February 18, 2025 • 44 mins
Join Rudy as he discusses the armor of God, specifically the Shoes Of Peace and the Shield Of Faith.
To get connected or to give online, you can go to connect.hcv.church or give.hcv.church. If at anytime during this message you feel called to make a change in your life, text "change me" to 970-00.
Come As You Are ...
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Episode Transcript
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Welcome to Hub City Vineyard.
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To get connected or to give online, go to connect.hcv.church or give.hcv.church.
If at any point during this message you feel called to make a change in your life, text
change me to 970-00.
Thank you and enjoy the message.
I've never seen your hair this short.
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I didn't lose a bet.
My mom is a 30 year plus breast cancer survivor.
I just made my ninth.
I just made my ninth hair donation, hence the warrior look.
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I don't know if 50 years old I can pull off this kind of haircut, but I did sport a mullet
in the 80s.
A little bit different look than this mullet.
So anyway, before I start, I'm going to do a couple things.
Who here volunteered for Reach?
If you helped out at Reach, please stand for me.
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If you donated money at Reach.
If you donated food for Reach, please stand up.
Listen, this has been the hands and feet of Jesus.
You can sit down now.
Thank you.
Thank you.
From the bottom of my heart, thank you.
Such a successful week.
Thank you Kelsey for all the hard work that you did to put this together.
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If you have never volunteered, go next year.
It will open your minds to the homeless in a way that you probably don't realize right
now.
I know the way I've lived my life.
I was probably just one bad decision away multiple times from being right there.
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That said, before I start, you're sick of hearing me talk.
You want to hear God's words.
So can we pray and invite him in?
Come Holy Spirit.
God, we thank you.
We thank you for today.
We thank you for this building.
We thank you for all that you provide.
God, we also thank you for those opportunities that we can go out into the world and be Jesus
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to our fellow man, to our fellow woman.
God, we just ask that you just continue to give us opportunity after opportunity to do
just that.
We put on your armor and we go out into the world and we fight alongside you.
But we know God that it's your armor and your battle and all we got to do is walk it out.
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So today God, as we go through the next couple pieces of your armor, just allow my voice
to speak nothing but your words.
Open the hearts of everyone in here so that they can truly understand your love and your
peace and your faithfulness.
I ask that in the precious name of your son, my Savior, Jesus Christ.
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Amen.
So some of you maybe have never heard me speak.
Others who have heard me speak a number of times, you may know if you've been here long
enough that I, in the past, have had a little fun with our lead pastor and call him out.
It always works itself into the message.
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But I haven't done that for a while, so you may or may not have heard me do it.
So I want to lift up our lead pastor, but I want to switch it up a little bit.
I have a fun short, quick video to show you to truly tell you how much I love and respect
my friend and mentor, Pastor Chris Lauderbeck.
Bryce, will you play this video for me please?
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Thankfully he's in the youth room right now.
But that's an example of why we need the full armor of God in our lives.
I had a couple different punch lines there, but I think that one works the best.
The problem is I only speak every other like two or three months, so he's not afraid to
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call me out either.
So we'll see what happens.
If you know me from my past, you do not need to send him any ammo.
For the past two weeks, Chris has done a really good job of teaching us why we need the armor
of God.
Last week he broke down and went into greater detail the first two pieces of armor, the
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belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness.
He talked about how truth and righteousness guide us as Christians.
Of course, if you can tell by the way I'm dressed, I was not going to light these up,
but my spiritual advisor, Jackson Troxell, red sun was like Rudy, light them up.
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But today I'm going to do the shoes of the gospel of peace and of course the shield of
faithfulness.
So excuse me, you may be able to hear it in my voice.
I have felt literally like Samson all week.
I got my haircut on Monday and then Tuesday got sick.
So you can kind of still hear it in my voice.
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Been fighting a cold all week.
I did hate going to urgent care, but I did go to urgent care.
I'm negative for all the flus, all the COVID, but I laid in bed.
I'm actually more sore today, not having worked out, but laying around all week.
But know this, I've been wearing God's armor all week.
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And because I have had his peace strapped around my feet, knowing that the enemy was
firing arrows and darts at me all week, I have been protected by this sword of faith.
So I encourage you to just take all these pieces of the body of armor into account.
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Now whose armor are they?
God's armor.
Before we get into these two pieces I'm going to talk about today, I want to read an excerpt
from an article I found in Christianity today when I was researching this.
And you guys, I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be the only one that relates to this.
It would have been really easy for me this past week to slide into my own armor as I
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dealt with the cold and the sickness.
Now listen to this.
He says, I have multiple options I go to regularly when I am in self-preservation mode.
I call it the army of me, which includes the belt of denial, the breastplate of humor,
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one that I'm pretty good at using.
Ask my wife and son and they'll tell you that it's often misplaced.
Our feet ready with a plan of escape.
The shield of perfectionism, the helmet of avoidance, and the sword of blame.
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My armor has additional elements that God's armor doesn't offer such as the shoulder pads
of delusion, the face mask of people pleasing, and the shin guards of distraction.
Anyone relate to that?
Now I might add to that little passage that for some of us, many of us, we also carry
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around the keyboard of self-righteousness that we like to use on social media.
Now that article that I just read was written by, I think, a man named J.D.P.
And it's entitled this, to put on the armor of God, we have to take off the armor of me.
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Today I want to challenge that many of us fail to put on the full armor of God.
Now I wore this white outfit for a reason because I wanted to highlight the shoes and
the shield, but imagine if I took this shield and these shoes and ran out to the battlefield
just like that.
How long would I last?
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How much damage would I do?
How ridiculous would I look?
They would probably just laugh at me before they slice me up.
Today I want you to understand that oftentimes we put on different bits and pieces of the
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armor at different times, and then we often throw in our own battle gear when we go out
to fight our battles.
Today I'm talking about just these two pieces, but I really pray that you understand all
the parts of the armor and how they work together and utilize the entire armor of who?
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God.
It's not whose armor?
Mine.
Make it personal.
It's not my armor.
It's his armor.
