Soldier No.10 The Soldier's Hope-2

And let's go to Ephesians in chapter 6, where we read from verse 16, In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Now let me say for visiting friends that for a long period of time we've been making our way at the tab verse by verse and sometimes word by word through the epistle to the Ephesians.

And we're looking at what is perhaps the height of the teaching of the Apostle Paul as he brings us face to face with the fact that going through this world we're in a war. If you have not found the world outside the church hostile to your testimony, then I wonder what your testimony has been all about. The Apostle realized our Lord warned that those who put their trust in him will be exposed to the forces of the devil.

They will know evil influences trying to infiltrate into their lives and blunt the edge of their evangelism and tarnish the pure name of the gospel. And so the Apostle is concerned to ensure that Christian people, as they go out into the world outside, have a defense. And he takes up piece by piece the equipment of the Roman soldier and says that spiritually speaking there is an equivalent grace for every believer so that as the Romans were able to be secure as they defended the frontiers of Caesar, so Christian people shall be secure.

When the devil comes along and he sends in those arrows to which reference was made in the 16th verse, and my address was preached on a couple of weeks ago, that the Christian shall be able to cope. Well we come to the fifth piece of the armor. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, but particularly the helmet of salvation.

I'm bringing you back to that again because I think there's so much more that needs to be said than what I shared last week. Now the helmet which obviously was placed upon the head sometimes had on it an inscription, a motto, a sort of catch phrase or word. And as far as the Christian is concerned it's easy to identify what that word is because when you go to 2nd Thessalonians you discover that the Apostle in making reference again to the to the armor of the Christian refers to it in terms of I said 2nd Thessalonians, 1 Thessalonians 5 makes reference to the helmet in terms of the helmet of hope.

But since we belong to the day let us become self-controlled putting on faith and love as a breastplate and the hope as a helmet, 1 Thessalonians 5 and verse 8. So the Christian has hope on his helmet and of course we're not going to be wooden or literalistic in our understanding this morning. I am speaking of that characteristic, that grace that should dominate your attitude to life. Your head obviously controls your body, your brain is within your head, it conditions your personality.

What is your personality like? Have you got a covering on it, the covering of of hope? When I was a lad living in Sheffield from time to time we'd catch the train and go to Derbyshire. Derbyshire is a very beautiful county particularly in North Derbyshire and the train from Sheffield Midland Station, this was before the days of the beaching axe and the cutting up of good village lines that were connected by the rail in in North Derbyshire. You'd get the train from from the Midland Station and it would take you through Dorantoffley, it would take you through Haversidge, it would take you through Grindleford.

You can see these places because I as I go through them in my mind because I frequented them so often and eventually it would take you to a village called Hope. Now the British railway system never took you beyond hope. Let commuters allow that to be the blessed thought that they take through this next week.

It stopped at hope, there was nothing beyond and in one sense my dear friend that's a parable of the Christian. He stops at hope. This is where the gospel leads him to you see.

He's going through this world, the world's somewhat hostile to him but he decides that because the Lord Jesus is his Savior and there are many many precious promises that speak to him of a holy optimism. He can don the helmet of hope and he can go through the world in a very blessed condition. You know if I may continue my tour de force around North Derbyshire and Sheffield which is South Yorkshire.

In my home city there's a suburb called Brightside. Never were words so prostituted than when they gave that suburb the name Brightside. It's a sort of row upon row of coronation streets all lined up together and a lot of them now have probably been replaced or they should have been.

But you know in one sense although that suburb is misnamed in my home city it describes the sort of territory in which the Christian has his life. He's got the helmet of hope and he lives on the bright side. He lives on the bright side.

He really does. You see what I'm sharing today, what I've been sharing for these last three or four months, God help me, is not academic theology. It's so vital for us to grasp these things.

The Christian has the helmet of hope. He has an attitude in life that is completely different from anyone else. Now this concept of hope and the helmet of the hope of salvation, again although it's sharpened in the New Testament, it's there in the old.

