This is War
Tony Khalil
Midland SDA Church
April 6, 2019
Has anyone here been in the military? Has anyone experienced the horrors of war? I have not. My father was in Vietnam, but as is the case with many who fought in that conflict, he never really talked about it, and I know little of his service. It was not by choice that he found himself in the military, and although he loved this country and was highly patriotic, he had little good to say about the American military. From a young age I knew joining was not an option for me, if I valued my relationship with my father. I can clearly remember him, a normally quiet and passive man, lashing out at my cousin when he found out Joe had enlisted. I could see the distress on his face as he asked with bewilderment “Why didn’t you talk to me first?” I never wanted that disappointment unleashed on me.
Although I have not seen military combat, I have concluded that life itself is a war. Have you lived long enough to come to that understanding? Have you in moments of exhaustion glimpsed the reality that we are in fact fighting a constant battle, under assault on all fronts? Have you noticed neither victory or defeat bring an end to the battle? Do you ever tire of fighting and want to give up? If you have, you must understand what you are experiencing is not merely depression, discouragement, or despondency. It is the awareness of the reality that we are engaged in an ongoing relentless struggle that will continue until Christ’s return.
I am not trying to be negative or sensational. Nor am I choosing to dwell on the bad in exclusion of the good. In fact, I can, without contradiction, say that life is good. Perhaps you have seen some of the tee shirts proclaiming this mantra, “Life Is Good”. You know they have a simple illustration of someone engaged in an activity that the wearer enjoys, along with a cleverly worded narrative in celebration of the pleasure the particular activity adds to life. I personally own many of these shirts as they have become a favorite gift within my extended family. My personal favorite was given to me by my sister. It shows a man standing in a river fly fishing with the simple one-word caption “castaway”. Paying homage to something I like to do. So the recognition that life is a war that can take its toll on us does not have to send us into a spiral of despair or remove all pleasure from our lives, but it can help us understand and make sense out of difficult things we may experience.
In our state of fallen humanity, life without war is impossible. I am not talking about the kind of war in which one nation rises-up against another with troops, weapons, and aggression. I am talking about personal war, battles we fight daily with ourselves. These battles are waged constantly on all four fronts of our lives.
Consider with me the battlefront of the physical. I don’t know your routine, but five days a week I get out of my bed at 4:00 am and am at the gym by 5:00 to work out physically before I begin my work day. I spend an hour each morning riding a bike, running on a cross trainer or some other piece of equipment designed to simultaneously exhaust and bore me to death. After that I torture myself by repeatedly attempting to lift heavy weight using methods that will isolate the most feeble muscle groups in my degrading body. Why would anyone do this? Why is there a line to check in at the community center at 5:00 am? Why do I do this? I am not training for a race or a body building competition, both of which I would lose miserably by the way. No, I do this because I am at war with non-human forces that surround me. I am fighting time as I age. I am fighting gravity as it relentlessly pushes me downward. And I am fighting the very elements that make my life possible on planet earth as they contribute to my demise. This is a continuous battle that, if the world lasts long enough, I will most assuredly lose, but even knowing this, I continue to fight, for the war does not end if I surrender. I just lose more quickly, more decidedly, and possibly even more painfully.
Also fighting on the physical front are the things that attempt to destroy me from the inside out. Do you pay attention to your diet? Do you eat healthfully? Do you try to stay away From empty carbohydrates and foods high in saturated fat and cholesterol? Eating fresh leafy greens, complex carbohydrates, fruits, vegetables, nuts and legumes. I try, arguably with more success sometimes than others. Some of the most brutal foes we fight physically are impacted positively or negatively by what we chose to fuel our bodies with. They have names like diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. They are in effect the special forces of our enemy on the physical battlefront and the casualties they inflict are high.
The good news on the physical front is we do not have to fight alone. The word of God tells us in Exodus 15:26
26 … “If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you.”
God did not leave us without instruction on how to fight the physical battle. He gave us commandments and statutes in His word that are designed to protect us from the enemies we face physically. All the laws in the old testament governing eating, drinking, and personal hygiene were given by God to man to preserve life and protect us from the enemies we face physically. We are also told in Psalm 103: 2,3
2 Bless the Lord, O
my soul,
And forget not all His benefits:
3 Who forgives all your iniquities,
Who heals all your diseases,
Not only does God give us good council on avoiding sickness and disease he also offers healing. No, not everyone is healed of every infirmity in this life, but many times he sees fit to intervene and bring us a foretaste of the comprehensive healing that we have hope of one day receiving.
