Audio Transcript:

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Heavenly Father, we thank you that you are a good god. You created everything and you've said it's good, it's very good. Yet Satan rebelled against you, a third of the angels rebelled against you, and we, in tow, rebelled against you. We declared war and instead of vanquishing us as you could in a second, you sent your son Jesus Christ. Jesus, we thank you that you are truth. Everything you ever spoke was true, and you've stood up against the lies and the accusations and the perversions of the evil one and the evil one's manifestation in this world. You've stood up to Caesar. You've stood up to Herod. You stood for the truth, and you were killed for it.

So how can we expect the faith to be safe? When the author and perfecter, the champion of our faith was killed for it? I pray today, Jesus Christ, that you send us a steely backbone, a backbone of ... Infuse us with courage. To know what's true and to stand up for it no matter the cost. Just like many who have come before us. We pray that you continue to expand your kingdom and King Jesus, our swords are yours. As we open up the sword of the spirit, the word of God, I pray today, do a powerful work in each one of our hearts, we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen.

The title of the sermon is Holy War. If you want to live a life of safety, do not become a Christian. God is a good god, but he is not safe. The biggest competing god of our day and age, god competing for our affections and our allegiance is not the god of money or the god of sex or the god of leisure. It's the god of safety, and the most power-hungry amongst us know this, so they promise us safety if we give them our power. What is our power? It is our freedom to do that which God has called us to do. So as we give them our power, we are rendered powerless, which is the most dangerous place to be, and they conquer us by planting fear in our hearts. And then they promise to relieve our fear. If we would just put our faith in them, they plant fear and demand faith. They make us sick and then they promise to keep us safe, but they only make us sicker, yet we keep believing for safety's sake. They promise us safety, then they lead us to the slaughter.

God isn't safe, he's petrifying, he's wild, he's anything but tame, and that's why he's the safest place to be, because he's good. C.S. Lewis in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe has this one quote, "Aslan is the lion, the lion, the great lion. "Oh," said Susan, "I thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion." "Safe," said Mr. Beaver, "Who said anything about safe? Of course he isn't safe, but he's good. He's the king I tell you.""

A lot of people get nervous when you talk about politics at church. Get really nervous. Is he really going there? Oh yeah he is. He's been going there for a while now. I take my points from church history. We all love C.S. Lewis. Even pagans love C.S. Lewis until they understand what he's talking about. C.S. Lewis thought a lot about tyranny. He's got a lot of great work about freedom and standing up for freedom. One of the quotes that has been circulating around posted by Joe Rogan on his Instagram. Joe Rogan, the one who took the horse dewormer, that Joe Rogan. Well he posted this, a quote from C.S. Lewis, "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some times be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."

Well that's all Joe Rogan posted, and I wish he had kept reading. Because that would have made for even a better quote. C.S. Lewis goes onto say, "They may be more likely to go to heaven, yet at the same time, likelier to make a hell of Earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be "cured" against one's will and cured of states which may not regard as disease is to be put on the level of those who have not yet reached the age of reasons or those who never will to be classed with infants, imbeciles and domestic animals." God in the Dock. Why does C.S. Lewis go there? He went there because he as a minister of the gospel, us as believers in the truth, stand up for the truth, and when lies begin to encroach upon reality, we must push back. God, save us from this tyranny of safety. God doesn't offer us safety, he offers us salvation. Then he sends us to war. He frees us for war, so what does the enemy want to do? The enemy wants to take away our freedom to fight.

I will fight for my freedom to fight. Will you? I'm not talking about guns. The biggest battles aren't won with guns. They're won with words, and that's why it should shock every single one of us, believer or not, that we have entered a time when you can't fight with words anymore. You can't fight with ideas anymore because some ideas are forbidden. They've taken away our freedom to fight ideas with ideas, and just to ask the question now, you're banned. Instead of debate, they deplatform, and now you're banished to the hell of silence for asking the question, for thinking the thought. For the idea itself. Here is your muzzle. Put it on all the way. You can't fight for truth anymore. We went from there is no truth to you can't question the truth real quick. Hey, what happened to live and let live? What happened to live your truth? What happened to that? How fast can you go from postmodernism to communism? 18 months.

