Ephesians 6:13-18
SPIRIT-FILLED WARFARE - PART 2c
Intro: We are
studying pieces of the whole armor of God.
The armor
or God is a necessary tool in our
fight against our common the enemy,
the devil. Without every piece of the amor in place, we are easy prey for the
enemy. When the pieces of the armor are missing, Satan has little trouble
defeating us. He has little trouble damaging our testimonies, infiltrating our
churches, and devastating our church. When the armor is missing, we are easily
defeated.
Yet, when a saint of God is dressed in the whole armor of God, the enemy has a hard times dealing with them.
When the armor is in place, he cannot penetrate their defenses, and he must
watch helplessly as they stand for Gods glory
day after victorious day. I want that to be my testimony, how about you?
Lets continue to examine the pieces of the whole armor of God. Knowing what they are and how to use them will
help us to stand for the Lord in victory
The first pieces of armor is mentioned in verse 14a. It is the belt of truth. This refers to a life of total commitment to the
Lord. It refers to a life that is built upon faithfulness to the Word of God
and to the God of the Word. It speaks of truth in testimony and truth in
living. This belt
of truth will provide the Christian
soldier stability, and it also provides a place for the other pieces of the
armor to rest. Without the belt of truth the
soldier of God will find the other pieces of the armor useless.
As we continue to think about the matter of Spirit-Filled Warfare, lets move further in our study of the whole armor of God. We are doing that by considering all the pieces of that armor. We have talked about The Belt Of Truth. Today, lets consider The Breastplate Of
Righteousness.
II. V.
14b THE BREASTPLATE
OF RIGHTEOUSNESS
The breastplate was a
sleeveless piece of armor that covered the full torso of the soldier. No Roman
soldier would dare go into without the breastplate in place.
There were several ways to make breastplates in that
day.
Some were made of heavy pieces of leather. This
leather was shaped to fit the upper body. The breastplate was then covered with overlapping slices of animal hooves, horns, or
pieces of metal.
Some were made of very think pieces of linen cloth.
This kind of breastplate was also covered with strips of hooves, horns, or
metal.
The third kind, and the kind I would have preferred
since I am allergic to pain, was made of large pieces of metal that were
hammered to fit the body.
Regardless of the kind of breastplate the soldier wore, the intent was the same. The breastplate was designed to the vital organs that are housed
in the torso. The breastplate protected
the heart, the lungs, the liver, the stomach, etc. In an age before antibiotics, and
advanced surgery techniques, a wound in that part of the body would not only be
very painful, it would have likely been fatal too. So, the soldier depended on
the breastplate to protect him from injury and death.
The spiritual significance of this piece of armor
becomes clear when you stop to remember that the ancient world believed that
the heart represented the will and the mind of a person. They also believed that the bowels, of what we would call the internal organs, the guts, represented the seat of emotion or
feelings.
Several verses in the New Testament bear this out.
Phil. 1:8, For God is my record,
how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ.
Phil. 2:1, If there be therefore
any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the
Spirit, if any bowels and mercies.
Col. 3:12, Put on therefore, as
the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of
mind, meekness, longsuffering.
Also, Philemon 7, 12, 20; 1 John
3:17.
We still use the same terminology regarding the heart. We say things like I love you with all my
heart. Or, I feel it in my heart. What we actually mean is that we have a feeling about
something. So, we understand the
terminology.
The reason I mention all this is that just as the breastplate of the ancient Roman soldier would protect his heart and bowels, the breastplate Paul mentions here is designed to do the very
same thing for the child of God.
The two areas of life where Satan most frequently
attacks the people of God are in the mind and emotions.
Satan will fill our mind with false doctrines and
false emotions.
Satan will use the wicked world around us to tempt
us to think wrong thoughts and to follow wrong emotions.
Satan will use confusion to warp our thinking and
feelings to cause to love the wrong things, follow the wrong priorities, have
the wrong goals in life, dedicate ourselves to the wrong loyalties, and to over
commit ourselves to the wrong things.
Satan wants to strip the truth from our minds,
while filling it with his own perverted ideas.
Satan wants to stop us from living holy, pure
lives, so he will lure us toward envy, hatred, greed, jealousy, immorality, and
every other human vice.
Satan wants us to make light of our sins. He
doesnt want us to confess it and deal with it Gods way. He wants us to get
desensitized to it, so that we come to look at wickedness as a way of life for
us. He wants us to rationalize our sin, and not seek the Lord for forgiveness.
To accomplish these and other goals, Satan attacks
us in the way we think and the way we feel. If he can cause us to think about
things the wrong way and follow feelings that are not pleasing to the Lord, he
can defeat us and drag us away from the Lord. He can get us out of the fight,
all by changing how we think and feel.
The breastplate of righteousness offers protection against these attacks of the devil. When this
piece of armor is in place, Satan will be unable to attack us in those realms.
This breastplate sounds very important to me. So, lets find out
what it is. But, before I tell you what it is, let me tell you what it isnt.
It Isnt
Self-Righteousness -
Self-righteousness is not true righteousness at all. It is the worst form of
sin imaginable. The self-righteous person believes their character and
legalistic behavior earns them favor with the Lord. They believe it is up to
them to please the Lord and to earn Him reward, so they cloth themselves in a
cloak of self-righteousness.
The self-righteousness person comes to believe that
they are better than others because they possess standards for living that
appear to be higher than those who live around them. The self-righteous person
lives not to please the Lord, but to meet a standard of righteous they have
created in their own minds. They believe that if they can stop enough sin; if
they can avoid enough evil; or if they can do enough good, God will be pleased
with them and reward them accordingly.
