The Belt of Truth and the Breastplate of Righteousness (Ephesians 6:14)

We're doing a series and we're doing Ephesians 610 through18. Today we're going to be on 6:14. We're going to start talking about some of this armor that God has for us. And um and so uh let me go ahead and read that. So this is Paul and again recap. He's writing this from most likely from a prison in Rome. And uh and here in verse 14, he starts with that word that that word that we've used many times already, which is stand firm. Um stand firm then with the belt of truth buckled around your waist and with the breastplate of righteousness in place.

So let's break this out. Let's talk about this. Um the uh so so he's using again military terms. We've got armor. We've got the belt of truth. So what is the belt in in Roman military gear? The belt was what held everything together. It's what held his tunic up. It's where he would hang his gear, his sword. The the belt is where it all started. And so Paul writes this um with the belt of truth. So the beginning, the thing that holds everything together is the truth. Uh John 17:17 says, uh the word is thy truth. And so what is truth? The truth is our weapon.

It's our defense against what the enemy has. His weapon is a lie. And so the truth is is what separates us. The truth is what is what defends us. The truth is what allows us to wake up in the morning and and to know that we're walking in the right path. We're walking in the right direction. Uh one of the things that you have to know about is if the truth is the thy word is the truth according to John. It's multiple places in text. Then we have to know the word. How can you resist a lie if you don't know it's a lie? It's not possible to do. If you don't know something is untruthful, then you're you're subject to follow that or to believe that.

And so we need to make it our mission to know what the truth is because that is our defense, the belt of truth. It's the thing that that starts everything. It would almost be if we were going to use this in builder terms, I would tell you that it would be the the foundation of truth because this is where everything is built on. And so we have this belt of truth and that's our weapon, the the truth. And then he talks about the breastplate of righteousness. So now we've got this breastplate that we're going to hold out in front of us and it's designed to protect our our main organs and one of those being our heart.

And and the enemy again is going to be giving us lies. And uh and these lies are are designed to to cut at our heart. Uh you're not good enough. All those drugs you did, all those people you hurt, all those lies you told, how you mistreated your wife or your spouse, how you were abusive to your kids, um how you're a failure at work. All of those are lies that the enemy throws at us. And we have this breastplate of righteousness. Let's be clear about this. It is not our righteousness that clears cleans us. It's Christ's. That's what this breastplate, you guys can't see me.

I've got this breastplate up. That's what this breastplate is defending. It's the righteousness of Christ because that's what we have inside of us. We didn't go to the cross and die. Christ did. And he bought us for a price. And so that's the reason why we're supposed to pick up our cross daily and follow him. It's his righteousness that has been credited to us and that's what this breastplate is defending. Now, if we have unconfessed sin, it doesn't mean we're not saved. It means there might be some gaps here and there. It may maybe you got the breastplate off to the right a little bit.

And so, we need to confess that sin one to another. We need to ask for forgiveness for that so that that breastplate is right in front of where we need to we where we need it to be. So that it's there to prevent the enemy's lies from getting to our heart. Those lies that we we fall prey to to believing because of maybe not having known all the truth. And so they go together. We need to know the truth. What's the truth? The word is the truth. We got to read the word so that we know which lies or what what lies look like as the enemy is throwing them at us.

We have this breastplate to protect us and that's good. We have to have that especially if you're a young Christian, but we also need to be able to have the truth in in us as well too. And so we need to be able to continue to read that and learn that. So we have this belt which symbolizes the foundation. It holds everything together. It holds our tunic up. the the Old Testament says to gert up your loins and the and the the description there is their tunics are long and so that's pulling up your your robes so that you don't trip so that you can stand that that it's not impeding your progress.

Uh that's what the King James version says. And so that's also a piece of it as well too to be ready to be able to stand to do all the things. He starts this verse with stand firm, right? We're locked together. We're in this together. We've got community. We've got the belt of truth around our waist and we've got the breastplate of light breast. Say that 20 times fast. We have the breastplate of righteousness in order to be able to extinguish fiery darts which we'll talk about in another day. So there we go. So, thoughts, comments, suggestions, unmute down below.