So I'm going to read just that passage that we're using in this series, not putting it
on the Sky Bible.
I just want you to listen to the words.
You can close your eyes.
You can do whatever.
Just listen to the words.
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Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.
Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.
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 spiritual forces of evil
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in the heavenly realms.
Therefore, put on the full armor of God.
Man, you've got to be great students.
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.
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Stand firm then with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, the breastplate of wealth,
righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from
the gospel of peace.
In addition to all this, take the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the
flaming errors of the evil one.
Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.
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Now I encourage you, if you missed last week, or even if you didn't, go back and pull up
Chris's message from last week.
He talked about the belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness, and I want you
to just nail that down so you understand what each of those pieces mean.
And then listen to today because we're going to pick up here with the shoes of the gospel
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of peace.
Now how many of you love a good pair of new sneakers?
Like I like to get like a brand new pack of socks.
Like I'll take a six pack of socks and I'll wait like a month and a half to wear every
pair because I want that, I want to put on those socks with a brand new pair of shoes.
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And just how good does that feel?
It gives us a comfortable foundation.
It makes it comfortable to walk or run or work out, but what are we supposed to do with
them?
We're supposed to move.
It makes us feel grounded, which leads us to our first point.
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Like shoes, peace is the foundation of our armor.
The peace of Jesus is the foundation of our armor.
Ephesians 6, 15, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel
of peace.
Now I want to take a look at the sandals that the Roman soldiers actually wore.
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They were half boot, half sandal.
They were designed to provide a firm footing and stability in close combat.
They were made of multiple layers of metal, I'm sorry, of leather, and Bryce will you
put the picture up?
If you notice at the bottom they had these hollow metal studs called hobnails that dug
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into the ground.
Those hobnails are like cleats.
Anyone here an athlete?
Anyone strappling a pair of cleats?
They were anywhere from an inch in length upwards to a couple inches, depending on the
terrain that they had to cross.
But those hobnails dug into the ground.
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They enhanced stability in close combat and agility over various uneven terrains.
Folks, Jesus offers us a similar stability and agility as we walk with him.
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Now the boot, if you've ever been a soldier, you know is arguably one of the most important
pieces especially to the gear of the infantry men in the day.
See the legionaries in the Roman army would have to march thousands and thousands of miles
and they depended solely on their feet and their legs to get them there going over mountains,
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over woodlands and wetlands, snow and ice, across countless streams and rivers.
Just like that, we need his peace to get us through all the different terrains that we
face in our life.
Proverbs 16, 9, the heart of man plans the ways, but the Lord establishes his steps.
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You have any parents in here?
Grandparents?
Although if you are a grandparent, you probably are also a...
How excited were you when you saw your toddler take their first couple steps?
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How proud were you to see that growth and development?
As unsteady as it might have been, they were taking steps.
Folks, God takes delight in each step we take towards him.
He takes delight in every step that we take that walks out his will in our lives.
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See this verse, Proverbs 9, 16, 9, that word establishes that I just read.
It's a Hebrew word.
It comes from the Hebrew word, kun, K-U-N.
It translates to establishes, determines, prepares, provides.
It translates to firmly decides.
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It translates to makes secure, meaning that God cares for our steps all the way down to
the tiniest, tiniest detail.
Mark Batterson says this.
This piece is a calming word that imparts confidence that God has everything under control.
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Can you trust that God has everything in control for you?
Now, 1 Corinthians 14, Paul writes some words that back that up when he says this, for God
is not a God of disorder, but a God of peace.
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See, when I was in my 20s, I never felt tempted.
Why?
Because I didn't walk with Jesus.
I didn't know the full power that Jesus could have in my life.
My life was chaos.
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But the peace that Jesus offers is order.
The Greek word I'm in teaching marriage, so bear with me.
The Greek word for peace that we find here is irene.
Not the one from the song.
Irene.
And that word doesn't just mean peace, but it also means wholeness, completeness, salvation.
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It has a similar meaning to a word that you guys have heard, the Hebrew word shalom.
The gospel of peace that you're supposed to be willing to strap on is none other than
the good news of the salvation that we have through Jesus, who makes us whole.
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Which leads us to point two, Jesus makes us whole, but the enemy, he tries to steal our
peace.
John 10, 10, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.
I, Jesus, have come that they may have life and have it to the full.
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The enemy tries to steal your peace each and every day.
The enemy constantly puts stumbling blocks in front of you.
The enemy constantly tries to put loose gravel in unorder in front of you.
He does this easily through differing views on social media, through negative news articles.
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He misdirects our communication.
He's the master manipulator and he knows when to trip us up.
He does it in my own relationships all the time, as Carrie.
Which leads us to our third point, the best way to keep our enemy from stealing our peace
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is to be prepared to actively share the good news of Jesus.
See, we take the peace of Jesus everywhere we go.
We start by carrying his peace in our hearts and we let that peace leak out everywhere.
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Serving at reach is sharing the gospel of peace.
Helping at night to shine the Friday before last, man, what a great night.
That's sharing the gospel of peace.
Passing out flowers like we just did this past weekend on the square.
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And Chris has mentioned before, some people are like, pass out flowers.
I handed a flower to a lady on the square.
When I handed her this flower, you just see her countenance.
She got teary-eyed.
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I could just see the internal struggle on this lady's face.
And I said, are you okay? and she said, actually, now I am.
Said, you know, we do this because we just want people to know you are loved.
Honey, God loves you.
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And so do I.
That's sharing the gospel of peace.
And she walked across the street and I could feel her lighten.
I could just see her shoulders relax and just lighten up.
Did it fix everything?
No.
Showing compassion to our coworkers, our friends, our neighbors, our family.
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That folks is sharing the gospel of peace.
Peace.
But remember, guys, if we aren't willing, God don't want us.
So don't just strap on your shoes and go lay down.
Stand up and use them.
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See, if we try to keep the peace inside of us, that's when the enemy steals it.
When we don't give it away, that's when he has the biggest access to steal it from us.
The more we give it away, the less opportunity he has to take it from us.
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It sounds counterintuitive.