You see every man and woman of God in biblical times needed in one sense to put the hope of salvation upon their heads as a helmet. You fancy the occasion, imagine you were there for a moment when the Hebrews are just on the borders of the promised land. Joshua is sort of second-in-command to Moses and these men, twelve of them, are told to go on a reconnaissance mission into the promised land.

Now you remember this chorus, many of you used to sing it in those good old CSSM choruses which are really saturated in Scripture. Ten men, twelve men, twelve men went to spy in Canaan, you remember it? Ten were bad, two were good. Some saw the giants great and tall, some saw the grapes in clusters fall, some saw that God was in it all.

Ten were bad, two were good. The one who brought in, the ones who brought in the minority report and said let's go through into Canaan, they saw the promises of God and the blessings of God about to be realized. In a word they had on their heads the helmet of hope.

Now that applies to you, or it should do, to you and to me in the 20th century. Here we are believers in our Lord Jesus, there should be a holy optimism that keeps us, whatever our circumstances I would argue, and I say that in a very feelingful and considered way, should keep us on the bright side. Now I know that there are those who immediately, as I've been preaching on this aspect of this subject, knock up some sort of opposition thought.

How they say, can you argue that the helmet is the hope of salvation. Take the word hope. Hope seems to speak of what will be realized in the future, and here you are card-carrying Protestants, and you're immersed even though you don't know it in the teachings of John Calvin, not because Calvin was the authoritative teacher of Scripture, but because he got it right as far as the doctrine of justification by faith is concerned.

And this was really Augustinian theology, and if you trace it back historically, it's Paul's theology, it's Jesus's theology, it's theology of the whole book. Now what's this business about being saved in hope? You see, you could say that I'm no better off at this moment than that poor Jehovah's Witness who had the ill fortune of pressing my bell yesterday, and I spent a little while with him, and he was saying when I said, how do you know you're saved? Well I might be saved if, you know, if I bang so many doors, and my heart just went out this brother, I mean if I was almost in tears when I was through, as I very often am in regard to Jehovah's Witnesses. Now Christians are not sort of looking forward in terms of they've got an uncertainty in the present, have they? And yet we talk about the hope of salvation, and that predicts, it predicates something that's in the future.

So how do you understand it? Well my friend, you see, in one sense salvation is such a wonderful thing that you've got to put it into three dimensions. Now listen, shake your heads as Joy told you to do a little moment, two or three moments ago if you can't follow, and get those little cogs whirring round. How long ago were you saved? Well my brother, Mr. Hattersley, he'd say I was saved sixty odd years ago or something like that.

Listen to Campbell Morgan, and others would say well it was fifty years ago. Some would say it was ten years. Some fellows in the gallery, they'd say well it was just last year, or maybe some girls just a month or two ago.

But it was past, wasn't it? You know somebody explained to you, about the Lord Jesus dying on the cross of Calvary, and you gave him your heart as you realized that you're a sinner, and he died to save you. And at that moment, well you were forgiven. And so you're able to sing, praise my soul the King of heaven, ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven, who like me thy praise should sing.

It's the past you see, that this is what happened to me in the past, I have been saved. And that's glorious, and I don't want to dislodge that thought from your mind. But whether you were saved ten months ago, or ten days ago, or ten years ago, would you say that you've kept yourself so perfectly in a relationship with God, that there's no way in which God ever frowned, his brow was ever puckered, when he looked on what you were doing.

And you say no, no brother, I've been like the prodigal sometimes, and I've caused him harm, I've caused him hurt. But let me tell you, just in case you've not come across this scripture, you say to me that 1 John chapter 1 and verse 7 says, the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son purifies us from all sin. And you give me a little lesson in Greek, and you say it's the present continuous tense, he keeps on doing it, and therefore I'm saved right now.

This very moment I've asked him to forgive me, all that I've done during this last week, which perhaps caused him to frown. And you're right, your salvation was a past thing, and it's a present thing, but it's also, and this is glorious, it's a future thing. You say I don't understand.

