Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place. (Ephesians 6:14)
In today's text the Apostle Paul reiterates the command to "stand firm" which is one word in the Greek. The point that Paul is making here is: Jesus has won the victory, therefore stand firm and do not depart from Jesus Christ. Again, a spiritual warrior is being described. A warrior who recognizes the utter importance of the war and is engaged in it. He recognizes that the trouble in the physical is caused by the metaphysical or spiritual.
Now, in order to be engaged, the warrior must don his six part weaponry on a daily basis. There are six parts to our weaponry, with the first three are with us always. The last three we used as needed. The first piece of weaponry is the belt of truth. This belt is designed to hold up our pants, it brings order to our attire. The truth serves us by holding us up. Truth upholds the believer who is being beaten down by this world.
All the pieces of our armor belong to God and come from Him. Truth, righteousness, the gospel, faith, and salvation—all are gifts provided by God for His people's effectiveness in the battle. All except “the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God” (v.17) are defensive in nature. All are designed to help us “stand against the schemes of the devil” (v.11). The belt of truth is the first part of the armor listed because, without truth, we are lost, and the schemes of the devil will surely overpower us.
The truth here is whatever God has said on a given subject. This is the word of of God, the Bible. This is an absolute standard which causes all things to conform to it. This is not what some refer to as "my truth." There is no such thing as "my truth" because I am no standard, I am not perfect.
Truth must be absolute and perfect. And, only God, the Supreme Being, can be the determiner of truth. No human can be the determiner of truth because we are fallen, even though we are "born again." In 2 Corinthians 10:3-6 reads, "3 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. 6 And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete." In other words, we must be defined by the word of God instead of our point of view, opinion or "our truth." We must bend our will to what God says on a given subject.
Living out of God's definition of things enables us to recognize the things that we otherwise would be defined by. The truth sheds light on those flimsy things that make us deficient and shallow. On the other hand, when God defines us, we will not be controlled by that which is incomplete and cheap. Note that truth provides stability to the center of our being, this is why God uses the analogy of the belt affixed at the center of our body.
It is the nature of the truth to complete us when it defines us. In Matthew 18:21-22, the Lord Jesus is addressing the truth about the necessity of forgiveness. This is one example of how the truth brings stability to our existence. He uses the number seven and Jesus is not saying we should forgive others 490 times in a day. No, He uses the number seven to communicate that our ability to forgive should be the product of being made whole. If we want stability in our lives, we must be given to wholeness which produces the ability to forgive.
The believer in Christ does not experience the life Jesus died to give him when he holds onto bitterness. The whole believer or the believer being defined by God's truth has the practice of forgiveness. People who hold on to those feelings that are not informed by God's truth are lacking wholeness.
Finally, we must live out of this reality which is what God says on a given subject. Forgiven people forgive people. Our problem is that we do not understand His forgiveness of us. His forgiveness is complete and when we are defined accordingly, we will experience the stability of the truth that produces forgiveness in us.
