My dear readers,

1. Which piece of the Christian armour is most difficult for you to keep on? Ephesians 6:14-17 “Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; 15 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; 16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. 17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” Give reasons for your answer. –

To put on the armour of God means to be consciously aware of the armour that God has provided to all His children. None of these pieces of armour can ever be “put off” by the believer, as if to take off his old and dirty garments. The “old and dirty garments” of the sinner are put off by God only when he accepts Jesus Christ as his personal Lord and Saviour, when salvation in Christ is real. God does it for all believers. This means that all children of God have the whole armour of God. If anyone says he does not have even one piece of it, such as the piece called “truth”, it means he is still a sinner and a liar. His father is the devil, who is the father of lies. The child of God will always tell the truth, for he is like his heavenly Father who is the God who cannot lie. Therefore, whenever the believer falls into sin and lies, he will repent because the Holy Spirit will vex his conscience until he repents. Speaking the truth is one of the blessed hallmarks of one who is truly born again. Conversely, to tell lies is one of the hallmarks of one who is still a sinner and who thinks he is born again and he remains a depraved sinner whose master is sin.

Every believer, when he wakes up each day, needs to be consciously aware of every piece of armour he has on, so that he can live by faith and trust in God to keep him on the path of holiness and righteousness every moment of every day. Every piece of the armour is sufficient to protect him against everything the devil throws at him.

• Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, -- This refers to speaking the truth and not God’s Word which is mentioned in this passage as the sword of the Spirit. Speaking the truth always is the new normal for all believers. Before salvation, almost all things spoken were due to situational ethics, where lying was acceptable and reclassified as a white lie to ease the sin-filled conscience. There were no absolutes in his unregenerated life. Everything was relative, depending on which country he lived in. It is legal to take drugs in some countries, whereas it is a serious crime in other countries. Life to him was self-serving. As long as he benefitted, anything was acceptable to say or do.

But once he became God's child, the old man of lies was replaced completely by a new man of truth. He glorifies God now. The Bible is his only guide to what is right and wrong, thus giving him an absolute yardstick for evaluating every circumstance and person in his life. Everything to him is black (cannot do) or white (must always obey). There are no grey areas in his life as he grows in God's knowledge. His life of truth replaces his life of lies. All his loved ones and friends around him can surely see the night-and-day difference.

• having on the breastplate of righteousness; -- The moment a sinner becomes a Christian, God imputes him with the righteousness of Christ (cf. Romans 3:20-22), also known as the righteousness of the law (cf. Romans 8:1-4). In God’s eyes, the Christian will forever be righteous, as this imputed righteousness will never be revoked or diminished in him, even whenever he falls into sin as he serves God in his earthen vessel. If the righteousness is taken from him every time he sins, then he is no longer God's child and the righteousness is revoked; and the moment he repents, the righteousness of God returns. That would be completely ridiculous and most unbiblical, for it means that the redemptive work of Christ is weak and not completely acceptable by God.

Thank God that once the sinner is truly born again in Christ, he is forever righteous in Christ in God's eyes. There is absolutely nothing on earth that can separate him from God's love in Christ. Romans 8:38-39 “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Therefore, with the righteousness of God within him, he will always repent and do what is right without according to the Bible. If he has sinned against someone, he will readily apologise and seek forgiveness from God and from the person he has wronged. If someone has sinned against him, he will forgive just as God has forgiven him in Christ. He will always do what is right!