In addition to the physical, we will often find ourselves engaged on the battle front of the mind. This can be a particularly difficult realm in which to wage war. In the July 2014 edition of Psychology Today, Guy Winch Ph.D. lists five reasons why emotional pain can be worse than physical pain.
Reason #1: Memories Trigger Emotional Pain: Just thinking about a time you broke a bone generally does not cause you to feel physical pain again, however recalling a particularly difficult emotional injury will often time cause one to relive the experience and feel the pain all over again. Reason #2: Physical Pain is Sometimes Used as a Distraction from Emotional Pain: Have you heard of or known someone that intentionally inflicts physical pain on themselves. This practice is done because it offers one relief from emotional pain by way of distraction. Reason #3: Emotional Pain Garners Much Less Empathy: Studies have shown we consistently underestimate the emotional pain of others while sympathizing with those struggling physically. Reason # 4: Emotional Pain Echoes in Ways Physical Pain Does Not: That is to say if you experience emotional trauma in a certain setting, it will probably be a few years before you can enjoy that setting again without reliving the distress. Reason # 5: Emotional Pain Can Damage Our Self-Esteem and Long-Term Mental Health: A single painful rejection can lead to years of avoidance and loneliness.
Oftentimes when someone who has endured some great physical ordeal, whether it be sailing solo around the world or being a prisoner of war, when asked “what was the hardest part?”, they will respond that the mental struggle far outweighed that of the physical. Although all fight on the mental battlefront, it is a lonesome war. Depression and anxiety are the most common foot soldiers we encounter here.
According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, the leading cause of disability worldwide is depression. With almost one million people taking their lives each year. The World Health Organization tells us, 1 in 13 globally suffer from anxiety. The National Institute of Mental Health reports the following statistics for the adult population of the United States:
Generalized Anxiety Disorder affects 6.8 million people. Panic Disorder affects 6 million. Social Anxiety Disorder affects 15 million. Specific Phobias affect 19 million. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder affects 2.2 million. Posttraumatic Stress Disorder affects 7.7 million. Major Depressive Disorder affects more than 16.1 million. Persistent depressive disorder, is a form of depression that usually continues for at least two years, affects 3.3 million.
If you do not fall into these statistics of clinical disorders it does not mean you do not have to fight on the mental front. Everyone experiences disappointments, discouragement, anger, or sadness throughout their life and will spend time in combat here. But the good news is although we may feel all alone, we are not. In Psalm 94:19 the psalmist writes…
In the multitude of my anxieties within me, Your comforts delight my soul.
And the apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 1 3-7 shares…
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any [a]trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God… 7 And our hope for you is steadfast, because we know that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so also you will partake of the consolation.
In the midst of the war in our heads God is there. Offering comfort to us and equipping us to comfort one another.
The third front in the war of life is the battle of morality. Morality is principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behavior. Is our morality under attack today? In the late 20th century a philosophy that has been dubbed “postmodernism” was born. The premise of this movement is that no definite terms, boundaries, or absolute truths exist. This world view has permeated our society and has assaulted our morals as a people by stripping away the God inspired values we held and replacing them with a vague self-determined scale of right and wrong individualized for each of us, and modifiable as our thinking evolves. In other words, each person can decide for him or herself what constitutes right and wrong, or whether-or-not right and wrong even exist. This philosophy is in direct opposition to the teaching of God. We read in John 16:13:
“...when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.”
There is absolute truth it comes from God and is imparted to us through the Holy Spirit, but This contradictory idea that somehow truth is personal and individual has opened the door to all sorts of evils that would have been unthinkable previously.
Human life has been devalued to the extent that worldwide 125,000 babies are killed each day by the means of abortion. And if the effects of alcohol abuse were not bad enough, opioid abuse and deaths from overdose are at an all time high, but hey, why don’t we just legalize marijuana too. When there is no moral compass, anything is fair game. And what about sexual morality. Sexuality has been degraded to the extent that limiting intimacy to the confines of heterosexual marriage is viewed as out dated and old fashioned by much of society. Behaviors that were formerly considered depraved debased or perverted are now accepted and openly promoted as normal and natural. Personal pleasure seems to be the only standard by which we evaluate whether something is right or wrong.
Don’t misunderstand what I am saying. As human beings, since the fall, we have always had a sin problem. Morality has been a battlefront since Eden, but postmodern man has changed it from a battlefront to a destination. God has called us to a higher standard than this. In Philippians 4: 8-9 we read…
8 Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. 9 The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.
