Good Soldiers

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Well, I have not ever served in the military, but I can’t help but imagine that there are a number of sacrifices that are involved in doing so, not only for the one who goes and serves, but the ones who are left behind. And we have sort of this romantic notion of war, I think, sometimes. The heroics and the glory, and there’s some of that, too.

Patton is one of my favorite movies of all time, despite the language. and all throughout the movie that he’s obsessed with the glory of war. And in that movie, the character of General Bradley tells him, what about the little guy?

He said, he doesn’t share your dreams of glory. He’s here because he has to be. And, you know, there are so many who have served who were there because they had to be.

There are so many who have served because they chose to, but they weren’t there necessarily for glory. They were there to get the job done and to get home safely to those who they were fighting for. When I lived in Fayetteville, there are two Civil War cemeteries there in town, and you can imagine why there would be two.

One is a national cemetery now, and it’s very nicely laid out. As far as the just very geometrically organized rows of identical white headstones, It’s just like Arlington, maybe, I’m sure, a lot smaller. But it started as the Union Cemetery, from what I understand, and has become a national cemetery, and there are more recent people there.

I went there once or twice to take a look at it, just to see. I mean, it would be a shame to live there and not go and see that part of our history. But there was another cemetery there in town that even a lot of people who lived there for all their lives didn’t realize that it was there because it was in a secluded part of town that you wouldn’t have found it unless you just happened to cross it or knew where it was.

It was the Confederate Cemetery, and I went there a time or two. I actually went there more than a time or two. It was a very quiet place that if I just needed to go and think and pray, I knew nobody was going to bother me there.

And I’d go and park my car and go walk into the cemetery and just sit and think or whatever. And I was struck by the fact that slavery was a part of that war, and certainly I’m not in favor of that or racism of any kind. But thought of the fact that these men, maybe especially in the Ozarks, where not a lot of people held slaves, these men were fighting more in defense of their homes and their families than the ideal of slavery, and thought that so many of these men came to make sacrifices on behalf of their families as well.

And I was struck by the fact that it couldn’t have been about glory for them because in the whole cemetery, I only remember seeing one grave that still had the name on the headstone. It had been so poorly maintained over the years that if many of them probably were buried unknown and those who were, their names had eroded off the headstones. And I thought, I used to sit there and think about these men, we’d never know who they were, who made this ultimate sacrifice for their homes, for their families, for their country, and there was no glory in it, and yet they made the sacrifice.

And it just always brought to mind all the sacrifices that have been made. And I don’t mean to say that they made any more sacrifice than the ones who were buried down at the Union Cemetery or anything like that. It was just more glaring to me because they made the sacrifice and we don’t even remember their names.

And it just always brought to mind for me, excuse me, always brought to mind for me the sacrifices that so many have made throughout all the wars. Those who’ve served in war often say how horrible a thing it is. And they’re proud of their service, but it was a horrible thing to go through.

One of the reasons I like the movie Patton is because my grandfather has told stories about serving under George Patton. My grandfather served in the Third Army under Patton as they went into Germany, and after that was finished, he was actually transferred over to the Philippines. But he’s told me stories about Uncle Joe, or Uncle George.

I’m sorry, Uncle Joe was somebody else in World War II, wasn’t he? Stalin. My grandfather did not serve under Stalin.

He’s told me stories about Uncle George, as he still calls him. And has told me a lot of things, but you know, he’s 90 years old, and even after all these years, how many years has it been? 55 plus 14, that’s been 69 years, that sound right?

Since the war was over? There are still some things that he can’t talk about or won’t talk about. There are a lot of stories I will probably never know, because of the sacrifices and the hardships that he endured and so many others endured, that are just beyond comprehension if you’ve not been through it.

