Train to Live on Mission – Week 1
Battle Drill #1:
Resist the Enemy!
Proverbs 1:8-19 (NAS95)
The battle drill we are going to learn and apply this week is Proverbs 1:15: “My son, do not walk in the way with them. Keep your feet from their path.”
The first battle drill is to resist the enemy! The context of today’s battle drill comes from Proverb 1:8-19:
Hear, my son, your father’s instruction and do not forsake your mother’s teaching; indeed, they are a graceful wreath to your head and ornaments about your neck. My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. If they say, “Come with us, let us lie in wait for blood, let us ambush the innocent without cause; let us swallow them alive like Sheol, even whole, as those who go down to the pit; we will find all kinds of precious wealth, we will fill our houses with spoil; throw in your lot with us, we shall all have one purse,” my son, do not walk in the way with them. Keep your feet from their path, for their feet run to evil and they hasten to shed blood. Indeed, it is useless to spread the baited net in the sight of any bird; but they lie in wait for their own blood; they ambush their own lives. So are the ways of everyone who gains by violence; it takes away the life of its possessors.
Every good soldier of Jesus Christ must learn that if you want to maintain your life, then you must follow this first battle drill! Just as we see in Proverbs 1:8-19, there are forces of evil who seek to entice you away from the wisdom of God and His ways for your life. As Proverbs 1:10 directs, “My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent.” It’s that simple!
There are thieves who seek to rob you of your life by getting you to throw in your lot with them and believe their counterfeit promises about how to have a happier and more fulfilling life, seducing you with the promise of pleasures to walk away from the fundamentals of your faith and God’s reward for your faithfulness. That is the warning of Proverbs 1:19, “So are the ways of everyone who gains by violence; it takes away the life of its possessors.” Jesus Christ affirmed this by teaching His followers in John 10:10-12:
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand, and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.
Just like sheep cannot be left alone because they are dumb animals that will follow their animal instincts to their own destruction, God, the Good Shepherd, gathers us, together, as His one people under His rightful rule, so that we can train to live on mission today.
As a cadet, in both Cadet Basic Training (CBT) and Cadet Field Training (CFT) at the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point, NY, I was taught the fundamentals of being a soldier, what we call battle drills. As a brand-new Second Lieutenant, attending the US Army’s Infantry Officer Basic Course (IOBC) at Fort Benning, GA, I was taught how to train soldiers to work as a unit and execute the fundamentals without a deliberate decision-making process. Both the soldier skills and leadership training were further drilled into me through the arduous training regimen of the US Army’s Ranger School. The goal is to make the training instinctual, habitual, and reflexive, regardless of personal or situational stress. Today, we are going to look at one of the most basic battle drills every soldier must learn, and every unit must master as one collective body; it is how to “react to contact.”
The soldiers of Jesus Christ have an enemy – the devil! The battle drill we are to learn, and master is simple, but not easy. Army doctrine teaches us that when a soldier reacts to contact, she is to immediately take cover and return fire in the direction of enemy contact. Not surprisingly, the following New Testament Scriptures make the point clear of what we are to do when we come under enemy attack:
1) James 4:7. “Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.”
2) 1 Peter 5:8-9. “Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.”
3) Ephesians 6:11-12. “Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”
Good soldiers of Christ Jesus don’t just remain hunkered down returning fire, they are to seek the Commander’s approval by carrying on with the mission. It’s great to not be taken out of the battle, but staying alive is not the mission, pleasing the Father and doing His will is the point! Just like in the 82nd Airborne Division, jumping out of airplanes was how we got to work, so we needed to train how to execute a variety of airborne operations, under different circumstances, so that we could get to work safely and do the job we were delivered to execute. Our job was to arrive safely to fulfill the Commander’s plan for sending us behind enemy lines in the first place. The same is true with surviving an enemy attack! Resisting the enemy allows you to continue the mission, it’s not the mission itself, but you must train this into your mind and heart so that it is reflexive, instinctual, and habitual! That takes us to action step #3.
An interesting detail about the wisdom literature is that a bulk of it was written by a father and son team – King David wrote much of the Psalms and King Solomon, his son, wrote much of the rest, to include Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon.[1] With that understanding, both David and Solomon, began their works, Psalms and Proverbs, respectively, with a similar understanding of wisdom. Just as Proverbs 1:15, today’s battle drill, stresses the fear of the Lord as a fidelity to God’s commands as contrasted with the ways of the wicked, “my son, do not walk in the way with them. Keep your feet from their path,” so Psalm 1 makes a similar comparison:
How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but they are like chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, Nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.
When each individual soldier responds to the enemy’s attacks in this way – reflexively, instinctually, and habitually submitting to God and His ways when under stress to live life differently, then we can have the courageous confidence to carry on the mission of God, as a unit. That takes us to action step #4.
And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
We learn this from the example of Jesus Christ in how He conducted today’s battle drill against the temptations of the devil in His forty days in the wilderness from Matthew 4:1-11:
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry. And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.’” Then the devil took Him into the holy city and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning you’; and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’” Jesus said to him, “On the other hand, it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory; and he said to Him, “All these things I will give You, if You fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Go, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and serve Him only.’” Then the devil left Him; and behold, angels came and began to minister to Him.
As we conclude today’s message, I want you to learn two things from how Jesus reacted to enemy contact:
1) Jesus took cover in the will of His Father for his forty days in the wilderness. The Holy Spirit led Him there to be tempted by the devil, according to Scripture, so Jesus faced the will of God through forty days and nights of fasting in preparation for God’s will to be done. In His ministry, Jesus never evaded the will of His Father, even unto death on the Cross. That’s because Jesus’ purpose of coming was His Father’s glory – His good pleasure!
2) Jesus not only took cover in His Father’s will, but He returned fire on the enemy’s attack against Him. Three times Jesus quoted from Deuteronomy to thwart the enemy. When Jesus came under direct attack, He was ready to return fire with the Word of God.
This is the battle drill, and this is how you “react to contact” – the battle drill of resist the enemy! Jesus conducted the battle drill so that He could carry on the mission of God. Jesus submitted Himself to His Father’s will through His baptism in Matthew 3:13-17, then He resisted the enemy in Matthew 4:1-11, then He lived on mission Matthew 4:12 – 28:20!
In the same way, you are commanded to demonstrate your allegiance to the Commander by being baptized in the name of the One who enlisted you – the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. As a good soldier of Christ Jesus, you will come under attack, do not be naïve that there is an enemy seeking to destroy you, but train your battle drill – resist the enemy! Make this a reflexive, instinctual, and habitual part of your Christian life so that you can CM – Continue the Mission! Persevere unto the end and you will receive the reward from the One who enlisted you for this very purpose. Therefore, live on mission today and train the battle drill of the week for the glory of God.