• 15 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; -- Before salvation, his feet were shod with the “gospel” of power. He seeks power to control his own life and others' lives. He accomplishes this through the love of money. He does not care that it is the root of all evil, as he is evil within. Money brings great power and controls the lives of many. He is obsessed with making money at all costs. But after he has found salvation in Christ, the Holy Spirit who dwells within him will remind him of his mission. He desires to share the gospel with everyone he meets. He stops measuring himself by the abundance of what he possesses. He sees the world with new spiritual eyes, whereas before he was blinded by the world. Now that his eyes are open to the danger of the deceitfulness of riches, he desires to help his loved ones and friends to have their eyes opened too. Sharing Christ consumes him everywhere he goes. This divine mission from Christ is foremost in his mind as he remembers the new gospel shoes he is wearing, put on by Christ.
• 16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. – He knows that he is witnessing for Christ in the devil’s world. The world is the battleground. The only two places that are not supposed to be the battleground are the Christian home he lives in and his church, where Christ is head of these two precious spiritual fortresses of peace. His school, places of employment and the rest of the world where he has his recreation and entertainment are battlegrounds where the fiery darts of the evil one are hurled at him daily. They come through the people he meets, who might influence him to sin. The adverse circumstances he encounters as he serves the Lord to help save sinners are also places of temptation that might lead to sin. The shield of faith is the protective piece of the armour that he must strengthen through the daily and constant study of God's Word, else he will stumble and fall into sin, for without faith it is impossible to please God. All things done without faith are sin because they are against the teaching of God's Word, which includes wrong motives, wrong words spoken and wrong deeds because they are all done not according to God's Word. The foundation of faith is God's Word. Without God’s Word, there is no faith, for faith is to obey God’s Word in every believer’s life, rather than obeying the devil and sinful men and their words.
• 17 And take the helmet of salvation, -- Salvation is entirely God's work, for all believers are saved by grace through faith, and it is God's gift from beginning to the end. Every stitch of the believer’s garment of salvation is from God and made entirely by Christ when He came from heaven to live, suffer and die on the cross for the sins of the world. All must believe in Christ to be saved, from the time of Adam’s fall to the last sinners to be saved at the end of the Millennial Kingdom, before the destruction of this world. Old Testament saints were saved by looking forward to what Christ would do, whereas New Testament saints look back to what Christ has done. Since salvation is all of God, no one, not even the devil or anything in heaven or on earth, can take away or diminish a believer’s salvation.

Therefore, every believer needs to anchor their salvation in God's Word rather than feelings. If the devil succeeds in making the believer doubt his salvation and lead him to believe he is not saved, when in reality he is, the believer is usually rendered useless in the service and cause of Christ. The helmet of salvation protects the believer from doubting his salvation, for he must ensure that the evidence of salvation is seen in his life. This evidence includes the desire to worship God, to pray, to read and study God's Word with obedience in his heart, to repent and return to holiness, and to share the gospel so that sinners may be saved.

• the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. – Before salvation, the Bible is a closed book. A sinner does not understand the Bible other than the facts and figures of the Bible. He is unable to see and understand the spiritual truths in the Bible with a heart of obedience. The Bible may be a book he earns his living from as a pastor (a hireling mentality), or as a Bible College teacher or seminary professor to secure his earthly life and carnal future. But the moment he is born again in Christ, the Bible becomes the sword of the Spirit. He loves to read the Bible; every time he reads and studies it, he hears his heavenly Father's voice, and his life is transformed through obedience. It is literally a light to guide every facet of his life. He lives his life accordingly, knowing that it is pleasing to his heavenly Father. He desires to wield this sword skilfully with God’s help. He never stops studying God's Word. He experiences the sanctifying power of God's Word in his life, for when the mind of Christ is filled with the knowledge of God, he has God’s confidence in all he says and does.

Different believers struggle with different pieces of the armour. But all of us will struggle with exercising all the pieces of the armour all the time. All believers have experienced the price they pay when they stumble and fall into temptation because they have forgotten to utilise a piece of armour, for example the shield of faith, and allowed the fiery dart of the evil one to pierce it. Praying for the Lord’s help and strength is the only way to keep the armour on all the time, i.e. to have a conscious awareness that God has already given His armour to all His children.

2. When a sinner succumbs to temptation, lust begins, and then he sins. After he sins, death follows. Does this sequence of sin apply only to unbelievers, or does it also apply to believers? Explain your answers. –

The above sequence from lust to sin to death must be understood from a logical perspective, not a chronological one. Once it is understood from a chronological perspective, wrong conclusions will result. The logical sequence of succumbing to temptation is evidence that lust has begun in the sinner’s heart, whether he is a believer or an unbeliever. Sin will lead to death if not repented of immediately. To the unbeliever who is already spiritually dead, the sequence of sin applies. If he does not find Christ during his lifetime, and he dies physically in his sins, God will cast him into hell, awaiting the second death, which is to be cast into the Lake of Fire forever, experiencing great torment and pain.

If a believer does not repent and stop sin at the lust level before it is expressed in words or deeds, his spiritual witness will die because in the eyes of the person whom he sinned against, the holy image of Christ he bears is tarnished. How bad is the tarnish? It depends on the nature and seriousness of the sin committed; that is, his death is figurative. But if the believer persists in his sin and refuses to repent after God’s chastisement, then the Lord can very well take him Home to prevent him from causing further stumbling among God's children and sinners. Since he is born again in Christ who has made him spiritually alive, he remains a child of God upon his physical death.

Yours faithfully in the Saviour’s Service

                                                                                      Rev Dr Quek Suan Yew, Pastor