How to Stand Strong When Life Feels Like a Fight

Well, welcome, welcome to church today, everybody. We're so thrilled, so incredibly thrilled that you're here today on all of our campuses in Yorktown, Newport News, Virginia Beach, online. Welcome to the men at Indian Creek. And of course, a big shout out and a lot of love to the men and women and their families and our military. Can you help me show them some love today? We're so grateful for you. You've chosen to be at church on a fantastic, incredible Sunday. What a special day as we celebrate families and encourage parents, but also today as we kick off a brand new series of messages. And so I wanna ask you to just remain standing for just a moment longer, because I wanna do this. I wanna read with you today the theme scriptures that are for us, the basis of what this whole new series is gonna be all about. And I believe this is a word today for someone, not for everyone, but for someone. And when I say not for everyone, here's what I mean. If like everything's going good in your life, this might not be a word for you. All right, everybody. Like if nobody's getting on your last nerve, if you didn't fight with anybody on the way to church today, if you've got no trouble, no problems, no temptations, if you're not fighting or warring, if everything is comfortable right where you are,

if you woke up this morning dreaming of unicorns dancing on rainbows, pooping out Skittles while you're eating a bowl of Lucky Charms, this word might not be for you. But if today you feel like you're in a battle of the life, if you feel like you're fighting just to put one foot in front of the next, if there's a battle that's creating disunity in your marriage or with your children, if your bank account looks like it's getting close to zero, if you feel today the temptation of addiction or depression or anxiety, this is a word for you. Because the Bible says this. The Bible says, 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 the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore, 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've done everything, to stand. This is the word of the Lord for you today. And now you know. Now you know why you couldn't be seated while we read that scripture. Because that is a, I gotta stand up kind of scripture.

Because God's plan for your life, look at me, everybody, you need to know it, is for you to stand even when you wanna fall. God's plan for you is to stand even when the enemy comes against you. And it's not in your power and your strength, because I know some of us are at the end of our power and our strength, but as the scripture said, it is in his mighty power that we stand. And that's what this whole entire series of messages that we kick off today is gonna be about. We're calling this series, you ready for it? We're calling it Battle Ready, because this is a series to get you ready to stand in the face of a battle. If you're in one today, God wants to speak to you. So open your hearts. I wanna pray for you. God's got a word for us now. In Jesus' name, we come to you. And we ask you, Holy Spirit, to open our minds, to open our hearts, to illuminate our minds and eyes so that we can see exactly what you have to say to us today. Because we know, God, that you've got a word for us in due season, in due time, that's gonna change hearts and lives today from this point forward. And we receive it now. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.

Amen, amen. You may be seated. I'm not much of a fighter. I can talk a big game, don't worry, I can talk a big game with the best of them. But somehow at 50 years old, I have avoided, I've avoided most fights for most of my life. I know some of you have been known to throw some fists and it's okay, it's okay. But not me, not me, in fact, I was thinking about this. There was one time where I almost got in a fight. I was six or seven years old and there was a bigger kid in the neighborhood who was picking on me. And I was ready to fight him. I want you to know that for the sake of my reputation, everybody look at me, I was ready to fight him, all right. But my older brother stepped in and actually fought on my behalf. And I don't really remember, that was a long time ago, I don't remember how that actually went down. When my brother tells the story, it sounds like he beat the snot out of the kid. I'm not exactly sure. But I do know this, that my brother came home with an injury and had a scratch on his eyeball. He had to wear a patch over his eye like a pirate. And at six or seven, I must have had a phobia of pirates because my brother and I shared a room and when, as long as he had that patch over his eye, I wouldn't sleep in the same room with him. And I feel kind of bad about it today because he fought for me, but I wouldn't share a room with him. I feel kind of bad about it, but I'm not a fighter. I'm a lover, not a fighter, everybody. That's weird. That's weird. I don't know why I said that.

