Spiritual Equipment to Defend Against The Enemy

Stand therefore, and now Paul lists six pieces of equipment. We cannot really call them armor, but equipment. I’ll go through them quickly. They’re taken from the pattern of the Roman soldier in Paul’s day. I don’t want to dwell on most of them, but I suggest you make a study of them for yourself.

Number one, having your loins girt about with truth, the girdle of truth. Now, the girdle in ancient clothing was something around your loins which enabled you to lift up your lower hanging garments to leave your lower legs clear, so that you could act freely without tripping over your own garments. And many times the Bible speaks about girding up the loins of your mind and so on. If you’ve ever lived in Palestine or those countries, you’ll know, if you ever see a woman that’s going to sweep the floor or do anything, the first thing she does is gather up her skirt and tuck it into a girdle so that her legs are free to move.

And until you’ve put on the girdle of truth, when you try to move around, get active, you’re going to trip up. So, the first thing to put on is truth. Truth, I believe, in two forms: the truth of God’s Word and the truth about ourselves. This is basic to deliverance.

“Ye shall know the truth, the truth shall make you free.”

You’ve got to start being honest. Drop off all the religious phrases you’ve learned, what I call the religious cop-outs, and start saying what you mean. There’s never been a time when so many people said so many sloppy words about faith. Lots of people talk about faith, but they’re just misusing the words. I had a little kind of encounter with a lady the other day. I trust she’s forgiven me, but she got up and left me in tears. But really, we’ve got to be real. Be honest. Come to the moment of truth. Face the facts about yourself, about your situation, about your wife and husband and children, about the church. It’s awful, but you’ll get over the shock.

But without truth, you’re never going to make any progress. The whole basis of, “What does God require? Truth in the inward part.”

“In the hidden part, thou wilt make me to know wisdom.”

Sincerity in the inner part will bring revelation from God, but not without.

All right. The next one, the breastplate of righteousness, the area of the heart covered with the righteousness which is by faith of Jesus Christ.

“For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness.”

All right? Not the righteousness of good works, but the righteousness received by faith of Jesus Christ, on no other basis than that Jesus died, was made sin for us, rose again, and His righteousness is now imputed to us by faith.

The next one, “Your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace.” The shoes or the boots of preparation for the gospel of peace. You have to be prepared to be a witness or a minister of the gospel. You have to have your shoes on. When we were in action in the North African desert in the Second World War, if the enemy were close, we were never allowed to sleep with our boots off. We had to keep our boots on night and day, because in an emergency, if you had to reach out in the dark and grope for your boots and put them on, well, the thing would have passed before you were able to do anything about it. And this has always been so vivid to me. If you don’t have on the boots of the preparation of the gospel, the opportunity to witness, to serve, to minister will come, and you’ll still be looking up your scriptures.

You have to be prepared. You have to know the Word of God. You have to be prepared in prayer. You have to have the peace of God to minister, so that when people come to you in distress, you don’t say, “Let me go away and pray for half an hour, and I’ll give you an answer.” You have it out of you right there. The preparation of the gospel of peace, which is the boots.

Then, above all, or overall, taking the shield of faith. There are two kinds of shield in the New Testament. One is a circular, small, round shield. The other is a great big oval shield. This is the oval, long shield which is spoken of, something that can cover the whole man. You can hide completely behind this shield, and that’s faith. The total covering faith which covers every aspect of your life, your family, your business, your circumstances, your children, everything is covered by this great shield of faith. All right? And it can quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.

Verse 17, two more vital pieces of armor: the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. Now, we’ve dealt already with the sword of the Spirit. Let me take a moment to deal with the helmet of salvation. What area of the body does the helmet protect? And what does the head represent in your spiritual experience? Yes, in the body, but in your inner spiritual experience. The mind, that’s right. The thought life, whatever way you like to put it. Now, I have discovered by experience, many Christians have their minds unprotected. They do not have on the helmet, and they get wounded in the head. And then they can’t use the rest of the armor because they don’t have the strength. This is, I’ve learned this the hard way by personal experience. When I got delivered from the spirit of depression years ago, God showed me, “Now you’re delivered. Now you’ve got to learn how to stay delivered.” And God showed me these two things which I’m sharing with you now: the helmet of salvation and the other garment I’ll show you in a moment.