No more games. Hopefully my legs will begin to recuperate now after this. But I'm excited to talk to you today about this subject. I want to start, though, by asking you to get into your time machines with me, and let's go back 31 years.
I'm 19 years old, and I'm in the market for a new pair of basketball shoes. Like Josh, basketball has always been my love, and I had saved up and was going to go buy my first pair of Jordans. And so I went to the mall, which back then, that's where you went if you were going to buy anything, and had to go to Foot Locker because that's kind of the one of the only few stores that you had. So I walk into Foot Locker, look on the wall, and I see a pair of shoes. And it's very...
this wasn't the exact... this is really close. This pair of shoes, it jumped out at me. I was like, I need that pair of shoes, right? I'm going to look good in that pair of shoes. I want to play good. I need this. So I go up to the clerk, and I'm like, hey, can you go back? I need a size 12, please. So he leaves, he comes back in about a minute or so. He's walking up, he's got a box in his hands. I'm pumped, I'm excited.
He walks up to me and says, this is all we have, the biggest size, 11. We don't have any more, we're not going to get any more. Here's what you have. So I merely know in my head, okay, 11, like this just doesn't work, but I'm like, but I need this pair of shoes, like I like this pair of shoes.
So I sit down and I try the shoes on. And they're tight, but then I begin to tell myself, well, they're not that tight. A basketball shoe, it needs to be snug.
It's going to protect my ankle, right? It'll expand, I'll play, it'll be, yeah, this will work. So I buy the pair of shoes. A couple of days later, I go to the gym, get into some games, play for about an hour, and my feet are hurting. My feet are hurting. So I sit down and I take off the right shoe. I'm not going to get too graphic, but there's some blood.
I take off the left shoe, maybe a little bit more blood. In the end, I lose three toenails in this adventure, and my feet are bruised, and it takes me a good while to recover. All because I chose the wrong shoe. I chose the wrong piece of equipment. You know, we have all been physically here competing these last few days. In fact, a show of hands, how many of you played volleyball, basketball, pickleball? Something here competitive in the last few days.
All right, so you understand I'm walking slowly. It's not because I don't want to fall off the stage, but it's about as fast as I can go right now. So you understand what I'm saying. But we were physically competing against each other, right? Playing to win. Well, as we heard from Josh, we are in a battle. We are in a spiritual competition right now, and we have a competitor, an enemy, that is playing to win and is doing everything they can in their power to help to make us lose. And so his objective is for us to choose the wrong armor, not to use the correct armor.
As Josh said, in Ephesians 6, we learn about the armor of God. And again, I agree. I think this is a phenomenal theme for this weekend. And it's found in verse 10 here. It says, Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. We are told to stand strong, but it's not because of anything that we can do. It's because of the power that God gives us. It's through Jesus Christ. We lean on them.
We depend on them, and we will be victorious. That's the promise in the Bible, right? But we have a role in this as well. Verse 11, it says, For us to put on the whole armor of God, why that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Wiles, that's kind of a weird word, but it's really, it's the schemes. It's the deceit. It's the tricks that Satan wants to play on us. And God says, I will give you the power. I will be there, but you need to put on my armor.
Put on the right equipment. Not the wrong size, not something that's similar to it, but the correct equipment. And so these next, we heard about the Spirit, and we'll hear about many of the ones in the next few, next few talks.
But today, in my time, we're going to focus on verse 15, which says, In having shodged your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Have you ever thought, though, why shoes is in this list? Sword makes sense, right? A shield, headgear, breastplate, all these things make sense. So whenever I was asked to talk tonight, I chose shoes. I got my email back first. I was lucky.
I got the email back first. I'm grabbing shoes because I was kind of wondering, why shoes? So that's what we're going to talk about. Let's learn what this means, because I think it's very, very valuable. Before we can do that, though, we need to understand what Paul was referencing. Because when he was going through this armor, he was referencing a Roman soldier.
And at that time, everyone knew what a Roman soldier was. They were all over the place. Rome was the leader of the whole world. And these soldiers were everywhere. And so you would walk down the street and everyone knew what a soldier looked like. And so as Paul's going through these different things, they immediately knew what he was saying. So when he brings up shoes, they know what they're talking about, what he's talking about.
And what he's talking about is actually this. I was able to find this. I think this is so cool. This was a shoe that was found, almost intact, that is almost maybe a little bit more than 2,000 years old. This is a Roman legionnaire shoe that was found. And part of me thinks this is really cool because it looks so much like a shoe that we would wear now, right? I mean, I'm like, hey, put a Nike swoop on that, put a Jordan on there. I may be able to buy this and you'll see me tomorrow wearing it at church.
But this is what the Roman soldiers wore. And it served two very important purposes. Number one, they were soldiers. Their job was to go anywhere in the known world and defend Rome. And so they had to walk and march, miles and miles, day after day. It wasn't like now they didn't have tanks and jeeps and planes flying around. They walked. So they had to have a shoe that would allow them to stand strong day after day after day and to march mile after mile after mile and to keep their feet strong and healthy. To basically be the foundation to what they did every day.
