The Armor Of God

The Armor Of God - Part 3

Ephesians 6:13–20 NKJV

13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. 14 Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; 16 above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. 17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; 18 praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints— 19 and for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel, 20 for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.

Pray

Confession of Faith

I am not moved by what I see or by what I feel. I am moved by what I believe. I believe the WORD of God! The victory is mine! I have it now! I can see it through the eyes of my faith! In Jesus Name

Intro:

Last week we talked about the Belt of truth

One of Satan’s main tactics is deceit, and Paul says that we must begin by knowing the truth, and by bringing our lives in line with that truth.

We nust gird our selves with the truth and the truth is Jesus Christ, The truth is the word of God! Truth is the first line of defense against the attacks of Satan.

But Paul admonishes us to put on the Whole Armor Of God

Today We will talk about the 2nd component of the Armour Of God -The Breast Plate

Ephesians 6:13 NLT

13 Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil. Then after the battle you will still be standing firm.

Today We will talk about the 2nd component of the Armour Of God -The Breast Plate

The breastplate of righteousness. .

The image that Paul gives us isn’t hard to understand. Roman Soldiers would wear a layer of metal or very tough leather that covered the soldier from the neck to the thigh. It would usually come in two pieces: one to cover the front, and the other to cover the back. It was really like the ancient version of a bulletproof vest. If you wore the breastplate, then your vital organs like the heart would be protected, especially from thrusts from the short sword. You wouldn’t think about going into battle without wearing a breastplate.

As a Christ Follower - As a Believer our hearts must be focused on Jesus Christ

As a Believer our hearts must be focused on The righteousness of Jesus Christ, and that focus must be protected.

The sign of a Christ Follower, or The Sign of a believer of Jesus Christ or the Sign of a true Christian soldier is righteousness.

When we are saved, God puts in us the righteousness of Jesus Christ us !

What are you saying Pastor

When we are saved God looks at us or counts us to be in right standing with him!

Galatians 2:15–16 NLT

15 “You and I are Jews by birth, not ‘sinners’ like the Gentiles. 16 Yet we know that a person is made right with God by faith in Jesus Christ, not by obeying the law. And we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we might be made right with God because of our faith in Christ, not because we have obeyed the law. For no one will ever be made right with God by obeying the law.”

However, it is not enough to stand in the righteousness of Christ. As A Christ Follower, we must protect our hearts.

Protect Your Heart - Put your Spiritual Bullet Proof Vest On

Now, It’s interesting that Paul talks about the breastplate so early on, because it shows us where Satan is likely to attack us. He’s going to come after our hearts. When you think about spiritual attack, many of us think about all kinds of weird things like you see in horror movies: lights flickering, doors slamming, rooms becoming cold, and cupboard doors opening and closing by themselves. That’s the horror movie version of spiritual attack, but it’s not how spiritual attack usually happens. One of the most common ways that Satan attacks us is by going after our hearts. He knows that if he get to our hearts, he can inflict a mortal wound.

Listen, Your Heart … Your heart is so important to protect! There are a lot of people here today, listening today that that are trying to mend broken hearts… Hearts that have been under spiritual attack! Hearts that have been misused, hearts that have been deceived, hearts that are sad, hearts that are lost! This all comes from a spiritual attack!

Remember Paul tells us in Ephesians 6:12

Ephesians 6:12 NKJV

12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

The Bible uses the heart and refer to the place or the seat of our thoughts and our motives and our emotions The People in Paul’s day believed that organs such as the heart and the liver were the center of affections. They believed emotions like joy or anger originated in these organs.

Now Paul used this understanding, I’m not saying it was based on any science , it was used to teach important spiritual lessons. Paul said we must put on the breastplate of righteousness to protect the vital parts of the inner man against the attacks of Satan.

In our was with these invisible powers, we become vulnerable in our thoughts, vulnerable in our motives, and vulnerable in our emotions.

We need strong protection—That breastplate of righteousness—to keep us from being wounded in our inmost being.

Listen, if the enemy gets to your heart - he can get to our hearts that will impact your righteous living!

