Here’s a short post which I thought I had published a month ago. A few thoughts about some verses in the Bible.
I was considering a passage in the Bible which I have written on a little before which I come back to time and time again within the year and that’s the passage from Ephesians 6 which begins ‘Finally be strong in the Lord…‘
This time as I considered it I was struck by why the word stand. When I say struck it was more “I need to look at what this word in this context means. I think there’s something important that’s being said here.” In v 10 it talks about be strengthened in the Lord. He’s already given us what we need in him that is his strength. This is relevant in another way to the church I belong to. We have taken for or verse of the year 1 Chronicles 16:11 which is also paralleled in psalm 105 vs 4 which says ‘Seek the Lord and his strength seek his face always’. (In the Lexham version it says: Make supplication to Yahweh and his might, seek his face continually. Face can also be presence, that’s how other versions translate it).
Ephesians 6.10 refers also to resisting. That word in Greek looks like it has the same root as standing. I like that! In other places in the New Testament it talks about resisting the devil or evil in 1 Peter 5.9 and James 4.7 again the word in Greek is the same as the one in Ephesians I refer to.
This in and of itself is deliberate warfare. We don’t have to do anything as such apart from putting on armour or leaning into what’s already provided for us by the Lord. This is the Lord’s strength, his presence. It is modelled to us in the form of armour.
Stand still and see the salvation of your God… (Ex 14.13) there’s that old testament connection. Standing itself is a form of resistance and overcoming. If we include the word resist along with stand the word is repeated 5 times in verses 10 to 14.
According to the Faithlife Study Bible the expression standing in Ephesians 6:11 is a military expression that refers to a posture of opposition toward an enemy.
To sum up changing the words of The Borg, some Star Trek bad guys – resistance ISN’T futile! This standing is a way that we can be empowered to fight our enemy.