18 months ago, I was talking about radical individualism. It's not about you, it's not about you, you got to care about the church, you got to join the church, you got to care about other people. Radical individual, and now I'm like there is no more radical individualism. It's all collectivism. It's what best for the herd, what's best for everybody, even at the expense of the individual. You don't follow the orders? You're fired. No matter how much you've poured into your career, you don't follow the orders, no education for you. You can apply for religious exemption, it's against my religion. No, your faith doesn't matter. Heretic. No jab, no job, no school, no what else? What's next? No travel anywhere? No grocery stories? No hospitals? Can I go to the morgue? Or is that only for those who follow the orders? Suffering is coming if you stand up for the truth. So brace yourself. For what? For war. A holy war, and that's what we're talking about today from 2 Corinthians 6:1-11, would you look at the text with me?

"Working together with him, then we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For he says in the favorable time I listen to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you. Behold now is the fabled time, behold now is the day of salvation. We put no obstacle in anyone's way so that no fault may be found with our ministry. But as servants of God, we commend ourselves in every way by great endurance in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger, by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit. Genuine love. By truthful speech and the power of God with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left. Through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise, we are treated as imposters and yet are true. As unknown and yet well-known, as dying and behold we live as punished and yet not killed. As sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing everything. We have spoken freely to you Corinthians in our heart. Corinthians, our heart is wide open, you are not restricted by us but you are restricted in your own affections. In return, I speak as the children widen your hearts also."

2 Corinthians 6:1-13, this is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word, may you write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points, you are at war. To win, suffer loss. And fight with a smile. First you are at war. If you didn't know this, it's probably the reason why your life is so boring. If you aren't fighting, you live a domesticated life. Only because someone else is fighting for you. It's passive and ultimately pathetic, leading lives of quiet desperation someone said. If you don't know we're at war, then you're losing, and if you're losing, then the enemy isn't going to waste time actually attacking you, and probably, that's why God isn't using you because you haven't pledged your sword to him. You haven't offered to work together with him, the king. You are too busy building your own little kingdom to worry about his. That's why Saint Paul in Verse 1, he says, "Working together with him. I'm working together with God, I'm working together with the king of kings, who's expanding his kingdom. Working together with him, then we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain."

The context is that this is one of the truly beautiful passages in all of scripture, in all of Paul's letters in the original Greek, it's particularly impressive, bears some resemblance to famous specimens of Greco-Roman rhetoric. Socrates, the fourth century B.C. Greek orator, he said that, "The most powerful way to be persuasive is to argue from one's own life and experience, to share from your own battles because you have had your own battles." That's what Paul is doing here. What does he give us here? He gives us his own life, he shows us how he has faithfully endured suffering and hardship for the sake of the gospel, for the sake of the salvation of others. He's an ambassador. He said, "I've been commissioned by the king to go and to set the captives free. We're in enemy territory and that's our job, and we're warning everyone that the king is coming, and unless you're reconciled with the king, he is coming to devour. He is coming to bring the sword."

So see, we see Paul's devotion, his sincerity, his focus, commitment to what? To the holy war of God. He says, "We appeal to you. We're working together with God," so it's actually God who's making that appeal through us. It's the words of God.

2 Corinthians 5:20, the text before this one, "Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us, we implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. God stands behind the gospel, behind this message, God who is speaking," and as Paul spoke, as the minister of the gospel spoke, the power of God unto salvation came through, coursed through their veins, and now they got saved. They've been given grace and Saint Paul says, "Make sure that the grace was not in vain." What is he talking about? It's in the same breath as he says we're working with God, we're working with God. Don't let the grace of God be in vain. Meaning he's saying, "Are you working with God?" How is it even possible to receive grace and do nothing with it? It's like God has commissioned you, he's given you a sword at the commissioning, and you go home and you say, "That's awesome," and instead of unsheathing the sword, you put it over the mantle and you say, "That's a tremendous decorative sword." And it starts to accumulate dust upon it. That's taking the grace in vain.

In 1 Corinthians 15:19-10, the words of Paul, "For I'm the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. By the grace of God, I am what I am and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is in me." Saint Paul always viewed the grace of God as power, as fuel, as energy. Not just a get out of hell free card. It's energy to do the work of God. Once you receive it, follow God with every fiber of your being.