And war and just the very essence of being a soldier is about hardship and about sacrifice. And those of us who’ve never served and who’ve never been in battle, we see the romanticized version of it from the movies. I think of war and I see the final scene in The Patriot where he grabs the flag and he runs in spite of the fact that all the Americans are retreating the other way and he runs and he’s the lone one to go forward and they all see him carrying the flag and waving the flag and they rally and we see that and we think of the heroics and we don’t think of the sacrifices that lead to those moments and we don’t think of the sacrifices after those moments and we don’t think about the hardships that are endured in that moment but that’s the whole point of being a soldier.

I feel strange even telling you this because I’m Of all the men in this room, I’m the least likely to be able to tell you anything about being a good soldier. But being a soldier is about sacrifice and hardship. And it’s not for no reason that when Paul wrote to Timothy and talked to him about the Christian life, as we’ve talked about 2 Timothy some lately, it being some of Paul’s last words to Timothy, it is not without reason that Paul would write to Timothy and use the example of a soldier when instructing him on how he’s to behave as a Christian going forward in spite of the persecution that was going to be suffered.

I can’t remember if I’ve told you or not, but if I have not already told you, we’re going to be in 2 Timothy 2 this morning and just look at a few verses. But starting in chapter 2, verse 1, Paul writes to Timothy and says, Thou therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. It’s one thing to have the grace of Christ, but we need to be strong in it.

We need to understand the grace of Christ as much as we can. I still struggle with the idea of why would he die for me? When you really get to the point of understanding how little we deserve from God and how much he gave us in spite of that, there’s a lot about God’s grace that I don’t and never will understand.

But as much as we’re capable of, we need to have such an understanding of God’s grace, maybe not why he extended it or why he did it, but that he did it and what it means for us, that we do not waver. When the world throws everything it has at us, we still understand we stand in the grace of Christ. That when Satan tries to convince us, you’ve fallen too far, you’ve done too much, he can’t love you, he can’t forgive you, you know what, we stand in the grace of Christ. And not to say we sin because there’s grace, so we might as well use it, but sin is what grace is for. Grace is there because there is sin.

Now that doesn’t give us a license to sin. If we can sin and think, I’m going to do it as much as I can because there’s grace, I’ll be forgiven. You might want to check and make sure you’re really saved because our want to should change drastically.

But when Satan tries to deceive us and tells us, you’ve sinned, God can’t forgive you. I’m sorry, that’s exactly what forgiveness and grace is, that we’ve sinned and he forgives us anyway. So he says, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.

And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to teach others also. And we’ve talked about that some at length recently. But he calls him to train other men who will be able to carry this message of grace forward as well.

And then he says in verse 3, and this is where we’re going to focus this morning. Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that woreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. Now the Christian life is compared and contrasted with a lot of things.

He goes on, and we may talk about this tonight. At this point, honestly, I’ve studied a few different things, and I don’t know where the Lord’s going to lead as far as what we talk about tonight. I don’t know, but this may be one of them.

He talks about an athlete later on in the chapter, compares the Christian life to a race. He does that in Hebrews chapter 11, talks about running the race. He talks about being a farmer and how that applies to the Christian life.

There are other places where the kingdom of heaven is compared to a mustard seed, where it’s compared to someone who found a pearl of great price. There are any number of things where God points and says, yes, following me is like that. But in this instance, it’s well worth a reminder both to Timothy and to us.

I think it probably is more worth a reminder to us even than it was to Timothy, that being a Christian, that serving God, that following him is like being a soldier. And the reason I say it may be more applicable to us today is because as Christians in the United States of America in 2014, we have led such a life of ease in contrast to the rest of the world around us and many generations before us that if one little thing comes along that bothers us, we feel like we’re under such intense persecution or the Christian life is just so hard. And you know what?

It is hard. It is impossible to live as a Christian apart from the enabling of the Holy Spirit, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’ve talked about this from the pulpit.

but we saw a few weeks ago where Mary Annise Parker in Houston started issuing subpoenas or getting subpoenas issued trying to get the sermons of any pastors in Houston, or at least these named pastors in Houston, anything where they talked about homosexuality, gender identity, or about her. And Christians in America just lost it, as well we should have. And I was one of those.

