BEGINNING WITH TRUTH

Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace (Ephesians 6:14-15) The previous sentence ended with the idea, "stand." This sentence begins with the word, stand. Yet now, the Apostle Paul tells us how to stand therefore. We can only stand when we are equipped with the spiritual protection (armor) God gives us in Jesus Christ. Each aspect of this symbolic armor answers to a specific dynamic within the Christian life that enables us to stand against spiritual attack.
	Remember that Paul wrote this while in the custody of Roman soldiers. It was easy for him to look at the equipment of his guards and see how God has equipped the believer. As he describes this spiritual armor, the order in which the pieces of armor are described is the order in which the soldier would put them on. He began with the idea of a belt: "Having girded your waist with truth." Truth is symbolically represented as a belt that both protects our mid-section and gathers up our garments so that we can fight effectively.
Strictly, the belt is not part of the armor; but before the armor can be put on, the clothing underneath must be gathered together. Remember in those days men often wore long, robe-like clothes. It would be hard to fight and maneuver in hand-to-hand combat in a robe. The bottom part of a man's robe would be tucked into the belt to make the man more ready to fight. It kept the other parts of the armor in place, and simply made it possible for the soldier to use the rest of the armor effectively. When a soldier sat down and was relaxed, he took off his belt. Putting on the belt prepared one for action, it frees one for movement, and it put him in a battle frame of mind. The same idea is communicated by Jesus in Luke 12:35-36. The belt of truth puts on the Biblical beliefs of the Christians as a whole - what other passages call the faith. Many people believe that the church will never go forward until it takes off this belt of truth, but that is completely wrong. This is armor to have - it is a foundation you live upon all the time, your understanding of and confidence in the basic doctrines of the faith. Whatever you do – don't let go of the truth, Biblical truth. That keeps everything else together and ready to use. By David Guzik PRAISE GOD BLESSED BE THE ONE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD Tweet