In this chapter, we will
continue looking at the ways Satan tries to overcome us as we have our sword
ready for use. The fourth way that Gurnall describes, has to do with one of the
most destructive means that Satan uses, with the intended purpose of at best
disarming us of our sword entirely, or at least making it so ineffective that
it poses little threat to him. Gurnall
has us consider the various religious systems that are in operation within the
world, and how they either help reinforce, or minimize how well we know the
Holy Bible, the Word of God.
He says, "Is the Word
the sword of the Spirit with which the Christian can vanquish his enemies? Then
we must charge with cruelty any religious system which disarms people of the
only weapon which can defend them against enemies which seek their eternal
death. It is true, these leaders have a few fig leaves to hide this shameful
tradition, making the world believe they are merciful not to want their parishioners
to wound themselves with this weapon." Gurnall is referring to the practice
of certain religions of treating the Scriptures as though only a few people are
chosen by God to understand them, so if a layperson sitting in the pew were to
be unsupervised in their reading of the Bible, that they could do harm to
themselves.
This is the excuse they use
to withhold the Scriptures from people, Scriptures that would actually bring
light, knowledge and freedom to the reader if they were allowed to have it to
study freely, with the help of the Holy Spirit. But, the Holy Bible was not
meant to be read by only a few, it was inspired by God to be written by the
hands of what we would consider average men (except for Paul, the writers of
the Bible were not "seminary-taught", educated men). Thus, keeping the Scriptures out of the hand
of a believer, is to have him armed with a very weak sword, and that is to his
detriment.
"How wrong for teachers
to want the people to learn this knowledge solely from their preaching, and not
from the Bible! How can a congregation be sure they are hearing truth unless they have Scripture, the
only touchstone to try the purity of the doctrine? God Himself directs His Word
not to any one honored group - not to a select few - but to every man (Romans 1:7, Second Corinthians
1:1)...By the same authority with which the apostle wrote his epistles, he
commanded them to be read in the church. Did ministers of the early church hide
God's Word from the people instead of encouraging them to hide it in their
heart?", asks Gurnall.
We see from reading Acts
17:11 that the Bereans "... were of more noble character than those in
Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined
the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true." They could not
have done this if they did not have access to the Scriptures themselves. And if
one doesn't have access to Scripture, one can easily become spiritually
under-fed and ultimately deceived by erroneous teachings that weaken and
potentially destroy his sword, rather than building him up so that his sword
reflects the strength he has within him from his knowledge of the Scriptures.
As Gurnall tells us, "Can
there be a greater blasphemy to our God than to imply His Word fails to contain
everything necessary for salvation? Would God send His people into battle and
put such a dull sword into their hand that it could not defend them and cut
their way through their enemies' powers to heaven, whither (wherever) He
commands them to march? Why would the Father give arms that are not fit to
oppose any enemy that comes, since He knows how to furnish us with the best
weapons? Would He give us weak and insufficient weapons for defense and then
warn us to use nothing else? He would be sending His unknowing sheep to the
slaughter to have their throats cut by the enemy...And does He not forbid us to
use any other weapon than that which Scripture supplies? He sees it as
renouncing (our) allegiance to Him to go anywhere else for counsel or
protection except to His Word. Scripture is sufficient for God's purposes, and
is able to furnish every true Christian in the world with wisdom enough to find
salvation for his soul."
The fifth way that Satan uses
is to have us look for places in Scripture that we believe give us license to
commit wickedness and to defend our acts of willful sin. The enemy loves it when we use our knowledge
of the Word of God to ward off much-needed reproofs from another. Many use
their knowledge of the Word in order to protect their ungodly lifestyles or
attitudes. In an attempt to justify his corrupt ways, a heretic will choose
particular parts of God's Word to use to his advantage, in order to do as he
pleases.
Gurnall warns us, "Man's
heart is desperately wicked when he steals such sweet portions of Scripture to
disguise his lusts. Verses declaring God's free grace, given to melt sinners'
hearts and draw them to Christ, are often used as a wedge to keep a hard heart
from bowing before the Savior. God gave examples of holy men's downfalls to encourage
us to fear and to stand, and to take hope in His mercy. Yet many choose to
wallow like animals in their own wasted lives. They insist that everything will
be all right because some very important saints had a dreadful fall and yet had
their sins forgiven and their souls saved...Satan madly uses the few instances
of late repentance in Scripture to beg time of the sinner and make him stay
just a little longer in the Sodom of his sin...No sin is small, but the least
sin amounts to blasphemy when you commit it on a pretense of Scripture. The
devil cannot think of anything he had rather glory in than to wound God's name
with His own sweet sword. He coaxes man to sin and then brags that God made him
do it. If God ever singles out a man on the face of the earth for His utmost
wrath, it will surely be the person who shelters his sin under the wing of holy
Scripture."
Rather than allowing Satan to
tear the knowledge of the Scriptures from us by his deceitful, sneaky
strategies, we should be excited and thankful to God for this sword He has
furnished us out of His grace and love for us! We live in a world where we are
not safe unless we are fully armed with the armor He has provided. There is no
other way of reaching heaven without going through the enemies' territory, and
this has to be uppermost in our minds as we consider how much we need to make
sure that our sword is well sharpened, ready for quick grasp and has been used
in training to such a degree that it is carried in the hands of a skilled
warrior, ready to be used whenever necessary.
It is important to make sure
we have our sword at the ready all at times, and we do this by being sure we
understand the importance of studying the Scriptures for ourselves. It is easy
to allow another to read and interpret the Scriptures for us, but we do
ourselves a disservice because not only do we not get the Word into our hearts, but we also can
be tricked or manipulated very easily by someone with impure motives.
As
Gurnall said, "God has left only one book to the church, and can we refuse
to study it? There is an immense treasure in a nearby mine but too often we
remain paupers because we will not put on work clothes to dig it out...What has
happened to the hunger of saints to study the Scripture? In years past they gave
all they had - even the blood of their veins - to purchase a few pages of it.
Either these people were fools to pay so high a price for this knowledge or you
are greater fools to refuse it when it is so readily obtainable."
One thing that is very
important for us to remember when we study Scripture is that we cannot attain
the knowledge found in God's Word without the Holy Spirit's help. There have
been, and continues to be, many people who think themselves wise and feel no need
for God's help in studying His Word. These people are compared to the Pharisees
of Jesus' day because they are full of head knowledge of the Word but have no
truth in their hearts.
Many who would be considered ignorant by this type of
person are the actual ones to who God gives knowledge when they study the
Scriptures. As Gurnall tells us, "Now the more aware you are of your
weakness, the more fit you are for the Spirit to shape you into the likeness of
Christ; for a proud student and a humble teacher will never agree... He (God) has no
pleasure in the arrogant person, but He has patience with the humble and
diligent." Pray that God finds you a humble student who is teachable and ready
to be taught!
In the next chapter, we will
begin to look at how we are to use this Sword of the Spirit, which is the Holy Word
of God. Gurnall
finishes his book by explaining to us how we are to use our sword to handle the
different enemies that will come against us, those without (Satan and the
world), and those within (our flesh). At the very end he gives us words of
encouragement and wisdom on how to use the sword of the Word against
afflictions, trials and struggles.
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