I’ve told you before about the letter inviting her to Lindsay. Still has not taken me up on that, by the way. But we just lost it.

And rightfully so, because we have a First Amendment that protects those things. We don’t answer to the government about what’s preached. And if somebody from here in Lindsay, if somebody from the city of Lindsay or somebody from Garvin County or somebody from the state of Oklahoma, from the government wants to know what we’re preaching, I’m not sending them my message notes.

They can come and hear it just like everybody else, or they can go online and download it. It’s right there. but saying we’re going to subpoena things, we don’t answer to them for what we preach.

But people started talking about persecution of Christians. Well, you know what? We may be on the beginning of some persecution, but if this is persecution, if this is what persecution, a subpoena for sermon notes, if that’s what persecution is supposed to look like, then the people in North Korea are doing it really wrong.

People in Saudi Arabia are doing it really wrong if that’s what persecution looks like. It may be persecution by definition if they’re trying to silence the churches, but really that is nothing. That is nothing in contrast to what so many believers have had to suffer throughout the years.

That is nothing compared to what we may be called on to suffer on a daily basis for the cause of Christ. And I’m not just talking about persecution. But what I’m saying is we’ve come to such a point of ease as American Christians that some mayor gets her feelings hurt and issues a subpoena. We lose it.

Nobody ever promised us that the Christian life was going to be a cakewalk. Nobody ever promised us that it was going to be easy. And we have believers in this country who, well, I’m not going to that church because the pews aren’t comfortable, or I’m not going to church today because the pews aren’t comfortable, or the preacher preaches too long.

Wouldn’t that be a shame? Or, oh, it’s just always so hot in that auditorium. You know what?

there are people today, I think it’s the Philippines, I’m sure this goes on in a lot of places, but I think it was a missionary to the Philippines, told our church in Arkansas about people who walk 10 miles through mud to get to church, and since there’s going to be church twice on Sunday, they just stay there all day, and just hang out there in between the services, and then walk back, they bring their own food with them, and there’s no air conditioning, they sit on wooden planks, and they come, and they worship God for four hours and then they take a break and then they worship God for four more hours. And we complain because the service runs too long or the music isn’t exactly what my preference is. You know what, I’ve not ever been, I don’t think I’ve ever been to a church contemporary or traditional that does the music exactly the way I want it to, the way I would do it.

When I was leading the music at Peniel, we didn’t even, I didn’t even lead the music the way I would do it. But we’ve come to such a point of ease as American Christians that the slightest little thing and we’re ready to say, I don’t want to do this anymore. The slightest hint of persecution.

This is too hard. He tells us to endure. I’ve never had to endure anything good.

I had to endure that burger yesterday at the craft show. No, I inhaled that thing. I enjoyed that.

It was a good hamburger. I’ve endured things I didn’t like. I’ve endured things that weren’t pleasant.

When he tells us to endure, he’s not promising us a life of ease and you need to persevere and keep going through the good times. No, he’s saying there are things there that you’re going to have to endure. Things that are not going to be pleasant.

Things that we’re not going to like. I keep saying you. It’s we.

Things that we are not going to like or find pleasant. And he says we need to endure. We need to stick with it.

He’s telling us. He has just about promised us I think it should be clear to us in the Bible, God has just about promised us that the Christian life is going to be difficult. And if any preacher has ever stood before you and told you any different, I apologize, but you were misled.

If I’ve said anything to indicate that, I was wrong. There’s a lot of joy and there’s a lot of peace in the Christian life, but there’s a lot of difficulty that goes along with it as well. And that’s part of signing up for it.

That’s part of enlisting in his army. But about five things I want to cover just very quickly. And I, you know what, I probably shouldn’t say this because the more often I say it, the less it’s true.

But I think it should be. I think this will be a fairly quick message from here on out. Five things I want to share with you about what it means to be a good soldier of Christ, because he tells us to endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. Five things it means.

First of all, we’re enlisted as believers, as Christians, we are enlisted to serve as soldiers of Jesus Christ. Okay, we talk about him being the master. We talk about him being our Lord. And there are a couple ways that we could take it.