What they fail to realize is their self-righteousness
provides the enemy with a powerful weapon he can use to strangle the life out
of their service for the Lord. They lose their joy in the Lord. They have no
real peace, because they can never do or be enough. They become judgmental
because others are always failing to live up to their standards. They wreck
churches because they are slaves to a law of their own making, and because they
know nothing of love, forgiveness, and grace.
The self-righteous person cannot grasp the truth
that their righteousness is nothing more than filthy rags, Isa. 64:4. They cant understand that their self-righteous activity closes the
door to Gods blessings if they are saved, and to His salvation if they are
lost, Matt. 5:20.
It Isnt The Imputed
Righteousness Of Christ - When we
trusted Jesus as Lord and Savior, His righteousness was imputed to us, Rom. 4:6; 11; 22-24. God hath made Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin; that we might
be made the righteousness of Christ in Him,
2 Cor. 5:21. It is
impossible for us to put on that kind of
righteousness, because it has already been given to us in its fullness and it
is ours forever.
This imputed righteousness is
the very foundation of the Christian life. This righteousness allows us access
to God. It opens the door of Heaven to us. It protects us against the eternal
fires of Hell. But, it does not protect us from the attacks of the enemy. On
the contrary, since the devil knows that he cant have us because we belong to
Christ, he redoubles his efforts to defeat us in an attempt to discredit the
Savior, the church, and the God of glory.
It Is Practical
Righteousness - The breastplate of
righteousness Paul speaks about here
is the practical righteousness of a life lived in simple obedience to the Word
of God. The child of God is to walk in obedience to Gods Word everyday. This
is in line with the new identity we received when we came to Jesus, 2 Cor. 5:17. When
we walk in the newness of our life in Jesus, Satan will lack an opportunity to
attack us, Eph. 4:24-27. Thus, we are to robe ourselves in righteous works for the glory of
God, Col. 3:9-14.
Paul showcases the difference between human
self-righteousness and practical righteousness in Phil 3:4-12. He wants us to know that salvation is not based
on what we have done, but on what we have been given in Jesus. When the Lord
saves us and brings us out of sin and dead religion into a new life in Jesus,
the imputed righteousness of Christ within is lived out in practical
righteousness, or obedience to the Lord.
When we live in obedience to the Lord and His Word,
He is glorified and Satan has a difficult time with a believer who understands
who he is in Jesus Christ. On the other hand, a believer who takes sin lightly
and plays around the edges of evil, will find that lacking the breastplate of
righteousness will result in some
devastating consequences.
-
Lacking the breastplate of
righteousness will rob you of your
Spiritual Joy - Most of the
relationship and emotional problems we have in life are not the fault of other
people, but are the direct result of unconfessed, un-forsaken sin in our own
lives. Many of the doubts, fears, and griefs we carry around with us are not
related to what others do or dont do. They are related to a failure in our own
lives to live holy and clean before the Lord. When Satan finds a chinch in our
armor in this area, he exploits is to its fullest, and when he does, our joy,m
peace and sense of spiritual wellbeing are the first casualties. When David
committed adultery with Bathsheba, killed Uriah, and covered it up with a
mountain of lies, he lost his joy in the process, Psa. 51:12. Nothing takes the place of holiness!
-
Lacking the breastplate of
righteousness will rob you of your
Spiritual Fruit - If you are
disobedient to the Word of God, you will be unfruitful in your work for the
Lord. Here is the recipe for fruitfulness: I am the vine, ye are the branches: He
that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for
without me ye can do nothing, John 15:5. When we
serve the Lord out of a disobedient spirit, any achievements we seem to have
will be nothing but empty skins with no fruit within.
-
Lacking the breastplate of
righteousness will rob you of your
Spiritual Rewards - Without holiness
and righteous obedience to the Word of God, nothing we do is pleasing to the
Lord. Thus, nothing we do in His name will be blessed. Everything we do while
not wearing the
breastplate of righteousness will
burn up on the day of judgment, 1 Cor. 3:11-15.
-
Lacking the breastplate of
righteousness dishonors God, and brings
reproach upon His name and His glory -
The worst part of our sin as believers is that our sins bring dishonor to the
name of our Father in Heaven. Our sin hinders the spread of the Gospel. Our sin
tells the world that we are no different than them.
When we sin, we open the door for Satan to attack
us and hinder our effectiveness for the Lord. That is why we must take up and put on the breastplate of
righteousness. When we do, our
thought life and our emotional life are protected from the attacks of the
enemy.
Consider the following verses:
Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth
itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought
to the obedience of Christ, 2 Cor. 10:5.
Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and
supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And
the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and
minds through Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are
pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if
there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. Those
things, which ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me,
do: and the God of peace shall be with you, Phil. 4:6–9.
Conc: When we have
on the
breastplate of righteousness we will
live lives that are clean, pure, and that bring glory to the Lord. When we live
out practical righteousness day by day, the enemy will find that his
temptations will hold have no power over us. The belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness are essential pieces of the whole armor of God.
When they are in place, we are on our way to becoming a believer who is able to withstand in
the evil day, and having done all to stand.
Here the word of Paul: And that, knowing the
time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation
nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let
us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of
light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not
in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord
Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts
thereof, Rom.
13:11–14.
Are you wearing the breastplate of righteousness?
Are you living a clean, holy life for the glory of
God?
If there are sins to confess, bring them to God
now, and He will forgive them, 1 John 1:9.
If you have been kicked around by the devil, do
what you have to do to get clean, so the Lord can use your life for His glory.
If you are lost, come to Him now for salvation. He
will not turn you away, John 6:37.
I. The Belt Of Truth
II.
The
Breastplate Of Righteousness
