What Is The Difference?

What Is the Difference?

3/27/19

When one considers fighting for their honor they first must assure that their armor is adequate for the upcoming encounter.  It does not make sense to fight an enemy that knowingly dominates every aspect of the potential battle before the actual shooting starts.  The question before such animosities begin is if your party has listened to the surroundings and then builds your defenses according to who your enemy is and how they may attack.  This is a strategy that any military leader seeks out for if they do not their command shall be conquered within a short period of time.  Our spiritual battles do not differ at all from the physical in that we need to understand the strength and tactics of the enemy in order to eternally survive.  To get the proper defenses we must understand the armor that God intends for us to have and exactly how to wear it when we face the enemy.  If we do not listen to our Creator for the perfect defensive measures then our choices of weaponry shall not fit and will prove useless in battle.

This may sound like a repeat of a couple of earlier articles that God wanted us to hear and while there will be some similarities the point of order here is for us to train our ears and hearts on our Leader and not what our beliefs of defenses should be.  Most of you know I was in the military for four years and during that time I learned many things about tactics on both the defensive aspect and the offensive aspect of battles.  There is a strategy to both and when it comes to putting these plans in action it takes skilled leaders to make it happen along with well trained, disciplined troops, and adequate supplies in order for results to be favorably gained.  Being enlisted personnel, I had to start from the ground up in rank which meant I received a lot of orders to do things that would not be considered pleasant, but they had to be done in order for our unit to be effective when called upon so I did them as ordered.  The war that my unit and I were preparing for was the Gulf War, the first one that occurred in the early 1990s.

War is war no matter how one looks at it or how overconfident an army may be for the destruction of materials and lives will result on all sides.  If we had two million soldiers in the tank corps but only twenty-five tanks the appropriations of such personnel versus equipment was certainly off and therefore would be ineffective when the time for the battle to arrive.  Remember Poland at the beginning of World War II when they approached heavy German tanks on horses with sabers?  It is the same concept when entering into a battle that your protection is off and thus cannot be productive when it comes time to fight.  The job of the top leaders would have been grossly deficient in their leadership and preparedness tactics basically inviting an embarrassing and quick defeat.  A battle is one of action and eventually will have a winner at the end of the day and when historians look back at all of the after-action reports and tables of equipment used and remaining it will become clear as to who listened to the commands around them and who did not.  It is this point that God wants us to understand not about just the physical battles that we may face but the eternally important ones that our immortal enemy wishes to conduct against us.  If we are not adequately prepared for such a battle we will have no choice but to accept a surrender of ourselves by the world’s sword, a result that God sees occurring every day.

The passage we are reading from today comes from 1 Samuel 17:38-40 and is part of one of the most famous stories in the Bible.  It is the beginning scenes of when David fought Goliath and how King Saul was in the process of giving David his armor for his upcoming encounter with Goliath.  “And Saul armed David with his armor, and he put a helmet of brass upon his head: also he armed him with a coat of mail.  And David girded his sword upon his armor, and he assayed to go; for he had not proved it. And David said unto Saul, I cannot go with these; for I have not proved them. And David put them off him.”  The time and place of the battle had been determined and who was to participate, it was now time to arm the participants with the appropriate defensive measures before the allotted time arrived.  But from this passage, we see that there is a huge problem with how David is being dressed for battle for it is someone else’s armor and it does not fit David which means that even though there is adequate armor available it is rendered ineffective because it will hinder the attack instead of helping the advance of the attack a death march if you want to know specifics.

Now first off, we must remember that David is a small boy here and not a well-built man.  Secondly, we must keep in mind that David was a shepherd boy at best which meant that while he may have understood the concepts of warfare and that there was a need for defending against an enemy he was definitely out of his living space when it came to fighting with this type of armor.  Verse 39 of this chapter states that David had so much armor on him that when he put the sword on his belt he literally could not walk, his protective devices that others believed he needed were not his size and were too heavy for him.  David could not fight in such conditions and instead of having protection the weapons of the flesh of others rendered him a target for certain defeat with a deadly outcome from a hated enemy.  The stakes were already set and the conditions quite clear so there had to be definitive equality proven in order for it to be a fair fight.