I am my dog’s master, but he doesn’t have to do much. I specifically got a rat terrier so he could catch the rats that were living under the shed after they all came our way when the tornado took out some houses that must have had them. I got a rat terrier.

He is almost useless at catching rats. It was the little nut dog that my sister adopted who ended up helping me get rid of the rats years ago. My dog’s job is just to be.

I’m his master, but his job is just to be. Well, Christ is our master, but that doesn’t mean our job is just to be. We are his servants, not his pampered house pets.

Do you see the difference? And when we come along and receive him, not only as our savior, but folks, as our Lord as well. When we receive him as our Lord, when we bow our knee before his lordship.

You know what? He’s Lord whether we accept it or not. That when we come to the realization that he is and ought to be our Lord and Master, we are enlisting ourselves in his army.

We are reporting for duty. I remember 10 years ago at the Democratic Convention when John Kerry showed up on the podium and saluted and said he was reporting for duty. Now, I don’t remember anything else about that speech.

I just remember him saluting and saying he was reporting for duty. You know, as staged as that might have been, that’s what we ought to be doing. We ought to salute our master and report for duty.

Now, I bring up the John Kerry incident because I don’t know if when you go in and enlist, you have to salute and say, I’m here to. . .

I don’t know how that works. I know that when I was a senior in high school, the war in Iraq was already going on. The war in Afghanistan had been going on for a few years, and when the recruiters would, somehow the high school gave the recruiters the phone numbers, and whenever they would call, my mother would yell at them.

So I never got, I don’t know how enlistment even works. So that is my understanding of reporting for duty, is his speech. But we are enlisting in his service, not just showing up to be his pampered house pets.

And when we enlist, we sort of give up a little bit of our freedom, don’t we? There’s been an irony in that to me, that you gentlemen enlisted to go defend our freedoms, and you gave up some of your own in the process of doing that. And you did that willingly, as far as I understand.

You couldn’t wear your hair just the way you wanted it. You couldn’t sleep in just as long as you wanted to, could you? They kind of frown on that, don’t they?

Unless I’ve got this army thing completely wrong. or Navy in your case. You give up some of your freedoms and you take on a lot of responsibilities when you enlist. You know what?

I gave up and should rightly give up some of the control and some of the say in my own life when I bowed my knee to the Lordship of Christ. And I came to the realization that I’d been bought and purchased with a price. Folks, we no longer belong to ourselves. We no longer get to call the shots.

We belong to him. We’ve enlisted in his army and he’s the commander. and along with that comes the necessity of obedience to him.

So we’re enlisted to serve as soldiers of Jesus Christ. Second of all, we’re called to persevere as soldiers of Jesus Christ. Now, Brother Dacus, you’ve already said you weren’t in battle. Brother Shank, were you? Were you ever in battle?

Okay. Well, I’m guessing you know what would have happened had you been in battle. Would it have worked if you’d gotten into battle and said, yeah, I don’t think I want to do this anymore, put down your weapon and walked off the field?

That would not, they have a term for that, don’t they? What is it? Traitor.

Traitor. Not the term I was thinking of, but even better. I was thinking deserter, but traitor works just as well.

You’re not allowed to just walk off the battlefield because you feel like it. We’re not allowed to, you’re not allowed to say, well, they wouldn’t let me sleep in this morning. I’m just leaving the base.

I’m done. They call that going AWOL, don’t they? I do know a few things.

I’ve picked up a few things over the years no it’s hard I basic training I would have to believe is hard I’ve seen the shows where they where they do this the school for the Navy SEALs oh my goodness I wouldn’t make it the first three minutes I don’t know that I’d even make it through basic training I’ve watched old episodes of Gomer Pyle USMC I don’t think I would make it through that that was a show and with Sergeant Carter in his face yelling, I wouldn’t make it through that because I live in a world where nobody yells and everybody’s nice and anyway. Being a soldier is hard. I tell you that from no experience whatsoever.

