Guard Your Heart - Series: STAND AGAINST - Ephesians 6:14

I'm so glad that you're here worshiping with us today to celebrate what God is doing, to help us partner with the families and raising them in Jesus.

So we gather here every Sunday.

We'd love to have you here all the time, but uh I'll turn your attention towards next Sunday.

We're gonna continue on in our study.

Um, but we have a special guest speaker, Cam Huxford.

He's a retired pastor of Compassion Christian Church, one of the strongest, um, most respected churches within our movement, and I happen to be from Georgia, which is a great place to be from.

So Cam's gonna be with us next Sunday, uh sharing the message.

I encourage you to be here with us.

You will be blessed by what he has to share with us.

As we continue through our series, going through spiritual warfare from Ephesians chapter six.

We're gonna talk today about guarding our hearts because we protect what matters the most.

We protect what matters the most.

Think about how much of our life is built around protection.

We have seat belts and we have airbags, we have warning systems on our cars sometimes to help us know when we're not paying attention.

We have security systems and emergency drills.

We put helmets on our kids when they ride bikes or e-bikes or scooters.

We put special pads on so if they fall, they're less likely to get hurt.

We are in football season.

Football players wear pads to protect themselves.

Baseball season's wrapping up, and especially catchers and umpires who are behind home plate wear face masks and chest protectors and shingards to protect themselves.

We put cases on our phones that cost too much because we don't want them to get broken.

Why do we do that?

Well, we do that because when something matters, we want to make sure that we protect it.

We want to keep it from getting broken.

Whether it's a helmet or pads or a phone case, we have different things, and you can probably think of a lot of other things that help to protect you in life.

Most of the time, we don't put on a helmet when we're riding our bikes because we're planning to crash.

Now, we might be making a decision to do something kind of risky, and then we're more like more apt to put it on, but wearing your helmet is a good idea.

The catcher in baseball doesn't wait to put on a chest protector until after a foul ball that's coming at him 90 degrees is tipped and it comes off and it hits him, and then he goes, you know what, it's probably a good idea that I wear something to protect myself from getting hurt or from getting injured.

What happens is that we go towards things that can protect us when we know that there's a really good chance that we could get hurt, that we could take a hit, that we could be injured.

Yesterday, my two youngest kids were with me in the car and we were running some errands.

So Abby and Rhett were with me and we're coming over to the church.

I needed to look for something in my office, and then we picked up some dinner on the way home, and as we're leaving the neighborhood, Rhett says, Hey, Dad, can I ask you a question?

I say, Sure, buddy.

He says, Will you put your seatbelt on?

Yeah, buddy, absolutely, sure thing.

I put on my seatbelt.

Side note, okay, I wear my seatbelt, just not always before I pull out of the driveway, which I should.

We're still in the neighborhood going 20 miles an hour.

But a reminder from a six-year-old that, hey, dad, you need to put on your seatbelt.

You know it.

The car is dinging at you.

You should put that on to protect yourself.

You see, protection's there because we never know when we're gonna take a hit, when an accident could happen.

Paul teaches us the same thing in the Bible in this series that we're going through in Ephesians chapter 6.

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

He teaches the same thing spiritually.

We are in a spiritual battle that is raging all around us, and God needs us, it gives us exactly what we need before we even know we need it.

Last couple work weeks, we're only covering a verse or even a part of a verse at a time, but let me read this.

Ephesians chapter 6, verses 13 and following.

Ephesians 6:13

It says, Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done it, to stand firm.

Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given you by the gospel of peace.

Last week we did the first part of Ephesians 6 14, stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth.

And today we're going to cover the last part of that verse, putting on the breastplate of righteousness.

We start with the truth that comes from God that defends us against falsehoods and enemies.

And now Paul turns his attention towards this breastplate of righteousness and this armor that God has given us to protect ourselves.

You put on a breastplate to protect the chest and our vital organs and the parts of your body that you don't want to leave exposed.