Verses 39 & 40 tie into each other and provide us with the exact defensive mechanism that would serve as the offensive weapon according to the acts of David previously.  At the end of verse 39, David takes off all of the armor given to him by King Saul.  It must have come as a shock to Saul for the one man who has volunteered to fight Goliath of Philistine has just refused the best armor that mankind can make.  Verse 40 states: “And he took his staff in his hand, and chose him five smooth stones out of the brook, and put them in a shepherd’s bag which he had, even in a scrip; and his sling was in his hand: and he drew near to the Philistine.”  Are you serious?  This must have been what Saul and the others around the area must have been thinking because, from the angle that they were noticing the common weapons that should have been used, the ones that were deemed normal and upright were lying on the ground, replaced by a sling and five stones.  The world and its “appropriate” weapons shall always look better and mightier than what God shows us to use this is a guarantee.  However, we can never forget exactly WHO God is and WHAT we can do if we listen to His voice.  It is this choice of armor that makes the difference and is what God wants us to know about how to defend our enemy according to what God has given us as our purpose in life.

We know that David is still young and that he is not yet king of Israel but his faith in the gift that God gave him as a shepherd speaks volumes to those around him, plus it provides us a clue as to what the enemy knows about our methods of weaponry.  Goliath had made himself known to everyone in the valley and these same people understood what was at stake.  The sides had agreed on the terms and it was just a matter of time before the rumble began.  So, David shows up with what God showed him to bring which was not what the convenient or the so-called “modern day” weaponry demanded, David’s was different from what was expected.  There have been plenty of examples of differences in what God wants us to bring to a battle then what we believe what we need to fight the battle; all of us are guilty of this.  But look at what would have occurred if David strolled out with other armor types on his body, as stated above he would have been cut into pieces quickly and Israel would have lost that day.  But when we bring the armor that God tells us to bring things will have the ordained outcome that He intends for it to be, not our intentions.

It does not matter what our battle circumstances may be, it is always important to listen to the voice of the Lord in order to know exactly what type of armor we should don when it comes time to fight our enemy.  In this passage, most people would consider it insane for David to enter into this confrontation with nothing more than a slingshot, 5 stones, and a large knife.  Goliath was a proven warrior with a long history of ruthlessness when it came to his enemies, a formidable opponent that on “paper” should have had no trouble handling the little kid from Israel.  But when God is in control of the situation and wants to make a point, He will always have a person at the ready who are listening to His voice and understanding what needs to be done and how to get the job completed with the resources that He provides.  It does not matter what our situation or battle may be, God has the perfect armor for our lives and it is this armor that He makes for us individually it always fits perfectly, never too big or too small.  The only catch is that we seek His Word for instructions for the battle which consequently is the exact reference for the armor we need to protect ourselves in such battles.

David recognized that the armor of the warring world was not going to fit and he immediately took it off and went to grab the necessary armor that God showed him to wear.  How many times have we ignored God when it comes time for battles to begin and tried our best to charge into this setting head on not properly clothed?  I know you can add my list to that content and each time I leave the battle I am battered, scarred, bruised, bleeding, and completely exhausted and defeated.  I took into battle what I thought I needed for it was similar to what my enemy had with him and it would seem like that I would know by now that my life was created to be more than a conqueror not an equal to the ruler of the world and his minions.  We know how the story of David and Goliath went after this passage it was a complete victory for God and a supernatural show of wisdom to Israel’s enemies.  Sadly, not everyone in the nation was pleased with the outcome and the strife between two men began to grow not just because of the actions on the battlefield but because of the personal choices one of the men started to make concerning God and His Ways which sets up another entirely different type of battle that David had to be prepared for this time the king himself was after David which required God’s armor as well.

Besides the fact of trusting God and listening to His voice during stressful times, this passage gives us another specific characteristic of God that we should be taking with us each day.  We have no idea of what our day shall hold and with all of the necessary defenses that the world brings into light all of these options have seemed to utterly fail when it comes time for them to be tested.  With all of the institutions and governments doing their best to curb this type of violence or to pass legislation in order to control this other type of human violence against each other the results are very conclusive, none of them will work for the center of their investigation and sources of resolve are pointed in the incorrect direction.  If this nation, in the position, that it has been placed in would ditch the loser self mentality, return to God and put His Ways first I guarantee that our lives would see a pretty dramatic change in a very short amount of time. 

