Last summer Kathy and I took our son, Justin, to Washington, D.C. One of our stops was a tour of the FBI building. We saw the crime lab, the shooting practice range, pictures of the top ten most wanted criminals and all that. But all the time I was dying to ask if we could see Fox Mulder's office. I knew right where it was, down in the basement. But I didn't have the nerve to ask our guide. He seemed to have trouble adjusting to the flexibility required when even when one person threw off his routine by needing a bathroom stop. And I'm sure we would just get a cover up anyway. He'd tell us that there's no such project as the X-files. We'd get the cover-up, the party line, right?
But I know what we would have seen if we went there. There is a poster on Mulder's wall that says, "The truth is out there." The show, X-Files, expresses some of the modern longing for truth, something to base our lives on. The world seems so twisted and confusing, but there has to be an explanation somewhere. Especially the younger generation has been lied to again and again by government, by corporations. How many respected public figures have fallen in scandals in the last 25 years?
And so it is easy to feel like the truth is very hard to find, like you can't trust anything or anyone. And yet there's this deep down hope that there is truth somewhere, something we can trust. And so we follow Fox Mulder and he hangs in there, just determined to cut through all the layers of deception, and find the truth, the answers for some of the most formative events of his life.
The Bible recognizes that we live in a confusing, distorted world. In our text for this morning, the Apostle Paul describes our world as being like a battlefield, a chaotic and often dangerous place to be. But he also gives us hope. Because God provides the armor that will allow us to stand firm even in the midst of the battle.
Our text for this morning is Ephesians 6:10 17 "Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power. Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on that evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. Stand therefore, and fasten the belt of truth around your waist, and put on the breastplate of righteousness. As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace. With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God."
Wouldn't it be great if we could just wade into the chaos of our world, safe and secure, confident that the battle won't hurt us? Like we were driving through a battle zone in a super armored car that no one could penetrate? That's something of what Paul is talking about here. And God has provided the armor that will make it possible for us to stand strong through the hardships of our world. In the next few weeks I'm going to look at one piece of that armor each week. As we go through them, I encourage you to make a real effort to make sure that you are taking advantage of the armor God offers.
The first piece of armor is the belt of truth. A Roman infantry soldier would certainly wear a belt. It would be one of the first pieces of armor he would wear. It sort of held some of the others together. The sword would hang from the belt. The breastplate would be tied to the belt so it wouldn't bounce around. So it started with the belt.
And Paul picks the belt to represent truth. That has to be in place first. No matter how comforting Christianity might sound to us, or practical for daily life, or useful for instilling values in the children, if it's not true, we're wasting our time. If it's not true, I don't want it. That's time to move on, to continue the search. My heart tells me the truth is out there somewhere. And I want something real.
And if you haven't experienced the gospel of Jesus Christ to be true, it won't do you much good. You can't pray without some confidence that God is listening. It's stupid to give away your money to God unless you can trust that God will take care of you. You can't really throw yourself into growing spiritually unless you can trust that God's way is good and will work. When friends start telling jokes that you know displease God or try to involve you in something you know isn't right, if you are confident in God you can stand strong. But if you aren't sure, you'll probably fall to temptation. It's all by faith. And you can't have faith without confidence that it is true. Wishful thinking, nice ideas just don't have much staying power.
And how can you put on the belt of truth? How can you find out for yourself if the good news of Jesus Christ is true or not?
I think it's pretty natural for us to believe in God. Children do it so easily. But then we get hammered with challenges to our faith from all directions. We really do live in a spiritual battle zone. And if we aren't able to fend off the attacks, it soon becomes very difficult to believe anymore. And the answer to that is to go back over the trail of our lives, to the attacks we have faced and think them through again. And that's hard work.
Many people talk as if evolution has disproved Christianity. If you say that scientific evidence collected by geologists and biologists makes it look unlikely that one interpretation of the Bible, that God created everything all at once is untrue, I'll agree with you. But that's no reason to throw out all of Christianity. Most Christians are very comfortable combining some elements of both, that God created gradually, over time and the geologists and biologists are working to follow his footsteps as he did it. That doesn't have to be a problem for faith. But many people talk as if science has defeated Christianity.
People often claim that Christian sexual morality is old fashioned, repressive, unhealthy, stilted. If people want to sleep around, why get in their way? Well, if any generation can answer that question it ought to be our generation as we are seeing so graphically the wisdom of God's ways and the damage done by the sexual revolution. How many lives have been destroyed by sexually transmitted diseases which the sexual revolution has brought to epidemic proportions? How do you measure the human and economic cost of so many children growing up without the benefit of two parents committed to working together to support them and share the load of building a home? The picture of one man and one woman who have saved themselves for giving their full love to each other and only each other, who are committed to a life together should look good in any age, but especially to our age. God's wisdom will stand long after the sexual revolution has ended.
And the other challenges come, one after the other. Blame wars on the Christians. Blame the ecological crisis on the Christians. Insist that the Bible is all fables. The list goes on and on.
And the questions come, one after another, challenges, like arrows puncturing our faith. If we allow them to hit us, if we get hit and don't treat the wound promptly and thoroughly, we may have no faith left to stand on. And when that happens the only thing to do is to go back to each arrow, one by one, and pull it out. Rethink the issues. Get help. Read. Come in and talk it over with me, I love that kind of discussion. That's one way of choosing to put on the belt of truth.
But there is one other movement we all need to take. I understand that years ago a famous atheist was on a circuit giving lectures on why he didn't believe in God. He had organized all sorts of arguments for his lectures and lots of people came to hear.
But one day as he was getting into his lecture a woman came up and stood beside him on the stage. She didn't say anything or do anything particularly disruptive, so he went on with his lecture. Actually, what she did was she took out an orange, quietly peeled it and ate it. The lecture came to its conclusion and he asked for questions. And finally the woman spoke. "Sir, you know the orange I just ate? Did it taste good?"
The atheist answered, "Lady, you're the one that ate it, not me. How can I know if it tasted good?"
"That's your problem," she said. "You have all these arguments that say God is a bad orange. But you've never tasted for yourself. And that's really the only way to know for sure."
Can I prove scientifically that the gospel is good? Probably not. But I can give them a taste. I can try them for myself. I can take Jesus at his word that he came to bring abundant life, that he can give us real forgiveness for our sins, that he is the light who can bring sense to my world.
You can't find that out by watching someone else take a bite. Ultimately you can't find out by reading books written by someone else, although they can help. You have to take the step of trying out what he said for yourself. The Psalmist said it, "Taste and see that the Lord is good."
This morning I ask each of you, are you wearing the belt of truth? Do you know for yourself, in your heart, from your own experience, that the good news is true news? Do you have a foundation on which the other parts of your life can hang securely? Do you know that it's really true?
Next Sunday I'll be moving on to another piece of the armor of God. But don't slide over this issue of the truth of the gospel. If you don't know for yourself, go back over the questions that have wounded your faith. Where have the arrows wounded your faith? Give me a call and let me help you work them through. Today a commitment to Christ may seem like a hopeless leap of faith. But the answers may be there to make it a much more reasonable step of faith if you are willing to wrestle with the questions.
And may the day come soon, when you can take the step of tasting for yourself, of taking that step of commitment, and experiencing for yourself God's truth. May we all find the strength and security that comes from putting on God's belt of truth. AMEN