All right, how many of you honestly want to take your body to heaven? Well, if you're 18 and you're handsome, like track one, I think they are. You might want to have that throughout eternity, but you know, when you get as old as I am, then things get a little different, and you're not too sure that you want to live with your body. It's bad enough for however many years I've been living in this one, but to think in terms of it throughout, throughout eternity.

You see, there's an aging process. The apostle Paul is more blunt than I am, when he's writing to the Philippians, he says in Philippians 3, and take the authorized version, it's much stronger. He talks about my vile body.

NIV softens it and says it's my lowly body. And he says that one day, as he's writing to the Philippians, one day when the Lord Jesus shall come back, he will transform my lowly body and make it like into his glorious body. You see, there's a great deal ahead for the Christian.

He's going to have a new body, like the body of the Lord Jesus. That's future, you haven't got it yet. What about your relationship with God? Is it ever impaired? You say, well yes of course, because I sin and there are breaches in my relationship.

I'm not what God wants me to be. You're quite right, you're not, but one day you will be. You're not what you ought to be, but there's a great transformation going to occur in the future, to which Paul of course has made reference in Ephesians 5, when he talks about a bridal scene.

Jesus as the bridegroom, coming back for the bride, which is his church. Verse 26, she won't be any old church, she won't be the ugly sister, she will be the beautiful Cinderella that's made rich. He will come back, verse 26, to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the wood, and he will present her, his church, to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

Now the church isn't like that at the moment, we wish she was, but she isn't. So you see my friend, how salvation has, has not only a past connotation and a present connotation, but it's got a glorious future one. This is why Paul talks about the helmet of the hope of salvation.

So much I have received, but what is on in front is so mind-blowing, says the apostle writing to the Corinthians. I have not seen it, it has not heard of it, and I can't really describe it, because in any case, words wouldn't take the weight of all that I want to try to convey. Now that's the hope that's ours, the hope of salvation, that's what's in store in the future.

Now again, let me argue this, and it's most important that I do so, that it's not only Paul who's teaching this, the whole of the Old Testament and the New Testament converge to tell the, the believer to have an optimistic outlook. It's only that that will keep him going. Let's take Job for a moment, I mean he's about the worst example you can find, isn't he, of a man who was under pressure.

I mean if you had a plague of boils, a plague of boils, multiplied by the problems of a nagging wife, you would really feel that you couldn't get much lower than that, and there were many other difficulties that he had on top of that, and incidentally I wasn't joking about his wife, although thank God for wives who are not like Job's was at that point. She said curse God and die. You can't nag to any more absolute degree than that, can you? And here is Job in his emaciated condition, living in the refuge outside of his encampment because he feels that he's just human rubbish, there's, there's nothing for him, and then suddenly he spies, maybe it's a, it's a branch of an old tree that's been chucked onto the dump and it started to sprout.

You know how that happens, the miracle of nature, the curse so often, and Job becomes, begins to realize that all is not lost as far as he's concerned, and that ultimately out there in the future there is something on which he can place his confidence. And so he says, though worms destroy my body, yet in my flesh shall I see God. I know that my Redeemer liveth.

Now, now Job at the beginning of time has, has this attitude, you see, and it, it helps him to, to cope with the immediate present. He's not delivered from his problems then, but he has sufficient to go on in terms of the future to make the present at least more tolerable. Now I could have given you many another example.

Let, let's go to the New Testament, let's rehearse one that I referred to last week just in passing. Here's Paul, and in 2 Corinthians you find him giving us, unusually, a piece of autobiography. It tells us just how hard things have been for him.

I haven't time to go through the whole of the chapter. The fourth, halfway through the fourth chapter, he tells us verse eight, we're hard-pressed on every side. He says we're persecuted, we're struck down, we always carry around in our body the death of the Lord Jesus.

Do you remember how I showed you last week, he sort of tabulates it all. And then when you think, Paul, there's no one who can, who can have a more crushing burden than you have, he goes on to call it in verse 17, our light affliction. Why is that? Well, you see, he's looking forward.

