Day 157: Shot Through the Heart

Facing the hordes of Satan, you brace yourself and pray. The hosts of your enemy share a collective, malicious grin, waiting for the command to do their worst.

The battle cry sounds. They begin their charge; you tighten your grip on your sword and raise your shield. Weapons begin swinging with unrivaled fury; you do your best to parry the onslaught, but there are too many weapons to block. Eventually, you watch as one of your opponent's swords begins making a clean arc that continues right past your shield and toward your chest.

You brace yourself, preparing for the worst and expecting your quick demise, watching the weapon move ever closer to you as time slows to a maddening crawl—waiting, waiting, when CLANG! The reverberating noise of the sword striking your breastplate pierces the air.

Shaking your head in disbelief, you look down to find that your breastplate stopped the deadly blow in its tracks.

I love this visual picture of the purpose of the breastplate. A striking blow to our chest would very well kill us. Our heart and our lungs along with all of our vital organs (minus the brain) are housed there. If the enemy needs a place to strike, that would be the area.

The thing about a blow to the torso is that it would be easy to die a slow painful death from a wound in this area.

Don't believe me? Ever seen anyone whose heart is heavy with unforgiveness or with hidden sin? It's like a poison shot deep inside them. And the thing about arrows laden with unforgiveness and sin is that often we think we have dealt with them, but in reality we have just broken off the shaft of the arrow and left the arrowhead buried deep within us, where it festers, slowly killing us.

Ephesians 6:14 says, "Stand firm therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness."

So what is righteousness? To be righteous is to do what is right in God's eyes. God's commandments are righteousness. In contrast, lawlessness is sin, and sin is the opposite of righteousness. So to be righteous is to obey God's laws of love.

As my Pastor preached last night, fall in love with God's Word, don't JUST read it every day, meet God there in it every day.

All that to say, my righteousness is as filthy rags according to Isaiah, thinking I can protect myself from the enemy is pointless. I cannot. But covering myself with the righteousness of God . . . if God is for me, who can be against me?

First paragraph courtesy of freebiblestudyguides.org