And right in the middle of our chest, as we covered it when we sang the song today, is our heart.

We know it's our heart that provides blood to our body and gives us life so that we can keep living and moving.

What we're to do with this breastplate of righteousness is that we are to protect your heart.

That's what it's for.

We're to protect our hearts over and over again in the Bible.

God tells us to guard your hearts, protect your hearts, God guard your hearts and your minds and your thoughts.

And when the Bible talks about the heart, it means more than just the muscle that's beating in our chest, circulating body.

The heart is the center of who you are.

It is the very middle of all that you think and all that you do, your desires, your choices, your loves, your motives.

The Bible says it this way in the book of Proverbs, chapter 4, verse 23.

Proverbs 4:23

It says, Above all else, guard your heart.

It is where your life comes from.

Where does our life come from?

Our life comes from our heart.

And if that's guiding everything that we do, we need to make sure that we protect our heart at all cost.

Because what happens in the heart comes out in the rest of life.

The Bible tells us it's out of the overflow of our hearts that our mouth speaks.

So I guess that statement I heard from my mom growing up is true.

Garbage in, garbage out.

When we find that the things that we say aren't reflective of who we want to be and what we want to believe, are we guarding our hearts?

Because it's the overflow.

Whether that overflow is good or whether that overflow is poison, our mouth will speak.

And that is why righteousness matters for us.

That is why it is so important that we're going to start with the belt of truth and put that on and know who God is and what he has done and what he has taught and what he expects of us.

And then we're going to have this breastplate of righteousness.

I think we can be really clear about what Paul and about what God is talking about, because righteousness, we might think, sounds like just try to be a good person, generally more good than bad.

Try harder, make better choices, and then God will be happy with you.

The problem with that is that's not what God tells us.

That is not the gospel.

That is not what God teaches us in his word.

The Bible tells us that none of us can make ourselves right before God.

You can hear that word right, it built into that bigger word of righteousness.

We cannot be right before God on our own.

Romans chapter 3 says that righteousness comes through faith in Jesus, because Jesus has done for us what we would never ever be able to do for ourselves.

Romans 3 · chapter mention

He takes our sin, and through that we're made right with God.

Righteousness begins with what Christ gives us, not what we achieve or do for him.

God wants to give us this righteousness to protect us.

This matters for us especially today as we're focusing on families and they want to raise people up in Jesus.

They want to raise their kids and their grandkids in the Lord so that they can make a decision for themselves about who Jesus is and if they're going to find and follow Jesus and trust him with their lives.

We cannot make that decision for anyone else, no matter how much we love them, no matter how much we try.

Everyone has to make their own decision about where they stand when it comes to who Jesus is.

What we're doing with our parents that were up here today, they're not promising to be perfect or have everything right all of the time.

They're saying something that's more important.

We want our kids to know Jesus and we recognize that there is a body of believers all around us that can help us do that better.

To know where grace comes from and where righteousness is found.

Because everybody needs Jesus, young and old, need Jesus in our lives.

And this righteousness that God is telling us about in Jesus begins by changing the way that we live.

A little bit earlier in the book of Ephesians that we haven't covered in Ephesians chapter 4, Paul says this.

Ephesians 4 · chapter mention

He says, Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.

Live your life worthy to wear the name of Jesus on you.

We don't live rightly so that Jesus will save us.

We live differently.

We choose to live differently because Jesus has saved us.

Out of an overflow of our appreciation of what He has done for us makes all the difference.

Righteous living protects our heart from damage, and it protects us from the damage that sin wants to cause.

And I think this is where we can have a practical application about how we are going to protect ourselves.

And I brought something to show you today.

Hey, buddy, can you bring that up to me?

Thanks, bud.

Any guesses as to what this is?

Kevlar.

Oh, that'd have been cool.

I don't have any cool stuff like Kevlar.

Man, I should have talked to somebody and had a Kevlar.