With all of the issues that the world faces each day we should be running to the One source that provides all answers that suits every person, but instead we ignore it pushing our own agendas trying to be the David of the world but ending up being Goliath to another wannabe who then struggles with the outcome and runs off and commits suicide in some shape or manner.  This passage teaches us that no matter what the issues we may face God has the perfect answer for us to win the battle but in order to have this occur we need to shed the world and its defensive systems as our first line defense and seek God for the answers.  It is a simple decision and will have a simple and straight forward answer.  Yes, it may take a while and the road may be tough but we can never forget that a battle is just that, a battle.  It is a fight and it shall always be tough to get through and to finish and if we listen to God then we have the eternal advantage and promised a win every time.  However, we must all remember that when things are done God’s Way it may not always be of sound advantage to the world when the spectacular results come into sight.

So, now the question comes to us Church are we piling on the armor of Saul (the world) or are we picking up stones from the river that God has chosen for our armor and defense?  Do we understand that when we accept the world as a standard of improvement or legitimacy we are putting on the wrong armor and we will become sitting ducks for the enemy in front of us, which consequently is really on the same fighting side?  David demonstrated that if we turn to the armor of the world in which is not fitted for us in the first place that all it will do is drag us down and render us useless on the battlefield.  How is our usefulness on the battlefield and how have we taken in the people of the world in the correct manner to which Jesus commanded?  I venture to say that through direct observation of our actions we have lost the usage of God’s armor for the shiny and overweight armor of the world for that is who we now defend.  David used the purpose that God had given him for his life to accomplish the Will of God for the people of Israel that day, a complete sign of obedience to God.

The manner in which this nation was forged was done so in a very unique manner in which if it did not struggle in the correct manner our beginnings would have been our endings all rolled into one mess.  Even though our nation was ordained by God it has been the duty of many people to see its destruction and this process is never been in more swing than today.  We are no longer a victorious nation and we have established this self-righteous goal through our efforts of silencing David by enforcing him to wear the armor of the world instead of listening to the Creator of this nation.  It is a sad day for the stability of this nation because in silencing David the Church has been convinced that this is the approved method of winning against our enemies, the only issue with this belief is that we have now turned on our friends and consider them enemies which should not come as a surprise for this is what occurs when provisions from our allies do not fit properly.

Our spiritual prowess and motivation is now girded with lies of the world instead of truth, there is no helmet of salvation, no holy shield of faith, our breasts are bare, we have sandals on our feet, and the sword we carry is used to cut the physical enemy all to which are incorrect protective devices for the methods of our fight do not rest upon the physical as we tend to seek.  Look at how the Church conducts herself and it is plain to see that she fully operates in the flesh and not through the spirit which tells the world that she is ready to fight with the world and not against it.  The combination of armor is the key to a successful or defeat in battle and God clearly states that His Word is the way to fight successfully and if we do not obey this condition our fight will be brutally ugly with our defeat guaranteed.  It is time that we take this example from David and listen to what God says to our hearts concerning the fight that is ahead.  Yes, there is a great battle about to begin and it is vital that we are spiritually prepared for such an onslaught.  The battle groups are in place and the challenges have been made and it is just a matter of time before the darts begin to fly. 

Church, we no longer see that our stance is longer on the side of God and that the armor that we have adorned is of the world.  It has always been a lingering question in many people as to why the Book of Revelation is so blatantly cruel in the atmosphere of humanity, it is because the Church did not rightfully take the correct spiritual stance in the armor that God told her to use but rather used what she believed would do the trick all the while supplying the world with extra ammunition against the eternal institution that she was created to advance; actually helping our enemy destroy our lives.  It does not matter how hard a person or nation tries to solve problems on their own, those efforts shall always fall short and it is important that we understand and then live under the Ways of God for they are the choice of protective armor that will allow us to become victorious again.  Come on, Church let us return to God and listen to His voice so that we can not only solve the issues that are in front of us (battles) but do so through the name of God.  In answering the question that announces the title of this article, the difference is our eternal life or our eternal death.

DLB