Empowered by God's Righteousness in Spiritual Warfare

The breastplate of righteousness is to cover that particular portion of our life, feelings and sensibilities, moods and so on, and the conscience and the will and the desire. And he says that the only adequate protection is what he calls here the breastplate of righteousness, which isn't just our own integrity. [00:03:12]

The devil tempts the children of God in order that he may ridicule God's plan of salvation. Obviously, therefore, this is a matter which is of the most urgent importance. Now we shall see later on that the shield is also provided to deal with this. [00:06:23]

The ultimate defense against temptation is undoubtedly this breastplate. The shield will help us against many of them, but they come from so many different directions that sometimes when you're holding your shield in this direction, the attack may come from that direction. [00:07:25]

The only adequate defense against this is the breastplate of righteousness. Surely the whole modern position proves this to the hilt. Why is this problem becoming an increasing problem? You see the graph of the problem. It's perfectly clear. It's going up. It's getting worse and worse. [00:09:26]

History alone gives abundant proof of the truth of the Apostle's statement. What do you find as you look back across the course of human history? Take the very history of this own country of ours, and don't you find this invariably? There have been certain good moral elevating periods in the history of this country. [00:13:17]

Those good periods have always been the periods that have followed a religious awakening, a reformation, or a revival invariably. And even before the Protestant Reformation, you get evidence of this selfsame thing. And it's not only been true of this country; it has been true of other countries. [00:14:48]

The greatest enemies to society and to the moral welfare of the masses of the people have been those good, moral, personally upright men who have taught with such confidence that they now had come to shed the doctrines of Christianity but were still holding on to its ethic. [00:16:50]

The problem is the problem of man in sin, with his mind and heart and conscience defiled, twisted, perverted. And the more you educate him, the more you encourage the evil that is in him. You increase his cleverness, his ingenuity at doing it all, as if to have knowledge could solve the problem of temptation. [00:28:49]

There is only one protection against the temptations of Satan. It is the breastplate of righteousness. You'll never get righteousness without godliness. You can multiply your police force, you can build better prisons, you can staff them with psychiatrists, you can try and uplift people and educate them. [00:29:39]

The breastplate of righteousness helps us at this point by delivering us from a sense of condemnation. Now, that's, of course, linking up with what we were saying last week, but I have to bring it in again because it's the most important part of this matter. [00:30:14]

The breastplate of righteousness helps us in this matter also by reminding us of who we are and what we are. Now, this is something to me very wonderful. This is the New Testament way of preaching holiness. This is the New Testament way of presenting the doctrine of sanctification. [00:33:41]

You put on the breastplate of righteousness, and you remind yourself of this. You see, I don't live to myself. What matters is not what I feel or what I do. I belong to this family. I'm a child of God. I belong to Jesus Christ. I'm clothed with his righteousness. [00:35:38]