February 19 2026

Thursday February 19

Walking, Running, Standing, Resisting, and Soaring

Ephesians 6:17

“And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

Today we're continuing to look at Ephesians 6:17. In this entire passage that we've been looking at, Ephesians 6:10-17, Paul has been telling us that we don't wrestle with flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers and spiritual wickedness in the high places. Then he tells us about the armor that we need to put on. We put it on every day. Maybe we put it on many times during the day as we realize that there is a battle going on.

The Christian life, as we said, is a battlefield. Satan is warring against us. He wants to defeat us. He has come to steal, to kill, and destroy. But God, our God has given us an armor. The armor of God. Did you hear that? The armor of God. Not the armor of some man, some person in the past, or the armor that we have made up for ourselves. No, it's the armor of God Almighty Himself that's been made available to us. Remember how Saul gave David his armor to put on to fight Goliath. But after David put it on, he realized that he couldn’t wear some other person’s armor, and he didn’t need it when he by faith knew he had the armor of God on already!

The last verse of this passage that we have been looking at is verse 17. That's where Paul says, "Take up the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God." So the last thing we are told to do is to take and put on is the helmet of salvation. We've talked about that in the past number of chats. Right now, we're talking about the sword of the Spirit. We're talking about what that is. It's the word of God. It's the Spirit of the living God through the word of God. Then we find out why we should use this sword because it's our offensive weapon against the enemy, the devil. We also learn how to use this sword. We look at an example of even Jesus Christ Himself.

Jesus used the sword of the Spirit against Satan. The clearest example in the Bible is when Jesus was in the wilderness and Satan came and tempted Him. What did Jesus do when Satan tempted Him three times? Each time Jesus answered, "It is written." He was quoting Scripture from the Old Testament. My friend, Jesus did not argue with Satan. He did not negotiate with Satan. He did not reason with Satan like Eve did when she was tempted and failed. No, He answered the temptations with Scripture. Every time Satan came with a lie, Jesus came back with the truth. Now, that tells us something. And that is, if the Son of God, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God, chose to resist the devil with scriptures, then you and I better learn to do the same.

In the Scriptures, the Christian life is picture or describe as a battle, but the Christian life is also pictured as a walk. We are to walk in purity, walk in the light, and walk in love. We've talked about that here in the book of Ephesians. The Christian life is also described as a run in Hebrews 12:1. It says, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.”  How do we do it? We do this by “looking unto Jesus” (v. 2).

The Christian life is also a fight. But it's not a fight with Satan, my friend. It's a fight to stand strong in the faith. 2 Timothy 4:7, Paul said, "I have fought a good fight, I have finished the race, and I have kept the faith.” The fight is to keep the faith, to be armored with a faith in the Scripture, in the Word of God, which is a life of obedience. Then it is also “taking a stand”. We've read that here in Ephesians 6. “And having done all, to stand”.  We stand but Paul also said we “wrestle”. I'll never forget when I went out for wrestling in high school. I found out it's an exercise of resistance and endurance. You're resisting the strength of the person that you're wrestling with. That’s what we are told to do with the devil. James 4:7 says, "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil." How do you do it? You do it with the Word of God! Then we are promised that, “he will flee from you”.

Today we should be encouraged with the last verses in Isaiah 40:28-31, “Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, The Creator of the ends of the earth, Neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, And to those who have no might He increases strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall, But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.”

Oh my friend, we can walk, run, and soar like eagles above all the powers of evil when we walk in faith, and in the Word of truth like Jesus did.

God bless you, and may you have a wonderful, wonderful day.