Just to give you a little perspective. You know how special it is to have received the grace of God? You did not force God's hand in giving you grace. Your name was written in the book of life if you're a Christian. Before the foundation of the world. God says, "I picked that guy for my army before that guy's even born. And I know you're going to sin, and I'm going to regenerate your heart and you are going to be commissioned. It's special," and as you're commissioned, God says, "I give you grace which is strength, and you never know how strong you are until the strength is tested."

Well God says, "I'm going to send you a test. It's a blessing. I'm going to send you suffering so that you yourself see how much strength I've put in you. You must understand what you've been chosen for. You've been chosen for war. War against sin, the temptations of ... " Every time you say no to a temptation, it hurts. Every time. The more you do it, the easier it gets. Kind of, but you just got used to the pain. You've got pain tolerance. Every time you say no to temptation, the flesh, the world, Satan, that's war. War against personal complacency, war against lesser loves, grace isn't cheap so stop treating it as if it is. Don't be a waste of grace.

2 Corinthians 6:2, he continues, for he says, "In the favorable time I listen to you and in a day of salvation I have helped you. Behold now is the favorable time. Behold now is the day of salvation." God has visited with these people with salvation and the mission and he did it through Paul's ministry. Through Paul's battle, through Paul's warfare, and Paul's authority here is demonstrated by the work of God among them and he says, "Now is it favorable to now, now." God is summoning us, if you're not a Christian, to receive the salvation, to be reconciled, to stop being an enemy of God. Because you're not going to win. Your arms are too short to box with God, and if you are a believer, will you continue to bring the message of salvation. As Isaiah said, "Seek the Lord while he may be found and call upon his name while he is near."

We are at war, and point two is to win, you got to suffer loss. You can't win anything worth winning without suffering. 2 Corinthians 6:3, "We put no obstacle in anyone's way so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God, as slaves of God, we commend ourselves in every way." We commend ourselves in every way and Paul denies the charges the false teachers have made, we've talked about that, and asserts the faithfulness of his ministry and how does he assert the faithfulness of his ministry? He gives us later on a whole list of his suffering and he continues that same thought in 2 Corinthians 11 and 12, and here he just outlines how much he has suffered on behalf of the ministry, and also he suffered in not putting any obstacles in anyone's way. He suffered to live a life that is unimpeachable. When ministers of the gospel act shamefully, there's always great damage. There's always fallout in the wake and a damage to the credibility of the gospel and the reputation of Christianity, so Paul says, "I scrupulously, carefully avoid giving any offense so I suffer." It takes suffering to be obedient. Hebrews talks about Jesus Christ. Learn obedience through suffering. It takes suffering to be obedient.

1 Corinthians 9:26-27, Saint Paul says, "So I do not run aimlessly, I do not box as one beating the air, but I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others, I myself should be disqualified." That's self-discipline, to be ready to be used by God it takes work, it takes suffering, and there's also an enemy within us, it's the flesh, the sinful nature. There's an enemy out there, Satan, there's the enemy in the world, that's all of the systems built up against God and there's the enemy inside, the flesh, the sinful desire.

1 Peter 2:9-12, "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy beloved I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the gentiles honorable so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation."

Fight the good fight and that fight begins in your soul. A lot of people want to fight out there. A lot of people want to change everybody. I want everyone to change. You want to start with yourself. Men of God, women of God, we start with ourselves and to live a life that exhibits the power of the gospel, that your life is an exhibit, is a testimony, is a sign to the power of God, it's a life lived in the thick of battle.

You look around at the world today and you're like, "What is going on? I can't make sense of anything." Because you don't understand that we're at war, and once you understand that there's a spiritual war raging, everything makes so much more sense. So let me just speak to you directly. Let me speak to men, and I want to speak with men directly. King David had 30 men of war. Any time, he sends one text in that group chart. "We're going to war." You got the Tom Brady emojis, you got the Arnold emojis from Rambo. No, that's Sylvester Stallone. You know, you have any group chats like that? Going to war. You share your battles and you share victories over Satan's sin in the world.

