Understanding the armor of god: the belt of truth

​Understanding the Armor of God: The Belt of Truth (Read time ≈ 5 minutes)
Ephesians 6:14a
Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth…
 
The belt of truth. The first part of the Armor of God that is mentioned. You know, belts are pretty practical. They hold up your pants, that’s useful! Now days, it’s not very common to use belts to hold things other than the occasional belt clip to hold a cell phone. But in the context of the Armor of God, and armor in general, the belt is also where you hang your sword. In this case, the sword of the spirit which is the Word of God (more on that later). Truth is a powerful thing. Sometimes it brings sweet freedom, joy and peace. Other times, it brings anger, frustrations, stress, and more… Which is why we love to say, “you can’t handle the truth!” because, lets be real, sometimes the truth is hard to handle. No matter how the truth makes you feel, you need the truth. The ultimate Truth being Jesus Christ. He is the way, the truth and the life, and no one comes to the father except through Him (John 14:6)! That is about as necessary as it gets! We want into heaven? We need the truth of Jesus Christ.
 
So, what does the belt of truth look like for us and how is it used? Well, like a belt, the truth has some very practical applications. Vocab lesson, here we go! The opposite of a truth is a lie. Boom! You’re welcome. So, if this belt is the belt of truth, then to have no truth in our armor is to have no belt i.e. lies. So, this ultimately leaves us in a bad spot. I hope this hasn’t happened to you, but imagine an unfortunate incident where you are going about your day, at work, school, church or whatever and… your pants fall down. I think there are fewer things that could happen that would be more embarrassing than that. Just as a belt holds your pants up and keeps you from being embarrassed, the belt of truth also keeps you from being embarrassed. Always keeping the truth fastened around you, living and walking in the truth. Sometimes the truth is difficult, but being caught in lies, is even more difficult, and certainly embarrassing. Living a life wrapped in truth is life that maintains dignity and righteousness. A life that gives you confidence to stand through all things knowing that you are firmly standing in the truth. Another element to the belt of truth is that, as mentioned earlier, it holds up your sword. In the armor of God, we are talking about the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God aka the Bible. The word of God is powerful, as you likely already know. I’ll save that for when we get there, but ultimately, the word of God is full of truth. However, throughout history, and perhaps more today than ever before, people take the Word of God and they manipulate it’s truth by hand picking certain words or phrases or verses to mean something that is not true (Romans 1:25). The word of God is a powerful weapon, but if it is not held up by a true understanding of its words, it can be used for evil lies to mislead people. Our understanding of our sword, our knowledge and expertise in this weapon must be hung on the truth. Seeking a full understanding of the true intentions of the Word of God.
 
When we fasten on the belt of truth, we are saying, I am going to walk in the truth, focus on what is correct and spare myself the embarrassment of being caught in lies. I am going to interpret life through the truth of God and I will use the Word of God to advance truth not my own agenda. I will wrap myself in truth and allow it to hold together all that I am.