1Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.
Ephesians 6:13
The full armor (all the weapons) of God must be “put on,” or literally in the Greek, “taken up” or “raised.” It’s not just that we must put on the helmet of salvation, breastplate of righteousness, belt of truth, and boots of the gospel of peace, but we must also take up the sword of the Spirit and our long spear–prayer in the Spirit on all occasions–and raise the shield of faith. This not something that passively happens. We must actively engage in doing it. Our weapons are offensive just as our armor is defensive. We need to actively take up both.
The purpose of taking up our weapons is to stand our ground when we face those days that are really rough, those days we feel like we’re getting attacked–the day of evil. The Greek word for “stand your ground” is a compound word that puts together “against” and “stand.” This isn’t just a word that describes standing upright. It means actively standing against your enemy. This word comes with it the idea of refusing to be moved. The imagery here is a soldier who just took ground and is enduring a counterattack, leaning forward, resisting it with everything he’s got.
The last word in this passage “to stand” is not the compound word mentioned above. It is simply the word “to stand.” In other words, we strongly resist the counterattack, refusing to be moved, so that after we have fought the battle, we can stand tall with our heads held high.
Fire and Light 