Too many men are wasting too much time playing fake war. We love war. I love movies about war. I love it. If I wasn't married, I'd be fighting somewhere, something. My wife said, "You're going to put on your green shirt today?" I was like, "Yeah." Was like "Ahh no. I'm not going to that sermon." Stop wasting time, that's what I want to say to men. There's a real war waging, and you're losing if you spend all your time playing fake war. You're losing. That's why in the culture you're known as a loser unless you're monetizing off of it and then that's a gray issue, but are you tithing that money?

The real battle is waging. There's a real war and it's not enough to just study a war or play a war. You got to fight for your soul, for the freedom of your soul. For you to do what God has called you to do, you got to fight the sin inside. You got to fight the evil desires with good desires, you've got to fight for freedom, freedom from what? To begin with, freedom from sin. Through spending all day, connected to a screen, consuming content that someone has curated for you. You get enslaved to it and you lose because you become passive. You got to fight for the truth by knowing the truth, by studying the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God, by speaking the truth.

And men, yeah we should be on the front lines. "Pastor Jan, how do you stand on the issue of women getting drafted into the military?" I've got four daughters... Women getting drafted in the military? I will be on the front lines. I'm on the front lines. They can be there with me, but I will protect them to the death. That's how I stand.

Ladies, the real war isn't against men. That's not the real war. So stop trying to fight us. That's what I'm trying to say. Stop trying to be the, "I'm a watchdog for all the men." That's not your job. We're fighting together. So let's fight the enemy together. Marriage, husbands and wives. Next time you're in a fight, you say, "Baby, baby, baby, I'm not the enemy." That's a tremendous trick. "It's not me. I didn't do that. That was Satan." No, but seriously. Let's fight Satan together, that what I'm saying. You're not too young to fight, you're not too old to fight. The war continues. If you're alive, you're in the battle. That's what Saint Paul is saying here.

He later goes in Verse 4 and 5, people, the false teachers came in and they accused him, "Where is your letters of recommendation? Where's your credentials, St. Paul? And also your suffering, what kind of servant of God suffers?" Bro, we look at you and we're like, "God's favor is definitely not upon that guy. He's got a unibrow." Those are the accusations. But he says in Verse 4 and 5, "As servants of God, we command ourselves in every way by great endurance and afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger." The list of hardships here has been called the apostolic identification card. Did the Apostle Paul idolize safety? No, he didn't. Did any of the disciples idolize safety? Yeah, one guy, it didn't work out for him. Saint Paul knew, he knew that God isn't calling me to safety. He's calling me to a life of courage. Which is courageous. We don't see movies about heroes and legends, making all the right moves to keep themselves as safe as possible. That's not a movie that's captivating. Heroes and legends aren't forged by sacrificing everything for safety. They're forged by sacrificing safety for God and for people, and if you can't point to scars that you've obtained to living selflessly, then have you been in the war?

Something's very wrong if we follow a guy who got murdered and he said, "Follow me and take up your cross daily," and if you can't point to scars and wounds. If any of this sounds strange to you, if you're like, "I've been in the church my whole life and I'm just church shopping and I walked in today and I wasn't ready for this." If you have never experienced spiritual combat, if you have never experienced the struggle, the exertions in the face of difficulties, then you've got to do some hard self-assessment, which side am I on? Am I even a Christian? Am I living a life of virtue and not one of the virtues are self-protective. Therefore safety is not a virtue. Every single one of the virtues are self-sacrificing.

Saint Paul says, "With great endurance." Paul knew what it meant to keep going when you feel the pain. Will you keep going when things get tough? This must be settled in your mind and your soul now before it does get tough. Saint Paul here gives us three triplets of his endurance. Things he had to go through to build up endurance. Afflictions, hardship, calamities, just general terms to difficulties. Second triplet is beatings, imprisonments, riots, more specific instances of trouble. You see the clear accounts in the Book of Acts, and the third triplet is labors, sleepless nights and hunger. It sounds like he's having a baby. Like he's giving life, it's difficulties that are voluntary in nature. He labored, he preached all day, he goes home, he writes the sermon for tomorrow, and then he works with his hands to provide for himself and to have enough to share with others. Sleepless nights, that's why, and hunger, he's talking about hunger, yeah, he didn't eat in order to work during the day. He's also talking about fasting. Prayer and fasting, discipline himself to strengthen his prayers before God.