But as James tells us in his book in chapter 3 verse 18, those who are peacemakers will
plant seeds.
Seeds of peace.
But they also will reap the harvest of righteousness.
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Jesus followers, folks, we're peacemakers.
We're meant to be peacemakers.
We're meant to spread his love.
Jesus tells us, or sorry, Peter tells us in his first letter in chapter 3, be ready at
all times to answer anyone who asks you to explain the hope you have inside of you.
Where is that hope?
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Man, I've got to give you a cheat sheet or something.
Why do you have hope?
Where do you find your peace?
People will ask you that, but know that your peace, your hope is found in the name of Jesus.
But not just his name, but the personal relationship that you have with him.
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Know your story.
And when someone asks, be ready to explain how Jesus has given you hope and peace.
As a pastor, my life is no different than yours.
The only reason I have peace is because I have Jesus.
Remember those old bumper stickers, no Jesus, no peace?
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Well get to know Jesus and you'll get to know peace.
I'm a knucklehead without Jesus.
I live in peace when I walk alongside of Jesus.
Now when sharing the gospel, it's important to have patience and a desire to teach instead
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of trying to win an argument.
It's not a sword.
It can be intimidating to share the gospel, but it's important to remember the urgency
that we need to have when we're spreading the good news.
And know this, we should have the faith to share the good news of Jesus considering the
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next piece of armor is the shield of faith.
Point one, faith shields us from the enemy's attacks.
The more faith you have in Jesus and God, the more you'll be shielded.
The good thing is how big does your faith need to be?
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Ephesians 6, 16, the further along in our body of armor says this, in addition to all
this, take up the shield of faith which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the
evil one.
Does it say the arrows stop coming?
Okay, just hold on to that thought.
See Carrie and I have a son, 12 year old, who's extremely empathetic.
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He wears his heart, he cares for people, loves people in a way that most adults have never
learned how to do.
But Carrie and I are very intentional about not only protecting him, but make sure he
learns to advocate for himself.
We want him to hang on to his childlike innocence as long as he can without being naive to the
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way the world works.
One of our favorite verses that we use time and time again in our household is Proverbs
4, 23.
Above all else, guard your hearts for everything you do flows from it.
See the breastplate is in place, but the shield, it just offers a double layer of protection.
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We don't want our son to ever lose his heart for others, so we encourage Kingston to guard
his heart twofold so that Jesus' living waters can continue to flow out of his heart.
Now as parents, we also know that God is our protector no matter what.
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You've heard the story of Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, they're about to be thrown into
the furnace and they said this to King Nebuchadnezzar, we don't need to defend ourselves before you
in this matter.
Nebuchadnezzar is it?
Okay.
If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from
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it.
He will deliver us from your majesty's hand.
Know that God always has your best interest in mind.
Your best interest is always at the forefront of God's heart.
This leads us to point two, faith is saturated by living water.
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Now check it out, I thought this was so cool when doing research.
Sorry if it's, I might be teaching you guys too much today.
But in my research I just found the Roman shield was called a scutum.
It wasn't like this, didn't have the points, it was actually this large rectangular shield,
like four or five foot high.
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It was made of wood and canvas and leather.
Okay.
The soldiers soaked their shields in water until they were dripping wet.
Why would they do that?
You see a dry shield could catch fire if it was struck by one of those fiery arrows.
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Let's see when this shield was soaked in water, the flames would be put out even if the arrow
penetrated through.
The arrows aren't going to stop coming, but the living water.
John 7, on the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice,
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let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink.
Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow within them.
Living water is the spiritual refreshment that comes from Jesus Christ.
We need to be saturated in the living waters of Jesus.
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We need to be dripping with his faithful, loving grace.
The errors will still come, but when you're dripping with faith, the faith of God, the
shield will protect you.
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And lastly, point three, our faith is strengthened in community.
Look around you.
This is a pretty awesome community of believers.
No, no, look around you.
Do that right now.
Thank you.
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Our faith is strengthened in community.
Psalm 133, 1, how good and pleasant is it when God's people live together in unity?
Turn to your neighbor and say, I love you.
I got you.
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Now listen, those are the easier ones.
Some of you over here need to talk to some of you over here that refuse to sit together
because we're supposed to live in unity.
We're not supposed to be divided.
Now check this out.
To signify unity, the Roman soldiers would paint their shields to match and they would
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use something like I have the cross here, use something that was meaningful to them
and their unit, something that brought them together.
But the true unity is how they fought.
Bryce, will you put that other photo up?
They would fight together in tight formations which protected them behind their shields.
So check this out.
This was called the testudo.
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This formation is a testudo.
A testudo is a Latin word that means the tortoise.
Look like a turtle?
So what they would do is they would flank together.
Again, they were big.
See how big those things are?
They would cover them.
The front row would put their shields up.
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Then oftentimes, it's not here, but oftentimes the side rows would also put their shields
sideways and then the guys in the back would put their shields on top.
This wasn't even just to protect them from the arrows.
They weren't standing still.
What were they doing?
They were marching forward.
They were forced to be reckoned with.
They were expanding the kingdom behind their shields of faith.
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They understood that flanked together, that there was strength in numbers.
See, a few weeks ago, most of you are probably here, when we worshipped at the end, Chris
told us, put your hands up when you worship, right?
And he said, the higher you put your hands up, what did he say?
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The more you are thankful, the more you are winning, the more you are grateful.
And he did that and we held hands and some of you had your hands up, right?
Well, we weren't holding hands.
Some of you just had your hands up, right?
But I said holding hands because this was the picture I saw.
I stood in the back like I typically do and I watched all of you guys with your hands
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raised and I immediately thought of Moses.
How many of you know the story about Moses?
He sends Joshua out to war and then he takes two men, Aaron and her, up to the top of the
mountain, right?
Now they go to the top of the mountain and in verse 11, in Exodus 17, verse 11 tells
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us this, 11 not 12 yet, tells us that as long as Moses held his hands up, the Israelites
were winning, right?
As long as Moses had his hands up, the Israelites were winning.
But anytime he put his hands down, the Amalekites were winning.