This is where we can expect attack:

Write this down

the enemy will attack our thoughts. He will try to entice us to think wrong thoughts about God, Jesus, The Holy Spirit, The Word Of God, The Chrisitan Walk , he’ll try to get us to think he’s not the enemy, that there is no hell or heaven, that all you need is yourself. If he can twist our thinking, then he can poison our relationship with God and lead us into sin.

Satan will attack our motives. He will try to entice us to do the right thing for the wrong reason. He will try to capture us at the level of desires so that we want the things that God doesn’t want. If he can get us to desire anything more than God, then he’s got our hearts. He will have made us idol worshipers.

Satan will attack our emotions. Our emotions are a great gift from God, but they are also an area that Satan can attack. He can use our emotions to carry us away from God. Your moods don’t come from nowhere. They come from something that you believe. “When we are angry, discouraged, depressed, anxious, self-pitying, fearful, or irritable, it is likely because we are believing something very specific” . He can use our emotions as a means of doubting God’s love. When emotions and truth are in sync, it can be a powerful thing; when our emotions are out of sync with reality, then we’re in great danger.

That’s why we must put the breastplate of Righteousness On, Living Righteous keeps the heart from ever being wounded and losing its focus.

Righteousness keeps the our heart from ever being wounded and it keeps us from losing focus. The Christian soldier is...

Protect Your Heart - Put your Spiritual Bullet Proof Vest On

One of the ways that Satan attacks us is to accuse us. Ok so we fall short,,

He says, “What? You sinned again? You’re no good. God could never love someone like you.” That’s one of the key ways that Satan attacks our hearts. He’s our accuser.

Revelation 12:10 NLT

10 Then I heard a loud voice shouting across the heavens, “It has come at last— salvation and power and the Kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers and sisters has been thrown down to earth— the one who accuses them before our God day and night.

He loves to point out our flaws. And here’s the thing: he’s kind of right. We are sinners. We do have lots of flaws that he can point out.

When Satan attacks us this way, we need a righteousness that doesn’t come from us as our primary defense. If we try to argue with our own righteousness, we will never win.

Hear me now, the more we grow as Christ Followers ,the more aware you know that you have no right standing before God on your own.

The more you grow in your faith, the more you know that your own righteousness is no defense before Satan.

So what do you do? You put on the breastplate of Jesus’ righteousness.

Everyday we must work to operate in the right standing with God that we get from an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ!

Everyday we must protect our hearts, protect our thoughts, protect our motives and protect our emotions to live a life that is pleasing to God the Father

Jesus even warns us in Mathew Chapter 5 and verse 20

Matthew 5:20 NLT

20 “But I warn you—unless your righteousness is better than the righteousness of the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven!

Protect Your Heart - Put your Spiritual Bullet Proof Vest On

Philippians 1:11 NLT

11 May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation—the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.

Put on the breastplate of righteousness. Remind yourself, and Satan, that Jesus has died for your sins. Realize that the only way you can stand before God is based on the righteousness of Jesus Christ — and you have that. It’s enough. In Christ, you have been pardoned, cleansed, and perfected. It’s what theologians call imputed righteousness — that God has credited to us all the righteousness of Jesus Christ through faith. It’s not about our righteousness; it’s about Jesus’ righteousness. And Satan can’t attack Jesus’ righteousness. When we put on that breastplate, he can’t pierce it to get through to our hearts.

So I”m going to leave you with this have you put on the Breastplate of Righteousness: have you done this? You won’t stand against the attacks of Satan if you’re trusting in your own righteousness. Have you looked to Jesus for the righteousness that he provides? Is it your defense against the attacks of the evil one?

Now Let me push a little bit more. Even if you’ve trusted in Jesus’ righteousness, is this the breastplate that you wear when Satan comes after your heart? You know It’s possible to have trusted in Jesus, and to live as if it all depends on you now. That’s a recipe for failure in the Christian life. That’s what Paul means when he says that we put on the breastplate of righteousness. Everyday we need to remind ourselves that we don’t stand based on our own record; we stand because we are in union with Jesus Christ. We stand because of the work of Jesus Christ that cannot be undone. And when Satan comes after our hearts, we can stand with courage knowing that the breastplate of Jesus’ righteousness can handle any attack that Satan brings against it.

God Bless You and God Keep You is my prayer!