Ephesians 6:17
Concerning the “Sword of the Spirit”
Paul uses some interesting wording here. He writes, as translated by the NASB, “…And take the Helmet of Salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”
I have always been taught that the “Sword of the Spirit” is always the Bible. As a growing Christian believing that, I would use this understanding to defend my faith with scripture as well as be on the offense with scripture. This understanding was also used for evangelism. While this might be correct, I wonder why Paul uses this wording. Was he referring to the scripture of the time? Or was Paul merely painting a picture of how to grow and advance in your faith?
Without armor and weaponry, a soldier could not defend himself and advance on the battleground. Knowing the ideas of spiritual warfare, I think Paul was using this imagery to convey a message on how to defend from spiritual attacks.
Looking at the main subject of this letter, Paul spends a lot of time talking about the mystical body of Christ. The end of the letter continues this idea, talking about the spiritual realm. This makes an interesting interpretation of this scripture and brings me to the wording that Paul uses.
Earlier, I alluded to “word” as being scripture. But a look at the actual Greek word that is used (rhema) brings me to a different conclusion. This word literally means an utterance or a topic especially of command. The interpretation this brings me to is the literal word, or command, of God. Since this is the “Sword of the Spirit,” I would say this is about the Holy Spirit. Since the Holy Spirit dwells within us, we are in direct communication with God (in a sense). We can receive a direct command from God. This is the “word” that I think Paul is talking about.
Take these ideas and think about them. This is how I am interpreting this scripture and might be completely wrong.
The Logos of God is the general will of God as exhibited in Jesus His son. The Rhema of God is His specific word to each of us for the moment. Since it is the same Holy Spirit, the Logos of God and the Rhema of God don’t contradict.
In John 1:1, Jesus is referred to as the “Logos of God”, referring to the general will of God. Jesus called himself “the truth” in John 14:6. He and His Message were intertwined. “He who has seen me has seen the Father.” “… as my Father taught me, I speak these things.”
I think Satan tried to get the Christians off track by saying the Bible was entirely the Word of God because it contained the divine inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Half true. Then Satan could say that it IS the word of God and therefore, you don’t need the Holy Spirit anymore. Wrong. Considering all the account of Bibles being destroyed, God is not in the business of defending Bibles! A lot of brethren get off track following their own understanding of the Bible. They think it safe to do so because it is the Word of God. “It will not return void, but shall accomplish whatsoever it purposeth.” Wrong. We are people of the Holy Spirit, not people of a book!
Now the Bible is good, because the Holy Spirit authored it. The Word that is in it will wash you, if you let it. (I became a Christian entirely out of Bible reading with no Christians around.)
For divine guidance, we need the Rhema-word. That’s what the knowledge gifts of the Holy Spirit are for. Satan is a genius and has been around for centuries. No mere Human can outsmart the devil. Only God can — and has!
Concerning the Sword of the Spirit. This is an offensive part of the armor. Remember, our job is to knock down the gates of Hell and lead captives to freedom in Christ. Another part of our job is to pray for them that persecute us — or conspire to. We are to take the battle to the kingdom of hell to expand the kingdom of God.
A Roman soldier put on his armor to keep himself out of harms way and to project the Roman Empire with safety and confidence. When attacked, did he pile on the armor to make sure his attacker couldn’t hurt him? No. For too long, Satan misled the Christians into only being spiritually defensive. A defense is a no-win tactic: You either hold your own or you lose. You can’t win!
Out on my website I teach defense, how to scripturally take the battle to the enemy and even how to hide when things got really tough. (In the Bible, Jesus hid when he had to.)
The main difference between Jesus and ourselves is that we started out as children of Adam and opened all sort of backdoors into our soul that need to be closed. All Jesus had to do was disagree with Satan’s lies.
see: orderofsaintpatrick.org for a major education in this stuff.
Just thought I would check and see if your site was in fact working again.
Completely unrelated to the post, but Beth and I watched your magic show at camp last night. We were impressed.