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Anytime he let his hands fall, the Amalek, the Israelites were falling back.
They started losing.
Man, check this out.
You guys know this story?
Let's look at verse 12 now.
When Moses' hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it.
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And this, thousands and thousands of years later, every time I read this, I feel the
emotional gratitude of this.
Aaron and her held his hands up, one on one side, one on the other, so that his hands
remained steady until sunset.
Folks, when your hands get tired and you don't feel like you're winning and you feel like
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you're losing ground, get some friends.
Have them help you, one on one side, one on the other, to lift you up.
Because when your hands are up, you are winning.
Just like God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit work together in unison, all
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the pieces of armor work in unison.
Also, we as a family of God work in unison to spread the kingdom here on earth.
And we don't do it meekly.
We do it like a tortoise shell, firing forward.
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Now, I also want you to notice so far in all of the pieces that Chris and I have talked
about, all of the pieces of armor are defensive in nature.
Last week he's going to talk about the helmet, which also is defensive in nature.
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See, some of us want to run out to the battlefield with just a sword.
But most of us don't take the sword of the Spirit.
Most of us take the sword from our own armor, and our own swords are double edged.
And then we also forget you run out in a pair of scrubs instead of the rest of the armor,
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and you start waving that sword, and you start chopping people up.
And then what also happens while you're chopping, it's double edged.
I'm killing and destroying and stealing other people's peace when I do that.
So let's focus on the five pieces of armor that are defensive.
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Whose sword is it?
God's.
And we allow God to take care of the sword.
See, that's not the purpose of God's armor what I just talked about.
The armor represents God's action on our behalf.
It represents His truth.
It represents His righteousness.
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It represents His peace.
It represents the faith that we have in Him, so His faithfulness.
And as we'll hear next week, His armor represents salvation, and His armor represents the Spirit.
Now, also, it's not a suit, an article of clothing that we just take off and hang in
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the closet.
Some of you come home, I do.
The first thing I do is kick off the shoes.
Sometimes we come home and kick off the shoes of peace, and then we're just mad and annoyed
all night.
The armor doesn't come off, folks.
The armor becomes a part of us.
It's an exoskeleton that protects us from the outside, but it's also this endoskeleton
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that provides stability and support from the inside.
So as we move into our action steps today, I don't want you to think of each of these
pieces as separate, but one set of armor.
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They all have different functions, but they make up the full armor of God.
How much armor?
All of it.
Whose armor?
God's.
So let's do two quick steps to wrap this up.
Two quick steps to help us to growing in faith and peace.
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Ready for the first one?
If you got your toes in front of you, you might want to pull your feet back because
I'm about to step on them.
Replace the world news tonight with the good news of Jesus.
You got highlighters with you?
Replace world news with good news.
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Colossians 3.2.
Set your minds on things that are above, not things that are on earth.
Turn off the TV.
Quit doomsday scrolling.
Once you have read the fifth article, the tenth and fifteenth and twentieth article
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aren't going to tell you anything different.
They're going to reinforce the fact that the enemy is present and he's stealing and killing
and destroying.
Now folks, I'm not telling you to put your heads in the sand.
I'm telling you, make yourself aware of what's going on in the world, but then put down the
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world's news and pick up the good news.
You're going to need it when you talk to the rest of the crazy world because they need
that good news.
Second Timothy 3 verses 16 and 17.
All scripture is God-breed, then is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training
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in righteousness so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good
work.
The world will only know peace when it knows Jesus.
Nothing else matters.
Guys, don't wait for the world to stress you out.
Open your Bible now, today, and read about the good news.
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And then once you've read about it, how many of you have already heard the good news of
Jesus in your life before?
Come on man, there should be more hands up.
That means you know enough to tell someone else about his peace.
Can you do that this afternoon?
Which leads us to our second action step.
I love this.
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Have a personal council of advisors.
War isn't a solo affair.
We need a board of directors.
We need a cabinet, a joint chiefs of staff.
Guys, you need a support group.
See the Roman military had what they called a concilium.
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Can everyone say that word?
Concilium.
Concilium.
The concilium was an advisory council that helped the magistrate with military matters.
It consisted of the officer's most trusted second in command and a few of his closest
confidants.
Psalm 24, five and six.
A wise man is full of strength and a man of knowledge enhances his might.
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By wise guidance you can wage your war and in abundance of counselors there is victory.
Guys, find a trusted second in command and a few others that you can rely on.
Putting yourself just around other believers that are positive, that's going to help you
grow.
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One of my favorite verses, I have a couple men in my life that are this for me, Proverbs
27, 17.
As iron sharpens iron so one person sharpens another.
Couples.
We have a number of growth groups for you to be a part of almost every day of the week.
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Ladies, there is a group for you.
We literally have groups geared towards women every single day of the week.
Men, don't worry, they're not going there to bash you.
Men, we have men's group on Wednesday nights as well as other groups for you to be a part
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of.
And we have this cool new group starting, Chad Collins, raise your hand.
He's going to be starting a group at the end of April right around Easter.
It's going to be a group of men mentoring one another.
Mentoring one another to be God-centered leaders.
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Men that love their wives or their future wife and their children the same way Jesus
led His church.
Anyone want to be a part of that?
Let's go.
See me or see Chad and we'll get you information.
Guys, get in a group.
Get some counselors.
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Get a joint chief of staff.
Ecclesiastes 4.10.
If one person falls, the other person can reach out and help.
But someone who falls alone is in real trouble.
Folks, I have grown the most in my life when I have been in a sphere of positive, Jesus-loving
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individuals.
Get yourself a concilium.
Sometimes you need a support group to lean on.
Sometimes your faith just isn't there and you need to borrow the faith of your concilium.
If you're a younger or newer Christian, you're going to need a cabinet of advisors.
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We want to help you with that.
Speaking of new Christians, if you think you're ready to ask Jesus to be a part of your life,
we want to help you along by providing you that concilium, that group of believers to
walk along with you, to support you.
Today I want to offer you an opportunity to do just that.
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If you are here today and you are ready to make that decision, you've been coming, what
is this Jesus thing all about, and now is your time to make that decision, I want you
to just…
There's no impossible.