This whole passage is intended to challenge every single of us to re-examine our commitment to God. To the Lord Jesus Christ, to the king of kings. Am I following him like this? It's to get us to a point where we renew, rededicate every power, every talent, every moment of our lives to the single-minded pursuit of the will, the purpose, the pleasure of God through spiritual war. We must be aware that this kind of level of commitment is going to bring suffering. The scriptures are clear that anyone that wants to live a holy, righteous, godly life will suffer in this day and age. It's the way. Because Jesus is in the business of expanding his kingdom. He uses that language all the time and how do you expand a kingdom? Do you go to your enemy and say, "Hi, I'd like my real estate back, please." No, you don't do that. You sneak in. Covertly into the enemy's territory. You say, "Yeah, I'm just like you. Yeah, I live amongst you. Yeah, I look like you, I talk like you. My kids go to the same school as you," and then I send my kids in there like little spies. Learn their little worldview tricks, and here's how you counter them.

When your teacher stops calling on you because you have mic dropped her so many times, then in the next class, you got to do it even more covertly. You don't tell anyone you're a Christian. You just ask questions. That's how. With words and ideas. It's that kind of war, but it's war. How do you expand the kingdom? Through war. How do you take what belongs to another? Through war, and is this is a just war? Yes of course it is because everything belongs to Jesus Christ. He's just reclaiming it and he's calling us to do it, and to reclaim what belongs to the king, you have to go to war.

Being a Christian, following Jesus, that's easy. Isn't it? No. Becoming a Christian is easy. You repent of your sin, you turn to Jesus Christ and you trust in him, and then he gives you a sword and you're like, "What?" Other churches aren't honest. Other churches are like, "Come to Jesus. He's going to make everything better," and then everything gets worse, and you come to Mosaic and we'll just tell you the truth. There will be days where you will question whether it's worth it. Where is Jesus? Jesus is fighting on the front lines, he says, "Follow me," that's where he is. What kind of war is this? It's not a war of flesh and blood, it's a spiritual war in the spiritual realm. But how is that spiritual war manifested in the physical realm, and this you need to know. It's manifested with words and ideas and thoughts and ideologies and narratives and stories and these things are invisible basically, but we know their power, we see their power. It's a war of ideas, it's a war of information, it's a battle for hearts and mind.

I come at this with a very particular perspective. I'm from the Soviet Union, I've been studying communism for 30 years. I know the tactics of the enemy and on top of that I worked for the government, and you know what the project was that we were working on? How do we capture hearts and minds. Hearts and minds. That's spiritual warfare conversations, and the way you ... You can't do it with force. You can't force people to believe an ideology. You can try, but even after a while, people are going to start asking questions. Which now is happening. It's not with force, you do it with either fear or faith, and that's where they fear, fear, fear, fear from one thing to another. Fear, fear, fear, fear, fear, fear, fear, fear. Because when you live in fear, you're paralyzed of critical thinking. You lose sight of what these words are, what are they saying? You lose sight, you get this amnesia of, "Wait, what did they say a year ago? What did they promise a year ago and what's happening now? And what are they promising now and we believe it?"
The battle can't be won with force. It can only be won with fear or faith and the enemy wages war with fear, and we wage war with faith because we believe in God. Jesus Christ is our Lord and savior. We kneel before God. That's why we can stand before tyrants. We fear God and we fear not. Like Jesus Christ, and you're like, "Is any of this Christian? This isn't even in the Bible." Yeah it is. Let me give you a couple texts. John 18:33-38, "So Pilate, representative of the Roman Empire, entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, "Are you the king of the Jews?" Jesus answered, "Do you say this of your own accord or did others say it to you about me?" Pilate answered, "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?" Jesus answered, "My kingdom.""

Jesus, what are you doing? We don't want you to die. You feed people, you turn water into wine, come on. That's why we followed you. Let's not talk about your kingdom. Not here, not now. Let's ... Just tell them what he wants to hear and live to fight another day. ""My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting that I may not be delivered over to the Jews but my kingdom is not from the world." Then Pilate said to him, "So you are king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am king. For this purpose I was born, for this purpose I have come into the world. To bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice." Pilate said to him, "What is truth?""