Verse 16, therefore we do not lose heart. Why don't you lose heart, Paul? Well, verse 18, we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Here is Paul coping with his present problem, because of the hope that he has. Let me illustrate this a little, perhaps more plainly, by taking it to you to the 24th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. We're still with Paul.

Now, have you ever thought that Paul was on trial because of his hope in the Lord Jesus? That's what is being said. Later on in the, in the following chapter, he says that he's on trial for the hope of Israel, for the hope of believing in the Lord Jesus. Now, when he's on trial, as you find him in verse, in chapter 24, he's in front of two or three very important Romans.

The most senior is a man called Felix. And Felix has something of the gospel explained to him by Paul. And what does Felix do at the end? Well, he has Paul thrown back into prison.

Now, why does he have him thrown back into prison? Well, let's read from verse 26. At the same time, he was hoping that Paul would offer him a bribe, so he sent for him frequently and talked with him. Here is Felix, and he's hoping for money.

And Paul has been in front of him as the unsearchable riches of Christ to share with Felix. And he's more concerned about the money than he is about his eternal destiny. How, how tragic that is, my friend.

That Felix had no hope, and yet Paul was filled with hope. It's what kept him going. So, you see, there are illustrations, and one could literally pick up many of them in the Old and in the New Testament, that demonstrate the fact that when a man puts on the helmet of hope, he can, he's, he's well able to live on the bright side.

So, what I want to try and do now is, just in my, in my final moments, to, to apply this more specifically to you. I've no need to repeat all that the armor, in this, in this case, the hope stands for. That we did last week.

But what I want to do is to be even more practical. When do you need hope, the helmet of hope? Well, when do you need a crash helmet? Well, you need a crash helmet when you're going to crash. And because you don't know when you're going to crash, you always wear your crash helmet, if you're on a motorcycle, not so.

So, the Christian, he needs to be wearing the helmet of hope all the time, and particularly to be able to cope when he fails, in what I would call the dark hour of the soul. What's the darkest hour that you go through? Well, let me be autobiography, biographical for a moment. The darkest hour of the soul, for me, is when the devil gets through.

You know, I, that address that I preached two or three weeks ago, on the devil's quiver. He comes and he takes his arrows, and despite the breastplate of salvation, despite the belt of truth, despite my, my, my shoes shod with the gospel of peace, despite all the years I have been a Christian, he gets through. And I feel so miserable.

So, there I am, groping on the ground. He's got me again. The dark hour of the soul.

I should be standing, and I'm prostrate. I should be proud with my head high, but I feel so ashamed. Now, it's at that point that I need to reach out and recover my helmet, and put it back on my head.

And say, as does the prophet Micah, in chapter 7 and verse 8 of his prophecy, rejoice not against me or mine enemy. For when I fall, I shall rise. When I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me.

You see, I need the helmet of salvation, the hope of salvation, particularly when I am failing. When the devil has got through, and seems to be winning the battle, then I need to take that helmet and place it back on, and say to him, devil one day, I'm going to give you the hiding of your life. Even though you've won thus far, I'm going to beat you at this particular point of your pressure.

Macbeth, this, at least in Shakespeare's play Macbeth, one of the characters has this to say, the miserable hath no other medicine but only hope. Well, I'll settle for being miserable, if you will give me the medicine of hope, and I'll take the bottle when I'm down. When do I need the helmet of the hope of salvation? Well, when I failed in temptation's dark hour.

When also God seems powerless, and you find yourself to be in a minority position. When God seems powerless, and you seem to be in a minority position. Here is Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, those three Hebrews of Old Testament times, and Nebuchadnezzar has made his great decree, and they've, they haven't bowed down to his image, and they're brought up in front of him, and he says, look, if you don't bite the dust the next time that the Philharmonic Orchestra in Babylon starts to play, then you're done for.