If you are ever in a quandary, wondering about the morality of something you are contemplating, I think this passage would be a good guide to use in your evaluation. If we spent our time meditating on true, noble, good, virtuous, and praiseworthy things, I have a feeling it will be easy to recognize the false, base, evil, promiscuous, and disgraceful.
If morality is a battlefront for all of us, that means we probably have compromised and have fallen on this front at some point. Is there hope for us? Or is this battle too strong to gain the victory? Like all of our battlefronts, we are fighting forces stronger than ourselves and failure on this front would be certain were it not for Christ. Turn with me to 1 Corinthians 6: 9-11. We read…
9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor [a]homosexuals, nor [b]sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were [c]sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.
Praise God! There is hope for the fornicator, there is hope for the homosexual, there is hope for the thief and addict. Regardless of what you have done or how you have lived, Jesus offers hope and help in turning from our wicked ways. He will wash us, cleansing our record of iniquity. He will sanctify us making us holy, and he will justify us declaring us righteous in His sight. Our only duty in all of this is to cooperate with Him.
The fourth and final battlefront we will consider today is that of the spiritual. Of all four fronts, it is perhaps the most difficult to define or put a finger on. Perhaps because it is a fight in which we find ourselves caught in the crossfire. You see, this spiritual war started before our existence. Seventh-day Adventists like to refer to it as the great controversy. Turn with me to a familiar passage, Revelation 12:7-9
7 And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 8 but they [a]did not prevail, nor was a place found for [b]them in heaven any longer. 9 So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
Here we find the origin of the spiritual battle in which we find ourselves. By Adams enlistment, we have all been drafted into the spiritual battle. In fact, we all have been drafted into the army of the dragon. Can you imagine this, we have been called to fight in the army of the bad guys, the predetermined loser of the spiritual battle. It is as if we as Americans were drafted into the army of Nazi Germany. We have heavenly citizenship. We were created by God, yet through the fall we have allied ourselves with the enemy and here we are, caught between fighting our homeland or deserting. It seems an easy choice, doe it not? Nobody wants to be on the losing side, especially when they don’t even agree with the ideology of the force for which they are fighting. However, the deception prevalent within the dragon’s army is strong. What should be a clear choice has been made murky by the lies and propaganda we are immersed in. But as with all the battlefronts of our lives God has made a way of escape. Paul writes in Ephesians 6:10-13
10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the [b]wiles of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of [c]the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
Paul is without question speaking of the spiritual battle in this passage as he uses the imagery of wrestling against principalities, powers, rulers of darkness, and spiritual hosts. If we are wrestling against these things, we have in fact defected. We do not have to stay on the losing side. However, we are entirely ill equipped to fight the dragon and his forces. If we are to remain on God’s side in the spiritual battle, it is imperative we use the armor He provides. Paul goes on to describe this spiritual armor starting in verse 14.
14 Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; 16 above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. 17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; 18 praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints—
I find it fascinating that the armor Christ offers does not only equip us for warfare on the spiritual front, but is also all we need for victory on the other three fronts. If we are walking in truth, living in the light of the gospel of Christ, using faith in his righteousness as our defense and allowing the word of God to lead in our lives, we will experience universal victory on all fronts in the war of life. Allowing Christ to formulate both the attack plans and defense strategies victory is assured.
Every soldier knows it is imperative to follow the commands of the general, and if we defect from the forces of evil, and ally ourselves with the forces of our authentic citizenship, following Christ the divine general the forces of evil will lose their power over us and we will be overcomers. There are eight special promises we find in the book of Revelation for overcomers. Allow me to share them with you.
“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.”
“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death.”
“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it.”
And he who overcomes, and keeps My works until the end, to him I will give power over the nations—
He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels.
He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name.
To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.
He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son.
It sounds pretty good to be an overcomer doesn’t it? We have a choice. We can fight with the forces with which we were drafted into, we can even fool ourselves into believing we are the general calling the shots, while all the time under the influence of an evil general, predestined for defeat. Or we can defect and join the army of God, put on his armor and allow Christ to be our hope of salvation. It is a simple choice, but we are told few will make it. Christ says…”wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life and there are few who find it.” Matthew 7:13, 14. If misunderstood, this can be discouraging. We think “if the way to salvation is narrow and difficult, what chance do I have of making it.” The difficulty Christ is talking about here is self-denial, and the reason few find it is because they do not want to find it, because whoever wants to may enter in. Revelation 22:17 says “whoever desires. Let him take the water of life freely.” Is it your desire to take it? …Do you want to be part of the Lords army and allow Christ to formulate the winning strategy in your life? …So do I.
Let’s pray.