You see what's going on? Jesus is like, "I'm the king of truth," and Pilate says, "Are you? Are you? What is truth? Truth is whatever I say it is because I have all the force." What does that kind of talk do to a person? It gets you crucified. John 19, "Then Pilate took Jesus and flogged him, and the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and arrayed him in a purple robe. They came up to him saying, "Hail King of the Jews," and struck him with their hands. Pilate went out again and said to him, "See I am bringing him out to you, but you may know that I find no guilt in him.""

So Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe and Pilate said to him, "Behold the man." When the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, "Crucify him. Crucify him." Pilate said to them, "Take him yourselves and crucify, for I find no guilt in him." The Jews answered, "We have a law and according to that law, he ought to die because he has made himself the son of God."

When Pilate heard this statement, he was even more afraid. He entered his headquarters again and said to Jesus, "Where are you from?" But Jesus gave him no answer, so Pilate said to him, "You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you," and Jesus answered him, "You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given to you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin." From then on Pilate sought to release him but the Jews cried out, "If you release this man, you are not Caesar's friend." Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar, so when Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called the Stone Pavement, and in Aramaic, Gabbatha. That was the day of preparation of the Passover, it was about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, "Behold your king." They cried out, "Away with him. Away with him. Crucify him." Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your king?" The chief priest answered, "We have no king but Caesar." So he delivered him over to them to be crucified.

Pilate knew who stood before him. He also knew the cost of following the truth, and he did the math and decided it wasn't worth it. It wasn't worth following the true king. His wife had a dream the night before and she said, "Don't do anything to him. I know who this man is." But he had too much to lose, too much to sacrifice. So Jesus was crucified. The most godly always become the most dangerous to whom to those who love evil. That's why tyrants hate the king of kings, and the greatest Christians are deemed the greatest heretics in the church of Satan, and scripture is clear that if you're going to follow Jesus, you will suffer and we must be prepared, don't get caught off guard." The most dangerous shots in every fight are the ones you don't see coming, the spiritual battle rages, and the battlefield is strewn with the wounded and dead.

I've seen this happen where someone's like, "I want to follow Jesus." And then difficulty comes, struggle comes, war comes. Like, "I didn't sign up for this," and they walk away and they get mad at God for the war. Well if you're mad at God for the pain, for the suffering, then how can you receive his pain and suffering? That's what it took. There's no such thing as battle scars without wounds and our Lord and savior fought, bled, died on the battlefield. He told us we're going to have the same battles. John 15:18, "If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world love you as its own. But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

Remember the word that I said to you, a servant is not greater than his master. They persecuted me, they will persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things, they will due to you on account of my name because they do not know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have been guilty of sin but now they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my father also. If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin but now they have seen and hated both me and my father. But the word that is written in their law must be fulfilled. They hated me without cause. But when the helper comes, who I will send to you from the Father, the spirit of truth, who proceeds from the father. He will bear witness about me and you also will bear witness because you have been with me from the beginning."

You are at war, and to win, you have to suffer loss. But fight with a smile. You know why? Because no one wants to fight the guy who's happy about it. No one wants to fight the guy who's like, "Come on. Thanks for giving me the excuse." You look at that guy and you're like, "You're a nut. You're absolutely crazy, you're enjoying this? You're not afraid of death?" "No."

I think about Jack Nicholson, you know when he's like that? That's kind of what I'm talking about, it's like, "Yes, come at me." That's what he's saying. You know why? Because fear is actually a sin. You know the commandment that's repeated more than any other commandment in all of the scripture? Just over and over and over and over, do not fear. That's a commandment, that's in the imperative voice. The only fear that's not a sin is fear of God. So yes, if God said, "Go into battle," and you say, "Yes, sir, where's my sword? I don't have one. Where's my shield? I don't have one. Where's my armor? I don't have one. Take a stone, okay, let's go." But we do, we have the armor of Ephesians 6, you should read that.

A happy fighter is a dangerous fighter. Matthew 5:11-12, "Blessed are you when others reviled you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account." Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for they persecuted the prophets who were before you. You see this with the disciples, the disciples get up, they preach the gospel, and then the people in charge at the temple, they're like, "Yeah, that's not going to happen. You shouldn't do that anymore. Yep, canceled, you're banned." They come back the next day and they're preaching the gospel, and they're like, "All right." They arrest them and then they beat them. What do the apostles do? They come out of there and they're like, "God gave us the honor. God loves me so much that he allowed me to get beaten for him."