And their reaction is, oh, King Nebuchadnezzar, whether our God is able to deliver us or not, be it known, we will not bow down at the sound of the music, nor worship the image that you have set up. Wearing their helmet of hope, when they seem to be powerless, and in a minority position. Listen to this.

I only came across this, at least I came across it once again yesterday, I'd looked it up some years ago. It's a letter that was found in Ravensbrück concentration camp, after the Nazis had been reduced, and after the war was over, they went through these camps, and this letter was discovered, written by one of the inmates, and it had this to say, it was a prayer. Oh Lord, remember not only the men and women of goodwill, but also those of ill will, but do not only remember all the suffering that has been inflicted on us.

Remember the fruits we brought thanks to this suffering, our comradeship, our loyalty, our humility, our courage, the generosity that was shown, the great things that have grown out of this, and when they are persecutors come to judgment, let all the fruit that we have borne, be their forgiveness. Isn't that majestic? Now who can write that sort of thing? Only the person who has upon his head, the helmet of the hope of salvation. Continue to trust when God seems to be absent, and you're in a minority position.

This is why I argue my friend, it's so important that you understand these pieces of the armor are right, and that you practically seek to have those graces displayed within your personalities. But then again, I argue you need to know the hope of the helmet of salvation, when a loved one has been snatched from you. Someone has said this, there are two parties to the suffering that death inflicts, and in the apportionment of this suffering, the survivor takes the brunt.

Two parties who suffer when people die, and according to Arnold Toynbee, the survivor takes the brunt. Now some of my older friends have known that, and some of my younger friends. You remember how Dylan Thomas tried to get his father to cope aggressively with the fact of dying.

Do not go gently into that good night. Old age should burn and rage at close of day. Rage, rage against the dimming of the light.

And Bernard Shaw says, I hate being old. I used to meet with 50 of my friends in a pub in London, and now there's only me and two of them left. But you see, when you come to the tremendous hour, as a loved one is snatched from you, or as you face the jaws of death itself, you have a hope.

If we believe that Jesus Christ is only, says the Apostle Paul, I paraphrase him, is only good for salvation in this world, then our hope is utterly void. It is a hopeless thing in the end. But if we believe that Jesus Christ has gone through the grave, and is through on the resurrection side, and he beckons us ultimately to be with him, then of all men we are the most hopeful.

And so the Christian can look at death itself, and believe that when a loved one's been snatched, or when they're about to pass through the valley of the shadow, they can do so, in the words of the prayer book, in the sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life. Now put all those things together. Let's go through them just once more.

When do you need the crash helmet? The helmet of the hope of salvation? Well, when you've failed in temptation's dark hour. When you don't feel that you can cope again, put the helmet on. And know the strengthening of the Lord, as you put the devil to flight and promise him another skirmish.

When God seems powerless, and you're in a minority position, then hope in God, and believe that ultimately he'll redeem your circumstances. And finally, when a loved one has been snatched from you, then hope. Cling on to the fact that ultimately, you will go to be with them.

Live in the bright side of life, with a helmet of the hope of salvation squarely upon you. That's the way to cope, that's the way to advance. British Rail used to take lads of my age years ago, on that southern line from Sheffield.

No further than the village of hope, that's where the gospel takes you. So put on the hope of salvation, and live optimistically, knowing that the Lord God has his hand upon your life. Amen.

My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. 343. You that Jesus Christ is indeed our hope, our hope in the past, and he never let us down, our hope in the present, and he remains faithful.

But we thank you that he beckons us on into the future. Now be with every friend here, whose hope has been like the flickering light of a candle flame, precariously balanced during these last few days. Give them more oil, we pray, in their lamp.

Give them more fuel, and may they know the hope burned that much more strongly, giving light and warmth. We ask that all of us, Father, may be established more in the most holy faith, wearing the hope of the helmet of salvation, until the time comes when we can dispense with hope. For we stand in your presence, where we find ourselves in heaven, where hope is realized by actuality, and no longer is necessary.

So continue to bless us, for Jesus' sake. Amen.