Theologian and author, Martin Franzmann (1907-1976), has a gift for lively and brilliant command of language. He paints pictures with words.
I read one of his sermons* and thought I’d share a few of his words based on Ephesians 6:10-13, “Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes …” He titled the sermon, “Vision for Combat,” but then curiously quipped, “It could also be entitled, ‘Second Thoughts on the Way Home from the Devil’s Funeral.’” All of the words below are his:
We are walking home from the devil’s funeral, but somehow this walk home is uneasy business. We begin to ask ourselves: Who was it that was in that coffin? It was never opened … And what is that shadow behind the tree?
On our way home St. Paul is a good man to meet … St. Paul knows that battle is inevitable, and he knows, too, what it is like. He knows 1) that it is tricky, 2) that it is lonely, and 3) that it can be won.
Satan is a lot more sophisticated than we are. He has lived longer, and he has observed the human race very closely, with all the intensity of hatred, for all these centuries … One thing is sure: the attack will be in unlikely ways and in unlikely places … frustration … weariness … self-pity … perverted priorities … agony of freedom.
We look into the face of our adversary, and we recognize our own features. He always attacks us with weapons that we have furnished.
It is a tricky battle; it is not against flesh and blood. We deal with the superhuman, with the faceless, the contourless, the formless, the nonidentifiable power. All the terror of vagueness, all the terror of the nonmeasurable … that is in his battle.
We are in the land of senseless panic, of self-generated and self-perpetuating fear, of senseless cowardice and equally senseless self-confidence.
Just where we meet the blessing of the elective love of God, there we meet this Satan.
It is a fearful battle, and it is a lonely one; but it can be won …This battle can be won because it has been won by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who enclosed us all in his almighty love.
Take on the armor of God … and keep wearing it … It grows on us; it fits itself to us; it accommodates itself to us by daily use.
When God took hold of my life and made me his own, he did it for keeps. He clothed me in that armor. “This is my body, this is my blood,” our Lord has said, for keeps. These are weapons.
Our, “Get thee gone, Satan!” may be weak and squeaky at first, but we shall learn to speak it with increasing strength. We speak it and – strange! – in the midst of tumult and shouting and conflict the peace of God which passeth all understanding is ours even there, just there.
PRAYER: Make me strong, God! Take my weak courage and timid steps, my worried frenzy and inflated ego and cover them with your armor. The battle is waging and I will fight with you at my side! Send me to others to rescue them with your strong and seeking love. Amen.
*(Ronald Feuerhahn, Ha! Ha! Among the Trumpets: Sermons by Martin H. Franzmann, Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, MO, 1966, pp. 13-19)
FURTHER MEDITATION: Read Ephesians 6:10-13. Pray the prayer above. Again.