But those who’ve done it could tell you better than I could that it is hard and there are challenges. And you know what? You’re in it for the long haul.

You have to stick it out. Brothers and sisters, believers this morning, there are challenges involved.

There are hardships involved in being a soldier of Christ. there are things that are going to be unpleasant there are things that we would probably rather not do there are things that we’d rather not go through but we don’t have the luxury of just walking away and saying I’m not going to do this anymore because we’re called to persevere as his soldiers we’re told thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier you know what a bad soldier is the one who walks away a bad soldier is the one who doesn’t do what he’s commanded to do a good soldier follows orders and does what he’s told to do to the best of his ability even if it’s hard we’re called to persevere there are going to be times when the christian life is hard we’re told we’re encouraged we’re encouraged by paul’s letter to timothy to stick with it third of all we’re commanded to do battle as soldiers of jesus christ he says in verse four that no man that warth entangleth himself and he’s tying that back into verse three there’s the assumption there that as a soldier you’re going to be going to war you’re going to be going into battle Now, it is a fairly recent phenomenon, this idea of using soldiers as peacekeepers or lending them to the UN or whatever it is that we do or have done, lending them to the UN just to keep the peace and they can’t carry weapons, or using them to build bridges in other countries.

That’s a fairly new phenomenon. I can’t remember who said it now, but the quote has stuck with me for years, that the job of armies is to kill people and break stuff. Anybody else heard that?

You know who said that? Any idea? Rush Limbaugh.

You know what, I think that is where I heard it, but I think he was quoting somebody else. Now, I can’t remember who said it, but whoever said it, it was true. The job of armies, historically, has been to kill people and break stuff.

War, that’s the job of a soldier. Now, I’m not saying war is fun or soldiers enjoy war or, you know, if I had my choice, there would never be war again. And one day we’ll be at a point where there never will be war again, but we’re not there yet.

And I’m not the one who will be sitting there cheerleading the next war. If we have to go to war with another country, even if we have to, it should be a thing where we think, I wish we didn’t have to do this. I wish people didn’t have to die to accomplish this.

Sometimes war is a necessary evil, but that’s the job of a soldier is to go to war. and even if you weren’t in battle the job of a soldier is to be supporting the army to where it can wage war and you know what it’s all important in that but there’s this idea there’s this assumption that armies are going to participate in war and so he refers back and says no man that wars entangles himself and there’s this assumption that as Christians we will be as soldiers of Jesus Christ that we’ll be doing battle for him and for his army. Now I want to make very clear what I’m talking about here.

I’m not talking about raising a Christian army that’s going to go kill people and break stuff. And because these messages do end up on the internet, I want to make that very clear. We’re not talking about a Christian army to go kill people and break stuff.

I’m talking about doing spiritual battle. I mean, he says in another place that our enemy is not flesh and blood, but principalities and powers. We have a very real enemy in this world, and it’s not the atheist down the street.

It’s not the homosexual on TV. It’s not even the Muslim, ladies and gentlemen, who flies planes into buildings. The very real enemy that we face in this world is Satan, is the devil, is the same enemy that has been warring against God and his people since the very beginning.

Now, I’m not saying there are not people who do evil things, And I’m not saying that in a political, in a military sense, that we don’t have enemies in the world. We do, and I’m not denying that. But I’m talking about as Christians, if it bleeds, it is not our enemy.

In a spiritual sense, if they bleed, they are not the enemy. Because what we face is the people that we look at, and the world tells us they should be our enemies as Christians. And even some Christians think, oh, they should be, they’re the enemy.

we see the homosexual the atheist the muslim you could name any group of people that are opposed to christianity and say they’re the enemy but when it gets down to spiritual matters they are victims of the enemy they are bound up by the real enemy which is satan who’s who the bible calls the god of this world who has blinded their eyes and it is assumed that we as soldiers of the cross would be involved in warfare not taking guns and and making people convert or die but that we would be involved in the spiritual warfare of prayer, of fasting, of preaching the gospel, all of the things that God has commanded us to do, that we would be warring against the darkness that has this world just shackled, just bound. And we’re expected and commanded to do battle against those forces.

