When you plant a new fruit tree that you just bought and brought home from a nursery or a greenhouse, your hope and desire is that someday you will be able to get some fruit off of it, right? Well, to ensure that this happens someday you need to take the necessary precautions to protect that young tree as it grows and establishes itself in your yard. Young trees are not very sturdy when you first plant them and it is a good idea to run ropes leading from the trunk of the tree to stakes in the ground to keep the tree firmly in place as the roots grow and spread. Those ropes will act like supports, and after a while the ropes may be removed when the tree has become strengthened enough to keep itself upright on its own, almost as though you put armor around the tree to protect it.
You know, you can put many different types of things on different kinds of items in order to help build them up stronger and protect them. You might paint a car to keep the rust from destroying the metal, or spray silicone spray over gloves or shoes to help them repel water. But what are you doing to help build up and protect your faith in Christ?
A person’s faith in the Lord really is the most important thing in their life, and as such it needs to be protected. We can do this through daily study and application of the Word of the Lord in our lives.
Colossians 2:6-7 As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him:
Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.
When you “build something up” it means to make (something) strong, or to strengthen and secure. To give something endurance.
If we want our faith to endure we must protect it by putting in the whole armor of God. Not a piece or two. The entire set. When a soldier goes into battle, what is the ideal set of armor that they should wear? Just a helmet? What will protect their heart then? If they only had a bullet proof vest on, what would protect their head? They even have fabric today that will stop many types of bullets by themselves, and if a soldier has gear made out of this, as well as their vest and helmet, they will be very prepared for battle, because they have “built themselves up.” They have become fortified.
Ephesians 6:10-13 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
We might not physically see a war happening, but there is indeed a war going on, one between good and evil. A war between the Holy Spirit and the spirit of the devil, and we are the soldiers in it. We fight the good fight of faith (1 Timothy 6:12) and we must daily put on our spiritual armor, building ourselves up stronger each day through daily application of the Scriptures.
You know, I used to make snow forts all the time when I was a child, and have snowball “fights” with my friends, and when you make a snow fort you usually mound up a bunch of snow into basketball sized balls and then start packing them together into a wall. That wall when you first construct it might not be the strongest, but when you took snow and packed it into every crack and crevice that wall would withstand any barrage of snowballs that came your way. You would be completely safe behind your fort because you made it strong.
We will have tribulation in this life when we believe in Jesus. We will be hated because we choose to live different than the rest of the world and separate ourselves from it’s sinful influences. But we must endure. We must overcome. We must put on our armor, and endure until the end, and when we do we will be saved
Matthew 10:22 And ye shall be hated of all men for my name’s sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.
Search the scriptures, learn its wisdom. Apply those teachings to your life, and keep adding up those layers of armor. Be strengthened in the Spirit, and fight the good fight of faith.
In Christ
Andrew
Teufer Lake King James Bible Church 