What a perspective. If you feel like you're going through hell, rejoice, because we know someone who saves people from hell. By the way, this is why the greatest Christians have the best risk tolerance. Because God already saved me from the greatest hell, and you'd been through so much hell, you can take more. That's pain tolerance and this is why the strongest Christians are also the boldest Christians because they're like, "I can't lose. If I stand up and I do what God tells me to do, if I say what God tells me to say, and then they kill me for it. I'll go to heaven. What am I doing here? If I say what I need to say, people get saved and others get mad but I go to sleep but honoring the Lord, reward's in heaven. Then if they kill me I go and get to enjoy the rewards. It's a win-win, you can't lose." That's why.

2 Corinthians 6:6, he says, "By purity, I went through all that stuff. By purity, knowledge, patience, kindness and the Holy Spirit in genuine love." He turns from sufferings he endured for the gospel's sake to the virtues of the Christian life, which take suffering. The false teachers pointed to his hardship and said, "God's not with you," and Saint Paul says, "No, I go through the hardship because God is with me." In Verse 7 "by truthful speech and the power of the God with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left." The truthful speech, he's talking about in the word of truth. It's not just a reference to the way Paul speaks, but what he proclaims, which is the gospel. He preached the gospel with the power of God. Because he always knew it's a truth war. The Holy War, if you boil it down, it's a truth war. With weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left. He said "I proclaim the truth and that I live the truth." Verse 8, "Through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise, we are treated as imposters and yet are true."

This is the first of seven antitheses, opposite things, in which the perception, he's like, "This is what people see. They see dishonor." He's like, "But it's actually honor. They see slander but we see praise. They see imposters but we are true," and he just keeps going. This is what people see with worldly judgment, this is actually what's going on in the spiritual realm. Verse 9, "As unknown and yet well-known, as dying and behold we live, as punished and yet not killed, as sorrowful yet always rejoicing. As poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing everything."

If you study church history, the more faithful a Christian is, the more difficulties they accumulate, the more burdens they carry. Becoming a Christian is easy, living the Christian life is not. From Abraham to the patriarchs, from Moses to the judges, from David to the prophets, the story is same. Beaten not killed, sorrowful yet always rejoicing, poor yet making many rich, having nothing yet possessing everything, great endurance, troubles, hardships and distresses.

The most amazing thing as you read this is there's not even a whimper of complaint, and if you've been through difficulty for Christ's name's sake, you know this. You know how hard it was, but you're thankful for it. Both battles imposed by others on us and those we impose on ourselves. We wear that with a badge of honor. It's what following Jesus means. It's how we live lives of loyalty to him. It's in the battles that we see him most clearly. We feel his presence most near." Everyone that's been through a battle with Jesus Christ knows this. "That was hard. Jesus, we almost died, yeah." Imagine sitting with Jesus at the campfire? "Jesus, we almost died today, yeah. But we didn't." Delicious meal by the campfire. Jesus is in the battle with us. He will honor those who do battle. "He who honors me," he said, "I will honor."

Do you want more of God's presence in your life? Do you want more of God in your life? Do you want to feel him more near? So many of you experience so little of God because you won't fight. Joseph Conrad, the American novelist, wrote The Mirror of the Sea and he quotes a letter of Sir Robert Stopford who was one of Horatio Nelson's captains, Horatio Nelson is a world-renowned commandeer of ships, and Nelson chased the West Indies and enemy fleet, et cetera, et cetera. But this is what Stopford said about serving with Nelson, he said, "We're half-starved and otherwise inconvenienced by being so long out of port. But our reward is we are with Nelson." Our reward is that we are with Jesus in the thick of battle, he gives us more of himself. Living life behind the lines where it's comfortable, where it's safe, where you remain unwounded, yeah, okay. It's not the fullness of life. Ask any soldier that comes back from battle. They live their life of safety, okay. "Yeah, I got to mow my lawn. I got to paint my white picket fence. Do a little barbecue." And never risk another thing in your life? Who wants to live like that?