Mic drop. Mic drop. All right. So, I I think the thing that that if I'm if I'm sharing with this is, you know, how how does this relate to our lives? And it it's it's just the very thing that the enemy uses as an attack against us, which is the lie. And that's the thing that we fall prey to. I you know, I wasn't good enough a mom. I should have been better. You know, you listen, maybe you weren't the greatest mom in the world, but Christ already died on the cross and forgave you for that. It's time to put that in the rearview mirror. Look at the big picture in front of you.

The the the the truth, which is you're an heir to the throne. you you you are you are a priest, a royal priesthood. That's what the scripture says to us. And so that's the mindset that we have to have, not the enemy causing us or trying us to look back in the rearview mirror to see the garbage or the weight that we left behind. Christ is taking care of that. He's given you his righteousness. And so that's what we need to focus on. All right. So thoughts, comments, anybody else? when you wear when you wear the armor of God and and uh it fortifies you, you also resist the enemy.

And it says he will flee from you. He'll he'll see it can't get to you and he's going to leave you alone. I love that verse too in James because he uses the term flee. He doesn't just say, "I'm going to just go away." He literally is going to run like crazy from you. He's going to flee. Yes. And why? because he because the because the enemy can't stand the truth. He knows he's defeated. He's going to go. Yep. Anybody else? And I I love how the like divinely written the Bible is cuz like I never knew the part about the belt being, you know, the part of the whatever ar the armor get up that like literally holds everything together.

And that makes sense that the truth is is that piece. Yeah. And and so you know Paul is again Paul is sitting in a in a Roman prison and so as he's writing this and and you know he's used he's taking poetic license he sees the armor and this is what he's equating it to. I I was I've been a builder. So for me I'm I'm going to I'm going to I although I understand the analogy again I look at it from a builder's perspective. To me the truth is the foundation. If the foundation is crooked at all we got a problem. Yeah. Right. So we have to make sure that we get this foundation correct.

Uh, we have to know the truth in order to have a correct foundation. Once we have that correct foundation, then we can we can grow as tall as we want because that's God. Yep. All right. Anybody else? 30 seconds. All right. Cool. Let's bow our heads. Let's pray out. Father, thank you so much for today. We thank you for um for these analogies. We thank you for for this armor that we're going to continue to learn about that we should take up daily. That's what the text tells us that we should be prepared in advance for the enemy's attacks because we know that they're imminent.

They're coming. Could happen in a minute, could happen in an hour. Uh Lord, they happen and they could happen every day. And so we need to be uh prepared for that. And so we know that these two pieces of armor, the truth, that's our foundation. That's the that's that holds everything together, that belt of truth, Father, we need to know the word. We need to be in the word. We It's great that we come to the 9:15 devotional. It's great that we go to church, uh, but we need to pick up our Bible on a daily basis. We need to get that word in our heart.

And so, Father, I pray that we would do that. That if that's not in our schedules now, Lord, that we would that we would, uh, that we would come to you and pray about how we do that. Is it get up early? Is it stay up later? Is it bring our Bible to to work and in our lunch break, we read a chapter? We read half a chapter. Uh, just the just the just the the the ability to know that we need to consume it. Father, I pray for everybody on this call that they would do that. And then that righteousness that we would know that we have the righteousness of Christ in us.

There's nothing that we can do to be better and have more righteousness. It's Christ's righteousness that lives inside of us. And so, Lord, I pray that we would remember that when the enemy starts to throw those lies that that we don't have to believe that that that we are heirs to a throne. And so Lord, I pray for us today that we would walk out these two pieces of armor that we would live them and that we would we would make them a part of who we are. We would we would recognize in today's world what that means to us and we would apply that to who we are.

So Father, I just thank you for this call and this group of people. I pray that that uh each of us grow stronger in our walk. I pray that each of us has an opportunity to share our testimony and our stories uh in a in an attempt to hopefully bring others to know the good news about Jesus. Father, we love you. We praise you. And as always, in your son Jesus name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. All right, all we'll see you guys tomorrow. Mñana. Thanks, Dwayne. Thank you. Adios. Have a blessed day. That was great. B.

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly edited for readability.