I believe that you are working now.
So pour it out.
Oh, pour it out.
Welcome to Hub City Vineyard.
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To get connected or to give online, go to connect.hcv.church or give.hcv.church.
If at any point during this message you feel called to make a change in your life, text
change me to 970-00.
Thank you and enjoy the message.
I've never seen your hair this short.
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I didn't lose a bet.
My mom is a 30 year plus breast cancer survivor.
I just made my ninth.
I just made my ninth hair donation, hence the warrior look.
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I don't know if 50 years old I can pull off this kind of haircut, but I did sport a mullet
in the 80s.
A little bit different look than this mullet.
So anyway, before I start, I'm going to do a couple things.
Who here volunteered for Reach?
If you helped out at Reach, please stand for me.
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If you donated money at Reach.
If you donated food for Reach, please stand up.
Listen, this has been the hands and feet of Jesus.
You can sit down now.
Thank you.
Thank you.
From the bottom of my heart, thank you.
Such a successful week.
Thank you Kelsey for all the hard work that you did to put this together.
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If you have never volunteered, go next year.
It will open your minds to the homeless in a way that you probably don't realize right
now.
I know the way I've lived my life.
I was probably just one bad decision away multiple times from being right there.
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That said, before I start, you're sick of hearing me talk.
You want to hear God's words.
So can we pray and invite him in?
Come Holy Spirit.
God, we thank you.
We thank you for today.
We thank you for this building.
We thank you for all that you provide.
God, we also thank you for those opportunities that we can go out into the world and be Jesus
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to our fellow man, to our fellow woman.
God, we just ask that you just continue to give us opportunity after opportunity to do
just that.
We put on your armor and we go out into the world and we fight alongside you.
But we know God that it's your armor and your battle and all we got to do is walk it out.
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So today God, as we go through the next couple pieces of your armor, just allow my voice
to speak nothing but your words.
Open the hearts of everyone in here so that they can truly understand your love and your
peace and your faithfulness.
I ask that in the precious name of your son, my Savior, Jesus Christ.
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Amen.
So some of you maybe have never heard me speak.
Others who have heard me speak a number of times, you may know if you've been here long
enough that I, in the past, have had a little fun with our lead pastor and call him out.
It always works itself into the message.
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But I haven't done that for a while, so you may or may not have heard me do it.
So I want to lift up our lead pastor, but I want to switch it up a little bit.
I have a fun short, quick video to show you to truly tell you how much I love and respect
my friend and mentor, Pastor Chris Lauderbeck.
Bryce, will you play this video for me please?
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Thankfully he's in the youth room right now.
But that's an example of why we need the full armor of God in our lives.
I had a couple different punch lines there, but I think that one works the best.
The problem is I only speak every other like two or three months, so he's not afraid to
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call me out either.
So we'll see what happens.
If you know me from my past, you do not need to send him any ammo.
For the past two weeks, Chris has done a really good job of teaching us why we need the armor
of God.
Last week he broke down and went into greater detail the first two pieces of armor, the
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belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness.
He talked about how truth and righteousness guide us as Christians.
Of course, if you can tell by the way I'm dressed, I was not going to light these up,
but my spiritual advisor, Jackson Troxell, red sun was like Rudy, light them up.
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But today I'm going to do the shoes of the gospel of peace and of course the shield of
faithfulness.
So excuse me, you may be able to hear it in my voice.
I have felt literally like Samson all week.
I got my haircut on Monday and then Tuesday got sick.
So you can kind of still hear it in my voice.
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Been fighting a cold all week.
I did hate going to urgent care, but I did go to urgent care.
I'm negative for all the flus, all the COVID, but I laid in bed.
I'm actually more sore today, not having worked out, but laying around all week.
But know this, I've been wearing God's armor all week.
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And because I have had his peace strapped around my feet, knowing that the enemy was
firing arrows and darts at me all week, I have been protected by this sword of faith.
So I encourage you to just take all these pieces of the body of armor into account.
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Now whose armor are they?
God's armor.
Before we get into these two pieces I'm going to talk about today, I want to read an excerpt
from an article I found in Christianity today when I was researching this.
And you guys, I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be the only one that relates to this.
It would have been really easy for me this past week to slide into my own armor as I
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dealt with the cold and the sickness.
Now listen to this.
He says, I have multiple options I go to regularly when I am in self-preservation mode.
I call it the army of me, which includes the belt of denial, the breastplate of humor,
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one that I'm pretty good at using.
Ask my wife and son and they'll tell you that it's often misplaced.
Our feet ready with a plan of escape.
The shield of perfectionism, the helmet of avoidance, and the sword of blame.
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My armor has additional elements that God's armor doesn't offer such as the shoulder pads
of delusion, the face mask of people pleasing, and the shin guards of distraction.
Anyone relate to that?
Now I might add to that little passage that for some of us, many of us, we also carry
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around the keyboard of self-righteousness that we like to use on social media.
Now that article that I just read was written by, I think, a man named J.D.P.
And it's entitled this, to put on the armor of God, we have to take off the armor of me.
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Today I want to challenge that many of us fail to put on the full armor of God.
Now I wore this white outfit for a reason because I wanted to highlight the shoes and
the shield, but imagine if I took this shield and these shoes and ran out to the battlefield
just like that.
How long would I last?
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How much damage would I do?
How ridiculous would I look?
They would probably just laugh at me before they slice me up.
Today I want you to understand that oftentimes we put on different bits and pieces of the
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armor at different times, and then we often throw in our own battle gear when we go out
to fight our battles.
Today I'm talking about just these two pieces, but I really pray that you understand all
the parts of the armor and how they work together and utilize the entire armor of who?
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God.
It's not whose armor?
Mine.
Make it personal.
It's not my armor.
It's his armor.
So I'm going to read just that passage that we're using in this series, not putting it
on the Sky Bible.
I just want you to listen to the words.
You can close your eyes.
You can do whatever.
Just listen to the words.
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Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.
Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.
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 spiritual forces of evil
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in the heavenly realms.