Fourth of all, we’re expected to focus on being soldiers of Jesus Christ. When he says this in verse 4 about no man that wars, he says, no man that warth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life. No man that warth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life. A good soldier, you know, I can’t imagine.

I can’t imagine what it’s like to be that far away from home and that far away from your loved ones and in those awful situations and never knowing whether you’re going to see them again or not. But I’ve heard men who have served in battle talk about you have to focus on what you’re doing right then. If you’re going to have any hope of ever coming back to your loved ones, you’ve got to put some of that aside and focus on what you’re doing right then.

I’ve heard parts of a trailer of a movie. Is it Chris Kyle, the Navy SEAL who was in the news? Is he the one they made the movie about?

But they’re talking about this little boy in the trailer for the movie carrying a grenade, and they don’t know toward this American convoy, and they don’t know if he’s a suicide attacker or if he’s an innocent Iraqi who’s found a grenade and trying to turn it over to U. S. forces and this man is a sniper and as they go through he’s having to make this split second decision do I shoot the little boy or not and either way whatever you do if you’re wrong they’re going to be bad they’re going to be disastrous consequences.

You cannot you cannot be involved in those life or death moments and be worried about what’s going on back home in that and be worried about what’s for lunch later or be worried about, well, so-and-so said this and worried about all these little things that entangle our minds every day. Our men and women wouldn’t make it out alive. Folks, at the same time, there are things that entangle us spiritually.

The affairs of this life can entangle us spiritually. We can get so tied up in what we’re doing and what we want to do and what we want to see happen and what’s going on over here and what are they doing that we lose absolute focus on the job that Christ has put us here to do. How many days do I go throughout the day and not tell somebody anything about Jesus because I forget, as we all do from time to time, that that’s our job.

Get to the end of the day and think, that person needed Jesus. I didn’t even think about it. I was too fed up with their attitude in the line at Whataburger.

And we start to get entangled and distracted with our own life. And we think, okay, that’s the enemy. I don’t like them because they just said something mean to me.

Or I’m too busy worried about this bill. Or I’m too in a rush to get to work. I don’t have time to talk to you.

And we forget about the real battle that’s going on in the world. It’s not a battle for our survival. It’s not a battle for advancing our, for improving our finances or our situation in life. It’s not a battle for our health.

It’s not a battle for any of the things that we hold dear. The real battle in this life is the battle in the spiritual realm. And we can get so entangled and so wrapped up in our own lives and so entangled in the cares of this world that we forget the real job he’s left us to do.

And I’m not saying things that go on with our family and our finances and job. I’m not saying those are not important. But we’ve got to make sure that we keep our focus on what the top priority really is.

Because no man that warth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life. And finally this morning, we’re determined to please our commander, Jesus Christ. As he says in verse 4, No man that warreth and tangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. You know what?

When we trust him, when we trust Christ as our Savior, he does call us to more than salvation. Please understand what I mean by that. I’m not trying to belittle salvation because that is a really big deal. That Jesus Christ would die to pay for our sins is a huge deal. And nobody should ever minimize that, the importance of it.

But what I’m saying is that beyond that, God has a plan for us. God’s plan for us doesn’t stop with, let me get them saved and then send them on their way. No, God intends us to serve him.

God intends us to love him. And God intends for us to grow to be more and more like Jesus Christ. And so when it says here that he has chosen us to be soldiers, that means he has chosen to use us. Those who believed in him, he’s chosen to use us to advance his kingdom.

And when he says no man that wars entangles himself with the things of his life, that he may please the one who called him to be a soldier. What he’s saying here is there is a need to put aside everything else. There’s a need to put all other priorities second and say I’m going to focus on the job that he’s left for me to do.

Not because it’s even about the job. Not because it’s even about the battle. But because it’s about th