Maybe you think of yourself as a fighter. Maybe you got some bruises and some scars and some scratches and some memories. Maybe you'd say, yeah, I am a fighter. Maybe you'd join me and say, no, no, that's not really my scene. That's not really what I do. And that's okay because I need all of us today to understand something that all of us, all of us are in a battle, but most of us aren't prepared to win it. Our theme scripture for this series that we just, that we just stood to read together, those scriptures were written by the apostle Paul. He was writing them from a Roman prison and Paul gives us some insight, some, um, some information that, that we need to know because we're all fighting a battle that most of us are losing. In fact, Paul, Paul tells us, um, two truths that we need to know if we're going to be battle ready. And I want you to mark these two down today. In fact, today, as we kick off this series, lots of content, okay, I'm just going to prepare you. There's a lot of content today, so there's a lot of notes to take and I don't have proof to suggest to you that God loves note takers more than he loves non note takers. I can't tell you that, but I do. All right. He loves note takers more. So I'd encourage you open up your water's edge church app or, um, get out that little notes page and, uh, and jot down some notes as we kick off today's, today's message, two truths to be battle ready. The first one Paul would say this is there's an enemy that you can't see, an enemy you can't see. And this is a truth or a principle that runs in opposition to how most of us think and how most of us operate. But if you're going to be battle ready, then you've got to, then you've got to recognize

there's an enemy that you can't see. I don't know if anybody remembers that famous WWE wrestler, John Cena, who would say, you can't see me. You know that one? There's an enemy right now saying that to you and you don't even realize it. You aren't even aware of it, but there's an enemy that you can't see. Look at the scripture. Again, the Bible said for our struggle is not against flesh and blood. In other words, we struggle with something that, that you can't see the struggle isn't against flesh and blood. That little word struggle is actually the same word that we would translate as, as wrestle. Some translations say for, we do not wrestle with flesh and, and blood. It's a little Greek word, palae, palae, and, and it means what you think it would mean. It means, it means, um, when, when two opponents come together in close hand to hand combat and, and they're, they're both struggling, wrestling, fighting in an attempt to try to pin the other down or, or take over. for their opponent. That's the picture of this word. And the fascinating thing about it is, if I were to choose someone off the front row to come up here and pallet me, wrestle me, I'd pick somebody little, I promise you that. And if I were to do that, it would be evident to all that there's a struggle. Like everybody everywhere watching would know, oh, there's a struggle happening. There's a fight happening. There's a battle happening. There's a wrestling match happening. You would see it with your physical eyes,

but what Paul is telling us is, is there are some struggles you can't see. Like right now you don't know, but there are some people sitting around you who are in a wrestling match. Like right now you can't see it with your physical eyes, but there's somebody sitting in front of you or behind you. They look completely relaxed, don't they? They look completely at ease. But on the inside, in their spirit, man, there's a struggle happening. There's a battle happening with an unseen enemy. There's an enemy that you can't see. Who are you struggling against? Who are you wrestling against? Well, Paul says, look at it. He says, the struggle is against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Look at the repetition of that little word against over and over and over again. Paul says there's something in opposition to us, and we are in opposition to it. And most of us would say we feel some internal struggle. We feel some fight often. We feel a battle, but our problem is, look, we failed to recognize that the enemy isn't seen. Most of us operate only in the physical.

Most of us only operate with what we can see, what we can feel, and what we can touch. But we don't just live in a physical world. We live in a spiritual one. And according to the scriptures, there are rulers and authorities and powers and spiritual forces of evil that exist and every day, look at me, every day, they're in opposition to you and to the things of God that are in you. And because we can't see them, most of us never fight them. And so here's what happens every day. They win and you lose. Woo, preacher is coming out hot today. I know this is not like the most encouraging sermon yet. It gets better, don't worry. But where do you think anxiety originates from? Where do you think divisiveness and disunity comes from? Who do you think is behind temptation? Those negative thoughts that seem to invade your mind and come out of nowhere, where do those come from? That foul language that just rises up and comes out in a burst of anger, where is that from? Where's addiction from? Where does insecurity come from? I'm telling you today, it's from the devil. It's from his hordes of demons and you can't see them, but they are an enemy fighting against you every day. You have an enemy that you can't see.