Therefore, put on the full armor of God.
Man, you've got to be great students.
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.
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Stand firm then with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, the breastplate of wealth,
righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from
the gospel of peace.
In addition to all this, take the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the
flaming errors of the evil one.
Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.
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Now I encourage you, if you missed last week, or even if you didn't, go back and pull up
Chris's message from last week.
He talked about the belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness, and I want you
to just nail that down so you understand what each of those pieces mean.
And then listen to today because we're going to pick up here with the shoes of the gospel
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of peace.
Now how many of you love a good pair of new sneakers?
Like I like to get like a brand new pack of socks.
Like I'll take a six pack of socks and I'll wait like a month and a half to wear every
pair because I want that, I want to put on those socks with a brand new pair of shoes.
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And just how good does that feel?
It gives us a comfortable foundation.
It makes it comfortable to walk or run or work out, but what are we supposed to do with
them?
We're supposed to move.
It makes us feel grounded, which leads us to our first point.
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Like shoes, peace is the foundation of our armor.
The peace of Jesus is the foundation of our armor.
Ephesians 6, 15, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel
of peace.
Now I want to take a look at the sandals that the Roman soldiers actually wore.
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They were half boot, half sandal.
They were designed to provide a firm footing and stability in close combat.
They were made of multiple layers of metal, I'm sorry, of leather, and Bryce will you
put the picture up?
If you notice at the bottom they had these hollow metal studs called hobnails that dug
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into the ground.
Those hobnails are like cleats.
Anyone here an athlete?
Anyone strappling a pair of cleats?
They were anywhere from an inch in length upwards to a couple inches, depending on the
terrain that they had to cross.
But those hobnails dug into the ground.
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They enhanced stability in close combat and agility over various uneven terrains.
Folks, Jesus offers us a similar stability and agility as we walk with him.
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Now the boot, if you've ever been a soldier, you know is arguably one of the most important
pieces especially to the gear of the infantry men in the day.
See the legionaries in the Roman army would have to march thousands and thousands of miles
and they depended solely on their feet and their legs to get them there going over mountains,
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over woodlands and wetlands, snow and ice, across countless streams and rivers.
Just like that, we need his peace to get us through all the different terrains that we
face in our life.
Proverbs 16, 9, the heart of man plans the ways, but the Lord establishes his steps.
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You have any parents in here?
Grandparents?
Although if you are a grandparent, you probably are also a...
How excited were you when you saw your toddler take their first couple steps?
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How proud were you to see that growth and development?
As unsteady as it might have been, they were taking steps.
Folks, God takes delight in each step we take towards him.
He takes delight in every step that we take that walks out his will in our lives.
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See this verse, Proverbs 9, 16, 9, that word establishes that I just read.
It's a Hebrew word.
It comes from the Hebrew word, kun, K-U-N.
It translates to establishes, determines, prepares, provides.
It translates to firmly decides.
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It translates to makes secure, meaning that God cares for our steps all the way down to
the tiniest, tiniest detail.
Mark Batterson says this.
This piece is a calming word that imparts confidence that God has everything under control.
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Can you trust that God has everything in control for you?
Now, 1 Corinthians 14, Paul writes some words that back that up when he says this, for God
is not a God of disorder, but a God of peace.
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See, when I was in my 20s, I never felt tempted.
Why?
Because I didn't walk with Jesus.
I didn't know the full power that Jesus could have in my life.
My life was chaos.
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But the peace that Jesus offers is order.
The Greek word I'm in teaching marriage, so bear with me.
The Greek word for peace that we find here is irene.
Not the one from the song.
Irene.
And that word doesn't just mean peace, but it also means wholeness, completeness, salvation.
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It has a similar meaning to a word that you guys have heard, the Hebrew word shalom.
The gospel of peace that you're supposed to be willing to strap on is none other than
the good news of the salvation that we have through Jesus, who makes us whole.
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Which leads us to point two, Jesus makes us whole, but the enemy, he tries to steal our
peace.
John 10, 10, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.
I, Jesus, have come that they may have life and have it to the full.
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The enemy tries to steal your peace each and every day.
The enemy constantly puts stumbling blocks in front of you.
The enemy constantly tries to put loose gravel in unorder in front of you.
He does this easily through differing views on social media, through negative news articles.
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He misdirects our communication.
He's the master manipulator and he knows when to trip us up.
He does it in my own relationships all the time, as Carrie.
Which leads us to our third point, the best way to keep our enemy from stealing our peace
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is to be prepared to actively share the good news of Jesus.
See, we take the peace of Jesus everywhere we go.
We start by carrying his peace in our hearts and we let that peace leak out everywhere.
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Serving at reach is sharing the gospel of peace.
Helping at night to shine the Friday before last, man, what a great night.
That's sharing the gospel of peace.
Passing out flowers like we just did this past weekend on the square.
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And Chris has mentioned before, some people are like, pass out flowers.
I handed a flower to a lady on the square.
When I handed her this flower, you just see her countenance.
She got teary-eyed.
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I could just see the internal struggle on this lady's face.
And I said, are you okay? and she said, actually, now I am.
Said, you know, we do this because we just want people to know you are loved.
Honey, God loves you.
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And so do I.
That's sharing the gospel of peace.
And she walked across the street and I could feel her lighten.
I could just see her shoulders relax and just lighten up.
Did it fix everything?
No.
Showing compassion to our coworkers, our friends, our neighbors, our family.
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That folks is sharing the gospel of peace.
Peace.
But remember, guys, if we aren't willing, God don't want us.
So don't just strap on your shoes and go lay down.
Stand up and use them.
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See, if we try to keep the peace inside of us, that's when the enemy steals it.
When we don't give it away, that's when he has the biggest access to steal it from us.
The more we give it away, the less opportunity he has to take it from us.
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It sounds counterintuitive.
But as James tells us in his book in chapter 3 verse 18, those who are peacemakers will
plant seeds.
Seeds of peace.
But they also will reap the harvest of righteousness.
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Jesus followers, folks, we're peacemakers.
We're meant to be peacemakers.
We're meant to spread his love.