That was really important. And the second thing is it also allowed them to really have good grip. Right? In fact, it's very interesting. They found other shoes and pieces of it where it looks like the Roman soldiers actually would hammer nails into the bottom of it or drill spikes. Basically like a cleat, like we would have now. But what it did is it enabled them when they got to where they were going and they were in that battle.
And the enemy was throwing rocks and boulders and shooting arrows on fire and all this stuff. They weren't just supposed to stand there. They were to lean into it and they were to take ground. And so they would have footwear that gave them that ability to stand firm and to go forward into battle. When Paul is saying to the people that in a religious sense, in a spiritual sense, they need to have the shoes on, they're thinking of this.
They understand what he's talking about. But what specifically does he mean, again, by that verse? What is he referring to? He's referring to what Jesus Christ came to speak about. Right, because we know the gospel is the good news, the gospel of peace. What is that? Matthew 4.23, it says, And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, the good news of the kingdom.
That's what Jesus Christ came to preach. That is the shoe that we are supposed to have on. We are supposed to have the shoe, our foundation, what we do every day, what we are built on, is God's kingdom. Is the family that he is inviting us to be into? That is our focus.
That is our vision. That is our foundation. That's our footwork. Is the future that God is promising us, the kingdom that he wants to give us. That is what Paul is talking about here. It's our vision. It's what Jesus Christ has done for us. That is our foundation. That is our footing. That is why we are willing to day after day march forward. That is why you are here tonight in Hamilton, Ohio on a Friday night, instead of at the movies, instead of at a show, at the mall, at the stores, wherever else in the world you could be.
You're here tonight because you know that God is inviting you to live forever with him. And that's mind-blowing. That is our foundation. That is what we do everything based upon, that vision. But again, how does putting on that vision, how does it help us defeat the enemy? That's the promise that God gave us, right?
God says, I will give you the strength, put on the armor, and you will stand, and you will be victorious. Well, let's think about this again from that context of what that Roman soldier went through. The Roman soldier wore that shoe, so we've given them the ability to stand strong day after day after day. Again, our vision gives us that ability to stand strong day after day after day, especially when things aren't going well, when things aren't easy, when this calling gets difficult. What is our foundation? What is our footing? Because here's the whole point of this. Satan, he just wants us to quit.
That's his goal. Can I make this hard enough that they will just give up and quit? See, we're different than those that are in the world in that those in the world, you know, Satan has completely confused. God's not calling them, and so they're just going about their life. And they don't even understand what God hasn't planned for them in the future.
Again, you're in this room. That's a different story. Whether you believe it or not, you know what the Bible says. You know what you've heard. You know, again, what the promise is. Satan wants to take that away. Can I make this miserable enough that you will just quit? Then he's victorious. The Roman soldiers couldn't quit. They knew they had to keep marching day after day, going towards that big fight that they knew was ahead of them. And they kept moving forward because they had the right footwear. That's our vision, right? No matter what Satan's trying to do to us, no matter how miserable he wants to try to make our physical life, we keep marching ahead.
If we have that vision, if we have the right footwear on. Next, okay, so that's the first area. The next area, again, think about it. When the Roman soldier got to the battle, then the real fun began, right? Those miles and miles of marching was easy compared to the fight that they were about to be in.
And it was hand to hand, right? I mean, it wasn't fun. But again, their responsibility was to march and take ground one step at a time. Not to go and hide and run back, but to see that enemy, know what was there, and say, I'm one step at a time. I'm taking this. Again, Satan, he has weapons that he uses against us. So many times, the weapons that he will use against us, he'll throw ideas out into our head.
A lot of times, he'll use a weapon like, again, does God really care about me? I've done some crazy things. God really cares about me. Can I really depend on God? And then the fears and the anxiety and the turmoil of things going on. Again, why? He wants you to quit. It's as simple as that. It's not anything harder than that. He just wants you to quit. No, I don't want to do this anymore. It's too hard.
I'd rather do something else. That's what he's trying to do. Time machine time again. Let's go back into a time. This one's only eight years ago. I'm in the middle of my third half marathon. How many of you have ever ran like a 5K, 10K marathons? A few of you.
So you all know that there's always a point of the race where you're just kind of like, why am I doing this? So, and again, it's my third one. So I know that's coming and it's about mile 10. And it's good racing weather. My time, I trained well. I'm running a good time. I'm feeling pretty good. Much better than I am right now, for sure. But it's mile 10. And I'll never forget it because it never happened before. And it's the last race I've ever run because I was like, I'm just not doing it.
I don't want to go through that anymore. I had this immense emotion and thoughts take over my head of just quit. Like that was the last place I wanted to be anywhere in the world. Was on that street running at that point. I mean, I remember thoughts like this coming. This is all serious. Matthew, this is the stupidest thing you've ever done in your life. Why are you running 10, you know, 13 miles? No one's chasing you. There's no bear. There's no lion. Like I'm looking around, there's nothing. Why are you doing this? Get an Uber. Promise that came in my head. I was like, just stop. Get an Uber. Take you to the finish line.