What does this enemy desire to do? Six things, let me show you. The unseen enemy is out to do these six things, to distract you, number two, to discourage you, number three, to divide you, number four, to disable you from what God desires for you, number five, to deceive you and ultimately number six, to destroy you. That's what the enemy wants to do, just exposed it. Now look at the list, because that list describes many of your lives. Right now, in this moment, many of you would say, oh yeah, I feel distracted from the things that I know are most important or I feel incredibly encouraged, discouraged. I'm trying to do the right thing, but I just can't seem to get ahead or there's division in my life or there's division with people that I love or I'm disabled, I'm not actually able to do the things God wants me to do. Many of us are deceived into believing things that simply are not true and some of us would even say this, there's some part of my life, some part that's incredibly important to me that really, if I were to describe it to you, it's just been destroyed. And that's because. the work of the enemy in your life and you can't see him and you don't oftentimes aren't aware that he's working but he is behind the scenes

doing those six things unbeknownst to most of us it's not always physical there's a spiritual world and because it's not always physical you need some new weapons because spiritual battles can't be won with physical weapons and this is where some of us have gotten it all wrong what if I were to say to you you've been fighting with the wrong person you've been yelling at the wrong guy hello husbands she's been yelling at the wrong guy like your frustrations have been overflowing in the wrong direction because you're trying to fight something that's spiritual and you're fighting in the physical but but you need you need some spiritual weapons because you've got an enemy you can't see and so if you want to be battle-ready then you got to open your eyes this is why the Bible says to be alert and of sober mind your enemy the devil he prowls around like a roaring lion searching or looking for someone to devour so you got to wake up because you're in a battle and there's an enemy that you can't see that's the first truth that Paul teaches us as we kick off this brand new series battle ready here's the second truth though just like there's an enemy you can't see there's some armor that you must have so the armor that Paul talked about in that opening scripture the the full armor of God that that armor is the spiritual weapons that allow us to stand and be battle-ready to fight against this enemy that we can't see Paul said it like this he said hey because you got an enemy you can't see he says therefore put on the full armor of God because it's the armor that makes you battle ready and I want to ask you are you armored up like are you are you dressed for battle are you dressed for the occasion if you were going to the swimming pool today you put on a bathing suit if you're going to a formal event tonight you put on a tux or a ballgown if you're going out with friends later this afternoon you'd put on shorts and a t-shirt if you're coming to church you'd put on some of y'all wear all kinds of stuff to church so it don't matter it don't matter it's just I'm just glad you put on something all right everybody if I have this I have this recurring nightmare on Saturday nights I'll tell you this honestly on Saturday nights this happens more often than you would know on Saturday nights I

wake up in the middle of the night and I'm having a nightmare that I came to church to preach and I forgot my pants at home that's like the biggest nightmare so so so you dress for the occasion and Paul is suggesting that because we have an enemy we cannot see we're in a battle that we've got a dress that we had a dress for the battle now I told you that Paul's writing this from a Roman prison he's he's he's in jail he's he's writing these verses that we're reading today from a Roman prison he's likely chained up to a Roman guard and I just want you to get this image in your mind so so he's he's in prison he's chained to a Roman guard and he's writing about this enemy this enemy we can't see this battle that we're in he likely is as he's writes he likely looks up and he sees this Roman guard and he and he realizes this is a guy who is dressed for battle this this is a guy who's is battle ready I'll help you envision it he would have looked something like this a Roman soldier would have looked something like this and as you study him that's a good-looking that's a good looking Roman soldier all right all right take it back take it yeah yeah yeah come y'all a little slow on the uptake what's going on and a Roman soldier would have would have been outfitted in full and full body armor. And so what Paul does is he uses this Roman guard, this Roman soldier as a model or a metaphor. He uses the Roman soldier with physical armor fighting a physical battle as a metaphor for those of us who are followers of Jesus in a spiritual battle. And he says, hey, you need some spiritual armor. Like he's got physical armor. Well, you need some spiritual armor for battle. And that's what this series is gonna be about. They're actually six pieces, six pieces of battle armor.

