And David girded his sword upon his armour, and he assayed to go; for he had not proved it. And David said unto Saul, I cannot go with these; for I have not proved them. And David put them off him. – 1 Samuel 17:39
When I was in the military, I was issued weapons during basic training. One of the training exercises was to take my gun apart and put it together, take it apart and put it together, take it apart and put it together, over and over. Why? Because our officers understood the importance of us knowing our weapons. They were well aware that if the time came when we would need to use those weapons suddenly in a battle, we would have to be so familiar with them that we could respond without thinking about how to operate them.
The context of today’s focus verse is that David had volunteered to fight Goliath, and King Saul was offering to let David use his own armor. David, however, refused because he was not used to that armor. He chose instead to use the weapon he was familiar with—a sling. And God gave him the victory.
Although we probably will not face physical giants in our lifetimes, and we may never use military weapons, we will face spiritual battles. When we do, we need to “know” our spiritual weaponry. Ephesians 6 lists some of that armor, including truth, righteousness, the shield of faith, and the sword of the Spirit. How can we become familiar with these? We need to use them in our daily lives before we face a sudden battle.
For example, suppose we have an opportunity to witness to someone about salvation. That may not seem like a spiritual battle, but in fact, the enemy of all souls does not want our witness to be successful. How will we know what to say? God’s Word promises that His Spirit will bring Scriptures to our memory—but that cannot take place unless we have read the Scriptures in the first place. That is how we “gird” ourselves with the truth; that is how we become familiar with our weapons.
Another battle might be an attack by Satan to cause us to doubt God, telling us that He is not interested in solving a specific problem for us. Remembering a time when God intervened in our lives in the past could be a way to use the shield of faith, but in order to do that we must have noted past answered prayers. We want to treasure those answers in our hearts, so they will be faith-builders when we face a battle.
We will gain familiarity with our weapons by using them each day, and opportunities to do that are available if we will look for them. Use and know your spiritual weapons today!