This, as much as you might think it's a chest protector because it's baseball season and I can't not talk about baseball, this is a riding vest.

Or if you're gonna ride a horse and you want to protect yourself and your chest, it's a riding vest that Ella had when she got this from one of her friends years ago.

It still lives in her closet more than it does anything else.

But it's got protection on the front and the back because it's gonna protect the things that matter the most to you.

You're gonna put this on, and no, I'm not gonna try it.

It's a medium.

I haven't worn a medium since I maybe never.

I don't know.

All right.

But what this does is that it protects you if you were to fall, if you were to get injured, if you were to run into something.

This provides some protection for you, for the things that keep us alive.

It goes right here, and it will protect your chest, it will also protect your back, because that is what armor does for us.

When we're to put on this breastplate of righteousness, what Paul would have had in mind was the armor that they wore, and it was the armor that would come on the front and it would cover the back as well, because we know my heart's right here, and if my arm was long enough, I'd turn around and point to my back and go, but you can get to it from the other side.

What we need to do is that we need to make sure that we're protected, that we put on this breastplate of righteousness so that we can cover the vital organs, the things that matter the most, so that when something does hit us, it's less likely to injure us or it's less likely to make something catastrophic hurt us when that happens.

Here, go bud, you want to take us back?

Thank you.

We're to take this righteousness that comes only from God and to protect ourselves because the hits are going to come.

They are going to show up in this life.

Now imagine somebody saying, Well, I don't want to wear this.

It's too restrictive, it's not comfortable, it doesn't fit, it makes me hot.

I don't think I've ever seen a professional catcher in baseball say, you know what, I'm gonna be fine.

I trust my hands fast enough to catch the ball that's coming at me 103 miles an hour that might be foul-tipped and misdirected and hit me.

I'll just wait until I get hurt and then I'll put it on.

Maybe a 12-year-old, but not at a professional.

Because they've been there before and they know as good and as skilled as they are, they do not have the ability to protect themselves from what is coming at them.

In the same way, we know when things are coming at us, there are so many things that we are unable to protect ourselves from.

Suddenly we think protection becomes restrictive.

Sometimes that's how we think about God's commands as well.

We hear God tell us no, and we assume that God's trying to take something good away from us.

We hear a boundary that comes from God, and we think that God is limiting our freedom.

But what God is doing is that he is putting that boundary there, he's putting that protection there because he knows what's coming.

He can see what is going to happen.

Kids, you recognize that this, even when you don't like it, when your parents, your grandparents, or those that love you and care for you, when they tell you not to run in the street or run with scissors, or they tell you to be careful not to touch the grill or grab the hot stove, or when they tell you to wear your helmet, they're not trying to ruin your life.

Maybe other times, but not then, right?

They're not trying to ruin your life.

They're trying to care for you because they've experienced things that you have not yet, and they're trying desperately to protect you from injury and from harm.

Because there's some things that you just don't know yet.

And in all reality, there's some things that I don't know yet.

What God does is that He put these rules and this wisdom in place to protect us from the things that perhaps we don't yet know.

And God, like a loving parent, will put things in place to protect us because God knows we need righteousness to do that.

God knows where sin leads us.

God knows what dishonesty does to our ability to trust.

God knows what bitterness does to our heart.

He knows that sexual sin destroys.

God knows what greed does to contentment.

He knows what pride does to our relationships.

He knows what happens when we keep feeding anger because sin always promises more than it delivers.

And righteousness protects us from wounds that we don't see coming, whether if they're in front of us or whether if those wounds are coming from behind.

We are called to protect our hearts.

Protect your heart.

That is what this breastplate of righteousness does for us.

It reminds us to guard our heart.

That does not mean that righteous people will never suffer.

It doesn't mean if you obey God, painful things will never happen to you.

As a church, we just spent a month going through the book of Job, and Job was faithful and still had all of these difficulties thrown on him in this life because this world, because of sin, is not the way it's supposed to be.