If you live for safety, you're actually always going to live in fear, I got to protect this, I got to protect this, I got to protect this. So many of us have been so focused on how we're going to die, how, how, how, that we lost sight of the fact that we're going to die. We're all going to die. We're all going to die. Every single one of us. I'd rather die fighting. I'd rather die swinging. This is the Christian life. Soldiers fight for the king, fighting a bloody spiritual battle, displaying strength, courage, honor, no matter the heat of the battle, no matter the strength of the foe, no matter how exhausted you are. Keep going and sometimes the battles are public. Most of the time, they're private, they're in your soul. Some of you will get up on stage and you will have to stand up for what you believe in. Some of you have to stand up at your job. Some of you have to stand up to a colleague, to a neighbor and say, "You know what? That's not true. What you're saying right now isn't true. This is all a charade. Let me speak truth, no matter the cost."

2 Corinthians 6:11-13, "We have spoken freely to you Corinthians, our heart is wide open. You're not restricted by us but you are restricted in your own affections. In return I speak as the children, widen your hearts, also." What's going on with this text? We were just talking about war and spiritual war and saying all kinds of stuff that's making everyone feel uncomfortable. What's going on here? Then he's talking about love, then he's talking about widening your hearts. Yeah. Saint Paul is demonstrating his fatherly affection. I love you, that's why I'm speaking the way I am. Because he knows what he's fighting for. What's he fighting for? He's fighting for love, he wants to love God and be faithful to him. God said do this, and what's God telling him? God is saying, "Love God, go tell people love God. Stop loving passion, stop loving sin, stop loving temptations. Love God." He's motivated by love, so if he's fighting for love, then how is he fighting? What are his weapons? You can't fight for love unless you're fighting with love. You can't fight for love unless you're fighting with love. "Be more tolerant. You're not tolerant enough. Be kinder. Do good. Stop being so judgmental. Be more empathetic or else."

That's how they wage war. They try to force you into submission. I'm going to make you a better person. Then Jesus Christ comes and he's like, "All right. These people? For Pilate? For Herod? All right. For Jan? For you? Give me the cross." He carries the cross, gets on that cross. He fought with love. For love. To get you to love God, to get you to love neighbor. Because the more you love, actually the better of a soldier you are. You have more to fight for, the more you love, the better soldier you become. The more you love, the more you're willing to sacrifice like Jesus Christ, for God so loved the world that he gave, Galatians 2:20, "I've been crucified with Christ. It's no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me and the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith and the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." So a Christian, how can you live a life of fear if you love God? Because the scriptures say that perfect love, what does it do, what does it do? It casts out fear. It casts out fear. What are you afraid of? Let the love of God cast that demon out. Cast out fear.

I'll close with this. Do you have any war stories? You can't say that you lived a life of spiritual warfare if you don't have war stories. What war stories do you want to tell your grandkids? How do you want them to remember you? Do you have scars to show them? Well if you want scar, if you have scars, then that means you have wounds. Those are our war trophies. You have them if you fought, and how can you say you followed Jesus Christ if you don't have wounds and scars?

I'll close with this. Amy Carmichael wrote the following. "Hast thou no scar, no hidden scar on foot or side or hand, I hear thee song as mighty in the land. I hear them hail thy bright ascendant star. Hast thou no scar? Hast thou no wound? Yet I was wounded by the archers, spent, lean me against the tree to die and rent by ravening beasts that compassed me I swooned. Hast thou no wound? No wound, no scar, yet as the master, shall the servant be. And pierced are the feet that follow me. But thine are whole? Can he have followed far who has no wound or scar?"

Let's pray. Lord Jesus, you are truth, and they killed you for being true, and you allowed it because you love them, us. Jesus, we thank you that you didn't allow Satan's sin and death to conquer you. You rose from the dead and that you are right now the king of kings, the Lord of Lords. We thank you Lord for saving us, selecting us, commissioning us into your army, and we thank you for this call to speak truth. To fight for truth, to stand for truth. To wage the good fight as we stand in your presence.

Lord, we thank you that you are good and that you're great, and we thank you that you are not safe. I pray that you make us a people who would do absolutely everything to be in the center of your will, the safest place to be. We pray this in the beautiful name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Please stand and let's sing.