Jesus tells us, or sorry, Peter tells us in his first letter in chapter 3, be ready at
all times to answer anyone who asks you to explain the hope you have inside of you.
Where is that hope?
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Man, I've got to give you a cheat sheet or something.
Why do you have hope?
Where do you find your peace?
People will ask you that, but know that your peace, your hope is found in the name of Jesus.
But not just his name, but the personal relationship that you have with him.
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Know your story.
And when someone asks, be ready to explain how Jesus has given you hope and peace.
As a pastor, my life is no different than yours.
The only reason I have peace is because I have Jesus.
Remember those old bumper stickers, no Jesus, no peace?
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Well get to know Jesus and you'll get to know peace.
I'm a knucklehead without Jesus.
I live in peace when I walk alongside of Jesus.
Now when sharing the gospel, it's important to have patience and a desire to teach instead
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of trying to win an argument.
It's not a sword.
It can be intimidating to share the gospel, but it's important to remember the urgency
that we need to have when we're spreading the good news.
And know this, we should have the faith to share the good news of Jesus considering the
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next piece of armor is the shield of faith.
Point one, faith shields us from the enemy's attacks.
The more faith you have in Jesus and God, the more you'll be shielded.
The good thing is how big does your faith need to be?
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Ephesians 6, 16, the further along in our body of armor says this, in addition to all
this, take up the shield of faith which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the
evil one.
Does it say the arrows stop coming?
Okay, just hold on to that thought.
See Carrie and I have a son, 12 year old, who's extremely empathetic.
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He wears his heart, he cares for people, loves people in a way that most adults have never
learned how to do.
But Carrie and I are very intentional about not only protecting him, but make sure he
learns to advocate for himself.
We want him to hang on to his childlike innocence as long as he can without being naive to the
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way the world works.
One of our favorite verses that we use time and time again in our household is Proverbs
4, 23.
Above all else, guard your hearts for everything you do flows from it.
See the breastplate is in place, but the shield, it just offers a double layer of protection.
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We don't want our son to ever lose his heart for others, so we encourage Kingston to guard
his heart twofold so that Jesus' living waters can continue to flow out of his heart.
Now as parents, we also know that God is our protector no matter what.
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You've heard the story of Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, they're about to be thrown into
the furnace and they said this to King Nebuchadnezzar, we don't need to defend ourselves before you
in this matter.
Nebuchadnezzar is it?
Okay.
If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from
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it.
He will deliver us from your majesty's hand.
Know that God always has your best interest in mind.
Your best interest is always at the forefront of God's heart.
This leads us to point two, faith is saturated by living water.
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Now check it out, I thought this was so cool when doing research.
Sorry if it's, I might be teaching you guys too much today.
But in my research I just found the Roman shield was called a scutum.
It wasn't like this, didn't have the points, it was actually this large rectangular shield,
like four or five foot high.
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It was made of wood and canvas and leather.
Okay.
The soldiers soaked their shields in water until they were dripping wet.
Why would they do that?
You see a dry shield could catch fire if it was struck by one of those fiery arrows.
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Let's see when this shield was soaked in water, the flames would be put out even if the arrow
penetrated through.
The arrows aren't going to stop coming, but the living water.
John 7, on the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice,
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let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink.
Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow within them.
Living water is the spiritual refreshment that comes from Jesus Christ.
We need to be saturated in the living waters of Jesus.
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We need to be dripping with his faithful, loving grace.
The errors will still come, but when you're dripping with faith, the faith of God, the
shield will protect you.
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And lastly, point three, our faith is strengthened in community.
Look around you.
This is a pretty awesome community of believers.
No, no, look around you.
Do that right now.
Thank you.
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Our faith is strengthened in community.
Psalm 133, 1, how good and pleasant is it when God's people live together in unity?
Turn to your neighbor and say, I love you.
I got you.
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Now listen, those are the easier ones.
Some of you over here need to talk to some of you over here that refuse to sit together
because we're supposed to live in unity.
We're not supposed to be divided.
Now check this out.
To signify unity, the Roman soldiers would paint their shields to match and they would
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use something like I have the cross here, use something that was meaningful to them
and their unit, something that brought them together.
But the true unity is how they fought.
Bryce, will you put that other photo up?
They would fight together in tight formations which protected them behind their shields.
So check this out.
This was called the testudo.
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This formation is a testudo.
A testudo is a Latin word that means the tortoise.
Look like a turtle?
So what they would do is they would flank together.
Again, they were big.
See how big those things are?
They would cover them.
The front row would put their shields up.
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Then oftentimes, it's not here, but oftentimes the side rows would also put their shields
sideways and then the guys in the back would put their shields on top.
This wasn't even just to protect them from the arrows.
They weren't standing still.
What were they doing?
They were marching forward.
They were forced to be reckoned with.
They were expanding the kingdom behind their shields of faith.
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They understood that flanked together, that there was strength in numbers.
See, a few weeks ago, most of you are probably here, when we worshipped at the end, Chris
told us, put your hands up when you worship, right?
And he said, the higher you put your hands up, what did he say?
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The more you are thankful, the more you are winning, the more you are grateful.
And he did that and we held hands and some of you had your hands up, right?
Well, we weren't holding hands.
Some of you just had your hands up, right?
But I said holding hands because this was the picture I saw.
I stood in the back like I typically do and I watched all of you guys with your hands
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raised and I immediately thought of Moses.
How many of you know the story about Moses?
He sends Joshua out to war and then he takes two men, Aaron and her, up to the top of the
mountain, right?
Now they go to the top of the mountain and in verse 11, in Exodus 17, verse 11 tells
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us this, 11 not 12 yet, tells us that as long as Moses held his hands up, the Israelites
were winning, right?
As long as Moses had his hands up, the Israelites were winning.
But anytime he put his hands down, the Amalekites were winning.
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Anytime he let his hands fall, the Amalek, the Israelites were falling back.
They started losing.
Man, check this out.
You guys know this story?
Let's look at verse 12 now.
When Moses' hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it.
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And this, thousands and thousands of years later, every time I read this, I feel the
emotional gratitude of this.