Protecting your heart means that we don't have to leave our hearts exposed to everything that the enemy wants to use against you.

Some of that protection comes through choices that look ordinary.

Tell the truth.

Forgive.

Walk away from temptation.

Confess when you are wrong, choose integrity when nobody else would.

Treat people with kindness.

Stay faithful.

Be obedient to God even when another path looks more appealing or more enticing.

The choices that we make happen because of what happens in our heart, comes out of our mouth.

Or is that the overflow of our hearts that our mouths speak?

A really good test for the condition of our heart is what are the things that we are saying?

How are we talking?

How are we responding?

How are we reacting?

What types of words come out of our mouth?

Helmets protect our heads, shin guards protect our shins.

A breastplate, a chest protector protects our heart.

The very core of everything that we are and who God has created us to be.

That's why everybody in the room, we're a part of what it means to help children grow in Jesus.

We need more people to help us do that and to do it well.

Because as parents, we can't make every decision for our kids forever.

We can try, but we can't.

We are unable to protect them from every disappointment.

We cannot control every voice they hear, every influence that they have, but we can show them what it looks like to trust Jesus first with our lives and admit when we get it wrong.

We can teach them about what God says is good.

We can admit it when we don't get things right, and we can model confession and forgiveness for them.

We can help them understand that God's commands aren't there to inhibit our lives, but they are there for protection.

God is trying to guard us from being injured.

As a church, that is what we do.

Not only the parents who are going to raise their kids and those that are in kids' ministry and student ministry, but together, we can help one another point other people to Jesus.

Because everybody around us, these kids, are watching you all the time.

They're watching how you worship, they watch how you speak, they watch how you forgive, they watch how you treat people, they watch how seriously or how not seriously you take Jesus.

Children, just like all of us, need other people around us that will show us that righteousness isn't pretending that we have everything together, but it's shaped by the grace and the truth of Jesus.

This is what Paul's describing when he tells us to put on this breastplate of righteousness.

Christ makes us right with God.

He teaches us to live like people who belong to Jesus, and that righteousness protects what matters the most.

Our hearts.

Maybe there's an area of your heart today that you've left exposed, and you know exactly what it is when I say that.

Maybe there's a series of compromises and that you keep excusing.

Maybe there's anger that you've allowed to live there too long in your heart.

Maybe there's something hidden that needs to come to light because if you don't bring it out, eventually people will find out.

That's just the way that deception works.

Maybe you've been treating God like one of God's boundaries, like a restriction, when it's really a protection to guard your heart, to guard your mind.

Don't wait until the damage is already done to decide that the armor mattered.

That we should be together putting on the belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness so that we can live lives worthy of being called followers of Jesus.

Receive this righteousness that Jesus gives us.

Live in the righteousness that He is calling us to live in.

Remember what Paul says that the breastplate is breastplate is protecting our heart.

Protect your heart.

Proverbs 4, 23.

Above all else, guard your heart.

It is where your life comes from.

Would you pray with me?

God, thank you for your wisdom and what you have given us and how you have shown us how we're to live.

Father, as we come together and as we open up the word and as we pray, we talk to you.

God, we sing songs of praise to you because you are worthy.

God, we read what you have taught us in your word about how we're to live and how there are enemies around us and they're coming after us.

But God, you want to give us this armor to protect us.

God, may we stand strong and firm in the truth of Jesus and who He is and who you have created us to be.

Father, help us to guard and protect our hearts, the wellspring of our life with righteousness that comes from Jesus.

We cannot make it right on our own, and that can only be done through Jesus.

Father, help our pursuit of you not to be academic.

May it not just be head knowledge that doesn't make it down to our heart.

But God, may we live differently.

Because we are pursuing your truth.

God, thank you for your word and thank you for your protection.

God, help us to see how you're moving and involved in our lives.

In Jesus' name, amen.