And for the next six weeks, we're gonna do this deep dive study each week into a different piece of the armor. And we're gonna learn how to apply that piece of armor to our lives to help us be battle ready. By the way, this would be the perfect series, the perfect series for perfect attendance. What? I know. Six weeks in a row, you could get all six pieces. I don't know if you caught it, but Paul said you actually need the full armor of God. So you need all the six pieces, y'all. You can't just have one. All right, you need all six pieces if you're gonna stand. And so we're gonna study them together over the next six weeks. You're not gonna wanna miss a single week. Today, we're gonna start with the first piece of armor that Paul describes. And I believe he intentionally lists it first. I think there's intentionality behind listing it first. It's the piece of armor, I believe, that you are to start with if you're gonna be battle ready. And that piece of armor is what Paul calls the belt of truth. Would you just everybody say that out loud with me? Come on, the belt of truth. This is the first piece of body armor

that you need for a spiritual fight. Scholars tell us that those Roman soldiers, they would wear 70 to 80 pounds of armor every day, oftentimes for 12 to 15 hours a day. And there were all these different pieces. I told you there were six. There are these different pieces, but there was one piece of armor that was necessary to hold all the other together. It was their belt, their belt. Now, you and I wear belts for a different reason. You wear a belt so your pants don't fall down, right? That's why you wear a belt. But the soldier would have wore a belt to hold all the other pieces of armor in place. And Paul says this is the first piece of armor you gotta have. I'll show you. The Bible says this, stand firm then with the belt of truth, there it is, buckled around your waist, the belt of truth. Now, he lists it first, which I struggled with a little bit because I don't know anybody who puts their belt on first. Like you didn't get up this morning and be like, well, I'm gonna put my belt on, then my pants. That's not how it went down. But that's physical.

And Paul starts with it first because this isn't a physical fight. This is actually a spiritual fight. And in the spiritual world, for your spiritual armor to be battle ready for a spiritual fight, then you gotta start with a spiritual weapon. And that weapon is called the belt because it's the belt of truth. And it's the piece that holds everything else together and in place. In fact, write this down. You need truth to win the battle. This is where it starts. Without truth, you will not be successful in standing against the schemes of the devil. It's truth that'll keep you together when the enemy tries to attack you. It's truth that'll keep you covered when the devil comes against you. It's truth that'll protect you when the devil tries to lie to you. It's truth and you need to be wrapped up. Can you picture it? Wrapped up in the truth. That's what Paul's saying. He's saying without the truth, it's way too easy to fall apart. Now let me tell you what's happening in some of your lives right now.

There is an attack against you. And you're maybe even unaware of it. But in the spiritual realm, there are forces fighting against you, fighting against your marriage, fighting against your purity, fighting against your kids, fighting against your stand, fighting against you right now. And the problem for a lot of us is this. We can't stand, and it's not because we're not trying hard enough, and it's not. not because we're not praying long enough, and it's not because we're not focused enough, it's simply because we're not surrounded by truth enough. It's truth that'll allow you to stand because it's truth that'll hold you together and keep you from falling apart. And let me say it like this, that belt not only would stabilize all the other parts of the armor on the soldier, but the belt would also strengthen the core of the soldier. So picture it kind of like a weightlifting belt, or picture it like one of those belts that the Amazon delivery guy wears when he brings all those packages to your front porch. And he's wearing it as a means by which to strengthen his core. It would relieve the pressure