Now that would have been weird because Betsy, my wife's waiting there. And if I show up in an Uber, that's going to be an explanation. But it was anything. I just I was done. I didn't want to do this at all. Anything. Just get me out of here. And so within the other side of my brain kicks in, thankfully, and I'm like, Matthew, you've trained for months. You're only three miles from the finish line. Why would you quit? And the other side says, because you're an idiot, because why are you running? You know, that's why.
So for three miles, I literally am telling myself in my head, just keep running. Just keep running. And I begin thinking, OK, the finish line, what's waiting for me? Right. Why do I keep running? Well, I'm going to get a really cool medal. Should have brought it. That would have been a good thing, right? I should have brought it. It was a cool medal.
Chocolate milk, bananas, orange slices. I'm thinking of anything that's waiting for me. Just keep running. Just keep running. I make it the three more miles, and I cross that finish line. And I will never forget how immediately, as soon as I cross the finish line, number one, I was finally able to stop. So that was good. But all those thoughts left, and it was just kind of joy at that point. I remember she put the medal over my neck, pointing me towards chocolate milk, you know, and bananas.
And there was a band going. There was a party. I had finished. And I was like, man, I would have, you know, I found Betsy, didn't have to explain an Uber situation. Like, it was good. What would have happened if I would have stopped? What will happen if you stop? If I stop running this race, I'm not going to cross the finish line.
And there's a lot more than chocolate milk waiting for us at the finish line. I'm guaranteed. I'm sure of that. If we stop, we don't live with God forever. We don't live with Jesus Christ forever. We're not in their family.
What's worth? There's nothing in this world worth stopping for. But Satan's going to tell you different. He's going to say, it's too hard. Right? It's too hard. Do something else. There's nothing worth stopping over. I was trying to think here, a good story, that will kind of wrap up what it looks like to have your eyes on the vision and how quickly you can lose it, because we have to. This is something that we have to do daily.
We'll kind of talk about that at the very end. But this story didn't happen to me. It happened to someone by the name of Peter. He was a disciple. And Peter, one night, him and the disciples were in a boat. Jesus had put them in a boat and sent them off into the sea.
And it was late, and the winds were going in waves, and they look in the distance and they see some figure going across the water. And they think it's a ghost. They yell, there's a ghost over there. But it's Jesus, and Jesus comes towards them. And Peter says, okay, well, if it's really you, let me walk out to you on the water. And so Jesus says, all right, come on. So Peter, focused on Jesus Christ, takes one step out of that boat.
Boom. And his foot is firm. He takes another step out of the boat and his foot is firm. He is now defying physics, defying gravity, defying everything that we know. He's standing on water. And the Bible says that he begins to walk to Jesus Christ. Why? Because he's focused. He's focused on Jesus Christ and who Jesus Christ is and that he can do anything through Jesus Christ and he's walking on water.
But then, despite him doing that, what does the Scripture say? He then began to realize, I'm walking on water. I shouldn't be doing this. And there's waves and there's wind. And he lost his focus. And he got distracted with the things going on around him.
And it says he began to sink. But Jesus Christ immediately was there, grabbed him by his arm, brings him up and puts him in the boat. I think that's such a great story for us because we're just like Peter. We have faith. We believe. We do things every day. We focus. But then there's all these distractions that get around us.
Distractions are dangerous because we lose our vision and we lose our focus and we can't do that. As long as our focus is where it needs to be, our vision is on our Father and on Jesus Christ and the kingdom, we will keep marching. We will keep marching forward. And Satan won't stand a chance. So what is the call to action, right? As we finish this up, I could just say, hey, do what Jot said. That's really good. Those are good points.
But what we have to do, and again, just in a very simple way, here's what we have to do. We have to wake up every day and we have to put our shoes on. Every day it has to be a choice that you are going to put God number one in your life. That's the focus. That's the vision. That's the shoes. God, I'm putting you number one in my life. And I'm going to try to live this next 24 hours in a way that pleases you. That is what we have to do. And the thing is, there's no shortcuts on this. There's not, you know, there's no hack out there. There's not an app that do it for us. We have to do it every day. We have to pray every day. We have to study every day. We have to do these things because that is showing God that he is our priority. That's putting on our shoes. If we don't do these things, we're just going through life barefoot. The Roman soldiers didn't do that. They knew the importance of the shoe and the vision. And that has to be what we have. We have to keep moving forward. We have to stay focused on the future. I know life isn't easy. I wish I could stand up here and say that when you accept the calling of Jesus Christ and the Father, that life is just easy, but it's not. It gets hard because we have an enemy who wants to beat us, who wants to make us quit. But we have a father and an older brother that says, I got this. Stay focused on us and everything will be fine. That is where we have to be because the promise of God's future kingdom, the promise of spending forever in his family, what other reason is there to keep moving forward? There's none. That is awesome. It's just an awesome thing to think about. Living forever with God? Nothing compares to that. So let's all make sure that we're making the commitment to wake up every day, to put on the shoes that God's given us, fight the good fight, keep putting one foot in front of the other. In other words, stay focused and just keep running.
