“Our assurance is anchored in the love and grace of God
expressed in the glorious exchange: our sin for His righteousness” (Tullian Tchividjian).
The next piece of armor is the breastplate of
righteousness. During battle, soldiers would normally use their sword and shield
to block blows. However, sometimes an arrow or sword would sneak through and
would hit the chest. Thus, the breastplate protected the most vital organ of
all: the heart.
Human hearts are finicky. The heart needs protected
because it is so important and because it can be turned easily.
Righteousness is defined as “acting in accord with divine
or moral law: free from guilt or sin” (Merriam-Webster). In other words one
must have a good moral compass in order to be righteous. How do we get morals?
When we are young we are told stories that have morals in them.
In my K5 class the Bible curriculum always tried to pull
out a moral of the story. As a writer and reader I love to pull morals out of
stories, thus why our church once did a Moral
of the Story is VBS. Morals are important in society. If no one had morals
then society would crumble. And yet, it is the people who choose to lie, cheat,
and steal who are glorified while those who have morals are stomped on. At
least, that is what it seems like. That may be why the heart is so finicky. We
want what we want when we want it.
Is it possible to have morals all the time if we have
sinful desires? No, it is not possible to have morals all the time. Those of
you who are wondering why I am saying this listen to this story. Once there was
a man and his wife who lived in a farm in the country. It was a fairly secluded
area and they did not get visitors often. One day a man knocked on the door and
asked for help. The man said he needed to be hid. The farmer agreed. It was
just how he was. He would help anyone who needed it. The guest went into the
bathroom. A few minutes later another man knocked at the door. He asked the
farmer if anyone had come by. The farmer had a choice. He could either rat the
man in the bathroom out and not know what this other man would do to him, or he
could lie. Either way the farmer would be party to some form of wrong. The
farmer said he had not seen anyone. The man at the door went away. In order to
save someone the man lied. He was not free from sin.
As stated before, no one is ever totally righteous. That
doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to have good morals. It is just important
for us to realize that the only one who walked the earth who was righteous was
Jesus. Because he was righteous, he covered our sins with is blood. That is why
we can have the breastplate of righteousness. It isn’t our righteousness that
covers us, it is his.
So, do you realize that you can never truly be righteous
without the blood of Jesus? Do you still try to choose to do the right thing?
How can you guard your heart from the Devil’s lies?
1 John 3:7, Romans 5:1-5, Ephesians 6
Image from here.
Image from here.
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