of all the other pieces of armor weighing him down. And that's what I believe many of us need today. We need to be stabilized and we need to be strengthened in the fight. And that's what the belt of truth will do for you. You're in a battle, you're being tempted, you're feeling overwhelmed, you're full of anxiety, you're thinking negative thoughts, you're giving into an addiction, you're battling a depression, you're feeling insecure, you're divided in your home. That's a spiritual battle with an unseen enemy. And what you need right now more than anything else is you need to be stabilized and strengthened in the fight. So how does that happen? How do I get stabilized and strengthened so I can stand? Paul would say, it's with truth. You need a belt of truth wrapped around you. What is truth? That was Pilate's question to Jesus, by the way, when he was arrested, what is truth? I'll give you a definition, truth is this. Truth is the absolute standard by which reality is measured, that's truth. It's the absolute standard by which reality is measured. So truth is not what you feel. Truth is not what you think. Truth is not what you believe. There's no such thing as my truth, your truth, our truth. Let's all just speak our truth.

No, no, that's not truth. It's an absolute standard of truth. And where do you find truth? I'll tell you one word, God. That's where you find truth, God. In fact, if you didn't like my first definition of truth, I'll give you a second one, okay? I like it even better. Truth is this, God's view on any subject, that's truth. Well, how do I know if it's true? Well, what does God say about it? What does God think about it? What is God's view on it? Yeah, but I feel, it doesn't matter what you feel. That's what you feel, but that's not truth. Because truth is absolute for everyone, meaning it always has been and always will be true for everyone. Whatever God says is truth, why? Because he's the originator of truth. If you wanna know truth, you gotta go to the origin of truth. The starting point is always the closest to the truth. Now, you know this, you know this, because we all grew up playing this game, telephone. Telephone, anybody, remember the game? Okay, here's how it worked, here's how it worked. I would whisper something in your ear, then you would turn and whisper it in the ear of the person beside you,

then they'd whisper in the person beside them, then they'd whisper, and it'd go all the way down the line until it finally got to the end of the line, and then the last person would say something completely crazy, right? That's how the game worked, that's how it worked. Remember it? So if I whispered in your ear, hey, on this Sunday, I'm wearing a blue sport coat, and you whispered something in their ear, and their ear, and their ear, all the way down, and then the last person said, hey, this summer, Pastor Stu's gonna be wearing a green Speedo, you'd be like, wait, what? How did that happen? That happened because we got further, and further, and further away from the origin of truth. Because what I said was true, what that person said, not true, everybody. Not true. So we know the origin. Genesis 1-1, in the beginning, God, that's the origin. So if you wanna know the origin, you gotta go back to the beginning, and in the beginning, God. of God. And if you want to know truth, you got to know God because he's the origin of truth. Now we're going one layer deeper. Because God reveals truth to us in two ways. You're like, this is a lot of ones and twos. I know, I know it's a lot of content, but I'm trying to prepare you for what God wants to say

to you today. Two ways God reveals to us truth. One is through his word, the Bible, the B-I-B-L-E. Yes, that's the book for me. The Bible. Jesus said this, Jesus said, sanctify them by the truth. And then what does he say? Read it with me, everybody. Your word is truth. So if you're like, hey, what is God's view on a subject? What is, what is true? Well, we just go to the Bible and the Bible actually tells us what is truth. And Paul's saying, you should wrap up in the Bible like it's a belt. You should put it around your waist. You should, you should wear it because it's going to strengthen you and it's going to stabilize you. When you're fighting a battle with an enemy, you can't see. We're going to talk more about how to actually use the Bible in battle because one of the six pieces of armor is called the sword of the spirit. And it is the word of God. And when we get to that, when we get to that one, watch out, we might do a sword drill. Anybody know about a sword drill? Y'all didn't grow up going to church. Y'all know nothing about it, but I'll teach it to you in a couple, in a couple more weeks. Cause there's a way to use God's word in battle. There's another way that God reveals truth to us. It's through his word. And then it's through the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus said this, I am the way and the truth and the life. So Jesus is truth. And so Paul's saying, wrap, wrap up, wrap up in Jesus. Think like Jesus, act like Jesus, talk like Jesus, do like Jesus, live like Jesus. Cause he is truth. And if you'll put Jesus around you like a belt, if you'll make Jesus, listen, if you'll make Jesus the core of who you are, if you'll put him at the center, like we just saying of everything you do, you'll be battle ready. And this is how you stand. When the enemy attacks, you got to have the truth. And you get the truth from the word of God and you get the truth from who Jesus is. And you wrap up in him in order to stand against the devil's schemes. And let me tell you why I think Paul says to start with truth, because the enemy always starts with lies. If you're being attacked right now, the devil has started with a lie. Every battle you'll face with an unseen enemy, every spiritual attack, every spiritual warfare, every scheme of the devil is based on deception. And what the devil wants you to do is to question truth and believe a lie. And so the origination point of every attack that you'll face by the enemy is founded by a lie. If you're anxious, it's because the devil's lying to you right now. If you're tempted, it's because the devil's lying to you right now. Oh, this way would be better. If you're feeling selfish, the devil's lying to