Aaron and her held his hands up, one on one side, one on the other, so that his hands
remained steady until sunset.
Folks, when your hands get tired and you don't feel like you're winning and you feel like
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you're losing ground, get some friends.
Have them help you, one on one side, one on the other, to lift you up.
Because when your hands are up, you are winning.
Just like God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit work together in unison, all
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the pieces of armor work in unison.
Also, we as a family of God work in unison to spread the kingdom here on earth.
And we don't do it meekly.
We do it like a tortoise shell, firing forward.
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Now, I also want you to notice so far in all of the pieces that Chris and I have talked
about, all of the pieces of armor are defensive in nature.
Last week he's going to talk about the helmet, which also is defensive in nature.
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See, some of us want to run out to the battlefield with just a sword.
But most of us don't take the sword of the Spirit.
Most of us take the sword from our own armor, and our own swords are double edged.
And then we also forget you run out in a pair of scrubs instead of the rest of the armor,
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and you start waving that sword, and you start chopping people up.
And then what also happens while you're chopping, it's double edged.
I'm killing and destroying and stealing other people's peace when I do that.
So let's focus on the five pieces of armor that are defensive.
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Whose sword is it?
God's.
And we allow God to take care of the sword.
See, that's not the purpose of God's armor what I just talked about.
The armor represents God's action on our behalf.
It represents His truth.
It represents His righteousness.
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It represents His peace.
It represents the faith that we have in Him, so His faithfulness.
And as we'll hear next week, His armor represents salvation, and His armor represents the Spirit.
Now, also, it's not a suit, an article of clothing that we just take off and hang in
(36:30):
the closet.
Some of you come home, I do.
The first thing I do is kick off the shoes.
Sometimes we come home and kick off the shoes of peace, and then we're just mad and annoyed
all night.
The armor doesn't come off, folks.
The armor becomes a part of us.
It's an exoskeleton that protects us from the outside, but it's also this endoskeleton
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that provides stability and support from the inside.
So as we move into our action steps today, I don't want you to think of each of these
pieces as separate, but one set of armor.
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They all have different functions, but they make up the full armor of God.
How much armor?
All of it.
Whose armor?
God's.
So let's do two quick steps to wrap this up.
Two quick steps to help us to growing in faith and peace.
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Ready for the first one?
If you got your toes in front of you, you might want to pull your feet back because
I'm about to step on them.
Replace the world news tonight with the good news of Jesus.
You got highlighters with you?
Replace world news with good news.
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Colossians 3.2.
Set your minds on things that are above, not things that are on earth.
Turn off the TV.
Quit doomsday scrolling.
Once you have read the fifth article, the tenth and fifteenth and twentieth article
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aren't going to tell you anything different.
They're going to reinforce the fact that the enemy is present and he's stealing and killing
and destroying.
Now folks, I'm not telling you to put your heads in the sand.
I'm telling you, make yourself aware of what's going on in the world, but then put down the
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world's news and pick up the good news.
You're going to need it when you talk to the rest of the crazy world because they need
that good news.
Second Timothy 3 verses 16 and 17.
All scripture is God-breed, then is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training
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in righteousness so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good
work.
The world will only know peace when it knows Jesus.
Nothing else matters.
Guys, don't wait for the world to stress you out.
Open your Bible now, today, and read about the good news.
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And then once you've read about it, how many of you have already heard the good news of
Jesus in your life before?
Come on man, there should be more hands up.
That means you know enough to tell someone else about his peace.
Can you do that this afternoon?
Which leads us to our second action step.
I love this.
(39:59):
Have a personal council of advisors.
War isn't a solo affair.
We need a board of directors.
We need a cabinet, a joint chiefs of staff.
Guys, you need a support group.
See the Roman military had what they called a concilium.
(40:21):
Can everyone say that word?
Concilium.
Concilium.
The concilium was an advisory council that helped the magistrate with military matters.
It consisted of the officer's most trusted second in command and a few of his closest
confidants.
Psalm 24, five and six.
A wise man is full of strength and a man of knowledge enhances his might.
(40:46):
By wise guidance you can wage your war and in abundance of counselors there is victory.
Guys, find a trusted second in command and a few others that you can rely on.
Putting yourself just around other believers that are positive, that's going to help you
grow.
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One of my favorite verses, I have a couple men in my life that are this for me, Proverbs
27, 17.
As iron sharpens iron so one person sharpens another.
Couples.
We have a number of growth groups for you to be a part of almost every day of the week.
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Ladies, there is a group for you.
We literally have groups geared towards women every single day of the week.
Men, don't worry, they're not going there to bash you.
Men, we have men's group on Wednesday nights as well as other groups for you to be a part
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of.
And we have this cool new group starting, Chad Collins, raise your hand.
He's going to be starting a group at the end of April right around Easter.
It's going to be a group of men mentoring one another.
Mentoring one another to be God-centered leaders.
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Men that love their wives or their future wife and their children the same way Jesus
led His church.
Anyone want to be a part of that?
Let's go.
See me or see Chad and we'll get you information.
Guys, get in a group.
Get some counselors.
(42:30):
Get a joint chief of staff.
Ecclesiastes 4.10.
If one person falls, the other person can reach out and help.
But someone who falls alone is in real trouble.
Folks, I have grown the most in my life when I have been in a sphere of positive, Jesus-loving
(42:52):
individuals.
Get yourself a concilium.
Sometimes you need a support group to lean on.
Sometimes your faith just isn't there and you need to borrow the faith of your concilium.
If you're a younger or newer Christian, you're going to need a cabinet of advisors.
(43:15):
We want to help you with that.
Speaking of new Christians, if you think you're ready to ask Jesus to be a part of your life,
we want to help you along by providing you that concilium, that group of believers to
walk along with you, to support you.
Today I want to offer you an opportunity to do just that.
(43:37):
If you are here today and you are ready to make that decision, you've been coming, what
is this Jesus thing all about, and now is your time to make that decision, I want you
to just…
There's no impossible.
I believe that you are working now.
So pour it out.
Oh, pour it out.
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