Putting on the Armor of God

8-26-18 (Proper 16/Ordinary 21 B, Semi-Continuous)

Ephesians 6:10-20; John 6:59-69

Putting On the Armor of God

Today is a special day in our church - a day in which we will be officially welcoming Grayson and Reid into our church family as we celebrate their baptisms.  I have to admit - I always get excited over being able to baptize people.  The sacrament of baptism always awes me, whether it’s an infant, a child, or an adult being baptized - it’s a sign of new beginnings, a reminder of God’s love and God’s promises to us.  It’s the opportunity for us as a community of believers to affirm the promises that God has already made to each of us, the grace that we have been given before we could even understand what grace was, as we witness those promises, those blessings of God enacted and represented in the pouring of water.

Baptism, for all it represents, is a truly holy, truly sacred moment - and the more I thought about it in preparation for this Sunday, the more I also thought about the fact that it’s also the start of an adventure.  To quote the great sage and theologian, Obi-Wan Kenobi - in our baptisms, we take our “first step into a larger world.”  Today, Grayson and Reid become a part of the church - both as a part of this church community and a part of the “big C” Church, the body of Christ.  Today, they become a part of something so much bigger than themselves - and they now have the opportunity to grow into that community, to come to know it and understand it, to learn what it means to say that we are a “church family” and to say that we are part of one body together.  And as we participate as a congregation in this sacrament, we are invited to join them on this adventure - we’re even given the privilege and the responsibility to guide them along the way.  As we teach them, as we pray for them, as we encourage and support both them and their family, as we share in that journey together and live into the vows we’ve taken and confirmed in our own baptisms, we will find that we go together in this adventure side by side.

It’s interesting that the lectionary reading from Ephesians today, then, talks about putting on the whole armor of God, and I love how appropriate this passage is for us in the context of baptism.  It might not seem that way at first, perhaps - when we typically talk about baptism or look at the different traditions of the church that surround the sacrament, there’s not really any talk of armor.  In some of the earliest traditions of the church, a person would be given a new, white robe when they were baptized so that they could physically enact the baptismal commitment to “put on Christ” or to “clothe ourselves in Christ” - a lot of people still carry on a form of this tradition by having their children wear new, white clothing for their baptism day, or a special suit or dress bought just for the occasion.  But armor?  Could you imagine us standing by the newly baptized with full suits of white or gleaming silver full plate, just waiting for the water to be poured over them so we can start strapping them into their new “armor of God?”  It may seem a little silly when you visualize it that way, but when we remember that baptism is the start of that adventure of discovering what it means now that we say “I am a child of God…” perhaps there are stranger ways of looking at it.

When we think of adventures, we typically think of the fantastic voyages, the heroes’ journeys that tend to spark our imagination and fuel our dreams.  It’s these kinds of adventures that have the heroes donning armor, engaging in dangerous feats, and risking life and limb to accomplish their objectives.  You think of Frodo avoiding monsters to take the One Ring to Mordor, of Luke flying his X-Wing into the Death Star, of Harry Potter trying to find a way to defeat Voldemort - and when we hear this passage about “putting on the full armor of God,” it’s to these stories that we gravitate.  There’s something thrilling about the idea of donning our armor and wielding our sword to stand firmly against the demonic forces of the world, to wage war against our enemies and to conquer in the name of Christ.

But Jesus’ teachings are harder than that - and, if I may be so bold to claim, much more adventurous.  There’s a reason that the disciples scratched their heads and said to Jesus, “This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?”  There’s a reason that the Gospels tell us of those who, on hearing Jesus’ teachings, did not have the strength to continue to follow.  The battle Jesus calls us to, the kind of adventure that we take our first steps toward in our baptisms… it isn’t an easy one, and it’s far more complex than we tend to realize.  Paul tells the Ephesians that the struggle isn’t against “enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”  In the Feasting on the Word commentaries, Peter Rhea Jones explores the kind of struggle that Paul is depicting.  He writes: “In unmasking the powers, one thinks of segregation, apartheid, fatalism, the Mafia, addiction, bondage of the will, totalitarian states, a celebrity culture of glamorized Bad Girls and Boys, serfdom in the medieval period, attempted bribery of legislatures through large campaign contributions, and genocide. Depersonalization creates a long gray line of faceless folk who think of themselves as no more than a Social Security number. One thinks of Nazi philosophy, unbridled nationalism, violence, hunger, racism, obscenity, addiction, brothels in Mumbai, nuclear weapons, and tobacco companies.”

These are not enemies against which we can wage a physical war - these are demons of the kind we don’t typically imagine when we hear the term “spiritual warfare” thrown about.  But this is the kind of spiritual warfare to which we are called, all the same.  It’s why, of the six pieces of armor that Paul lists, five are strictly defensive items designed for our protection from the things against which we struggle.  Even the Sword of the Spirit isn’t so much the daring, swashbuckling weapon of destruction that we might imagine it otherwise to be - as we wear those boots of the Gospel of Peace, we should be reminded that we should never wield Scripture as a means to tear others down or to wound people, but that we proclaim a gospel, a Word that is infused first and foremost with love.  We don’t fight against corruption, injustice, and sin because we want to see our enemies trampled under our feet; we fight against these things because Christ has clothed us in his love and we desire nothing less than that all others may know that love, as well.  Maybe it would be easier if we had more clearly defined “enemies” against which we could genuinely take out our righteous aggression… but it is Christ who tells us to love those enemies, to forgive and pray for them, and to hope for their redemption even as we gladly profess our own.

And so, as we prepare to welcome these children to adventure beside us - let us also be reminded again of our own journey.  Let us renew our commitment to put on Christ, to wear that wonderful, protective armor that shines with God’s love.  Let us remember that this is not an adventure to which we are called to embark on alone, but one that we undertake together as a community.  Let us find strength in one another and build each other up as we share in our travels.  And may we always be girded with Christ’s love, above all else.  To God be the Glory.  Amen.