you right now. Listen, if you're depressed and it's not something chemical and it's not something physical, the devil's lying to you right now, because he's convinced you it can't get any better. If you're feeling insecure, weighed down, unsettled, if you're at odds or division with someone, it's all rooted in deception. How do you know that pastor? Because the Bible tells me that truth tells me that the Bible says this about the devil. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language. What language does the devil speak? Lie. That's his language. Lie. That's his language for he is a liar and the father of lies. So no wonder when he attacks, he attacks truth and he lies to you and that's how he wins the battle. But I got good news. If you today have been lied to by the devil, if you today are someone who feels under attack by the enemy, if you feel like you've been beat up with a lie from the enemy, I got good news for you because Jesus said this, then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. That's how you get set free. So if the lies of the enemy are battle and bondage, then the truth of God sets us free to live as he desires for us. It allows you to stand, to stand even in the midst of a battle. So what do we do? We put on the belt of truth. We cinch it up tight. We wrap it around our waist. We do not let go of it. And we stand in truth because it'll stabilize you and it'll strengthen you in the attack. That's a lot of content. Did you get it? Everybody got it?

Okay. Let's apply it. You ready? Let's apply it. I wanna teach you in this series to be as deliberate every day about putting on the armor of God as you are about putting on your shirt and your shoes and your socks and your pants. I want you to be as mindful about the enemy's attack as you are about how annoyed you get when your husband slurps cereal in your face. You see how quick we are to do physical things? We get frustrated with them. We yell at them. We lose our mind at them. We get anxious over that. Physical things. We fight physical battles, but there are spiritual battles happening. And I need you to be as mindful of those as you are the physical ones, because oftentimes what's behind the physical is actually the spiritual. You're fighting the wrong battle. So I wanna teach you today to put on the belt of truth. And I wanna do this because I just have this overwhelming sense. If you feel today like I'm passionate,

can we use that word? It's because I have this overwhelming sense that I'm preaching to someone in the battle right now. And if I were your commander in battle, you wouldn't want me to be lackadaisical and calm and chill and just say, hey, everything's gonna be okay. No, you'd want me to fire you up and get you ready so you could stand. And I feel like that's my job today. Like I gotta get you ready to stand against the schemes of the evil one. So if you're in a battle today, I wanna teach you how to put on the belt of truth. And if you're not in one today, you will be tomorrow. So I wanna teach you how to put on the belt of truth. And the way you do that is by remembering God's truth. And I'm gonna teach you three truths today. These are founded in scripture. I could teach you 23 of them. I could teach you 103 of them if we had the time. And the more you know Jesus and the more you know his word, the more you'll know his truth. So you'll be able to stand. But today I wanna just teach you three of them. And I want you to repeat these after me. These are simple truths from God's word that'll help you stand in the time of battle. Here's the first one.

