalism, torture, rampant consumerism, lack of respect for life, a broken prison system, the obscene role of money in the political process, etc. Focusing on these larger forces will help create greater capacity for mercy towards flesh and blood people.

And friends, we need to remember that Jesus prayed from the cross, having been crucified by the powers of his day, “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” I believe that Jesus was capable of both standing his ground but also forgiving the people who killed him because he saw them as leaves being blown about by dark forces – political, social, cultural, psychological and historical winds.

4.    Fourth and final, there is a whole armor of God but only one weapon (or maybe one and a half). And the weapon itself if good news!

It should strike us as important to recognize that the “full armor of God” is so short on weapons. Of the 6 pieces offered us only one is offensive – a sword. Moreover, a general description of a historic Roman soldier’s weaponry is helpful. A soldier of a Roman legion would traditionally carry four weapons: two javelins, a dagger, and a sword. So right off the bat, Paul is cluing us into an almost subversive vision of the Christian soldier and Christian warfare – only one weapon. And if that’s true then why is it today that believers assume they need an arsenal and bunkers? They imagine that they need multiple, high-powered weapons for some doomsday scenario of Satanic proportions. Their fear distorts the good news and the weapon itself. So some of you need to put your Uzi down! And quit sharpening your Bible into a pointy weapon. We’ve known such people and know that the Bible can be sharp and destructive in the hands of those who wish to use it badly. Some of us bear the wounds. But it’s not the Bible faults. In fact, the sword in Ephesians 6:17 is not the Bible at all. Here, the words matter. Illus. Jordan and the sword “it’s not a sword” (go to the audio version of the sermon to hear the illus.)

In Ephesians 6:17, the “sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,” is not speaking about Bible but the gospel message, the good news of salvation. The Greek term for “word” in vs. 17 is rhema not logos, which always refers to the spoken “gospel” message NOT the whole of Scripture (e.g. 1 Peter 1:25 “The good news that was announced to you.”) The good news is not pulling out scriptures of judgment, pummeling people with statements about God’s wrath as if you are some OT prophet, or offering mean tweets for Jesus. Our weapon is the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel hasn’t changed and won’t change in the face of demons. It’s the only news that they are really scared of. Will you have the courage to use it? The other half of a weapon is Paul’s command to “pray in the Spirit at all times” so that message of the gospel can be declared boldly. So what is the weapon that is the “word of God”? Simply this, “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16). Now Paul and I command you, “go and wield that!”