Truth number one is God is good. Would you say it with me? God is good. I'd love for you to say it today like you really believe it. Come on, say it with me. God is good. Now here's what the enemy's gonna do. He's gonna try to convince you he's not. He's gonna tempt you with something. He's gonna make you believe God's holding out on you. The Holy Spirit is gonna say, hey, I want you to go apologize to that person. And the devil's gonna convince you, no, continue to let disunity live between the two of you because God's trying to trick you into taking the underdog role. No, no, no, that's not true. Truth is this, God is good. So when God asked me to do something, what he asked me to do is good too. God is good. Say it with me, everybody. God is good. I need you to know it today. So this is how you fight the schemes of the enemy. You put on the belt of truth. And when the enemy lies to you and says, no, God's trying to hold out on you. God's trying to lead you down a road that's not best for you.

You can't trust God. You say, hold up, I know better than that. I am fastening up right now the belt of truth. My God is good. Guess what? The devil can't touch it. The devil can't touch it. You know why? Why? Because it's truth. And you know it's true. God is good. God is good. God is good. I need you to know that today. If the enemy's trying to take you away to chase after some dream that isn't God's plan for your life, that is not good. God is good. God is good. Truth number two. Let me say it to you like this. Truth number two is Jesus loves me. Say it with me, everybody. Jesus loves me. Come on, that is better than a right hook to Mike Tyson. I'm telling you, that is the best truth of all. One more time, say it, everybody. Jesus loves me.

And why is that an important truth to know? Because the enemy loves to use guilt and shame and condemnation to isolate you from God. And so the enemy will do anything he can to make you remember your past sin, your past mistakes. The enemy will do anything he can to heap guilt upon you, to try to keep you away from God. And the next time you feel that, you're like, hold up, I know better. Jesus loves me. This is truth. He loves me. God is good. Jesus loves me. Here's the third truth I need you to know today. Holy Spirit empowers me. Say it with me, everybody. Holy Spirit empowers me. So you're gonna feel like I can't. Oh, I could never do that. Oh, I could never tell somebody about my faith. I could never share my testimony. I could never, I could never say that to my boss to encourage them. I could never ask for forgiveness from someone. I could never serve someone. I could never do the thing God's asking me to do. Oh yes, you can.

Because on the inside of you is the same spirit that rose Jesus from the grave. The Holy Spirit empowers you to do the work of Jesus in this day. Put the belt on. Put the belt on. And you watch what happens. When the enemy attacks, you put the belt of truth on and you wrap up in the truth of God's word and who Jesus is and you will stand. You'll stand against the schemes of the enemy. Tomorrow morning when you wake up, put it on. The belt of truth so you can stand. Why don't you bow your heads, close your eyes. Who'd I preach to today? Can I pray for you? If I preach to you today, can I pray for you right now? If you're the one in a battle, if you're the one things feel out of control at home, if you're the one fighting an addiction, if you're the one overwhelmed with anxiety, if you're the one feeling like the devil has got your number, if you're the one with a bullseye on your back and I preach to you today, would you lift your hand right now? I wanna pray for you. God bless you.

Father, for every hand raised, for every battle being fought, in the name of Jesus, we declare truth. God, you are good and you have good plans for our lives. God, not only are you good, but you love us. Jesus, thank you for loving us. And Holy Spirit, thank you for empowering us today. We are grateful for the belt of truth. We wrap it around so we can stand firm against the schemes of the devil. God, strengthen and stabilize your children as we fight against an unseen enemy. And you can put your hands down because I wanna pray for one other group of people today. If you're here today and all of this seems a little strange to you because you didn't know. You didn't know there's a spiritual world. You felt drawn to it, but you didn't understand it. But today you know God is good and Jesus does love you. And His Holy Spirit does wanna empower you. And you'd like to receive the free gift of salvation from Jesus Christ today. Then I wanna lead you in a simple prayer to say yes to Jesus. If you've never given your heart and life to Him, but you want to today, and you'd like to be included in this prayer, why don't you join me? You can just lift your hand high right now.

So I know, God bless you. Anybody else, you wanna be included in this prayer to give your life to Jesus? And pray this from your heart and really mean it. Say, Jesus, I wanna know you. I want my sin forgiven by you. And I live my life for you. Now be my Lord and Savior. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Amen, amen, amen. God bless you, amazing. You