A breastplate is not something I think about putting on—ever.
In everyday life, the concept seems almost absurd. Who walks around wearing body armor to pick up groceries or attend a meeting? Yet as I sat with Paul's words about the breastplate of righteousness, my military experience came flooding back. The thought of putting on my modern-day equivalent—the body armor that added twenty-five to thirty pounds of weight to carry around all day—made my shoulders ache with the memory.
The same was true for the Roman soldier. The added weight was significant. Metal plates, leather straps, the constant pressure against the chest and shoulders. Every movement required more effort. Every step felt heavier.
Yet he—nor I—would never consider going into battle without it.
That's the paradox of protection. What feels like a burden in safety becomes essential in danger. The breastplate is not considered an inconvenience or non-essential when doing battle. In those moments, you're not thinking about the weight. You're grateful for every ounce of it. Because the protection it provides far outweighs the bulk it adds.
The breastplate protects our vital organs. While not completely sword-proof or bullet-proof, it adds a layer of protection that cannot be ignored. It's the difference between a glancing blow and a fatal wound. Between walking away injured and not walking away at all. It doesn't guarantee invincibility, but it guards what matters most—the heart, the lungs, the core of life itself.
And here's what is easily missed: it attaches to the belt of truth. The breastplate doesn't float independently. It needs that foundation, that central anchor point we talked about before. Without the belt secured first, the breastplate has nothing to hold it in place. The two pieces work together—truth providing the foundation, righteousness guarding what's built upon it.
But what exactly is this righteousness?
For the longest time, I thought of righteousness as my own moral performance. My good deeds. My right choices. My spiritual resume. And under that definition, the breastplate felt impossibly heavy—not twenty-five pounds, but a crushing weight I could never adequately carry. Because my righteousness, if left to my human nature, is riddled with holes. Inconsistent. Imperfect. Hardly protective at all.
Then I realized: this is righteousness based on God's nature and holiness, not mine.
The breastplate of righteousness is God's righteousness given to me, secured to the belt of His unchanging truth. It's a moral compass that always stays true and fully calibrated—not because I keep it calibrated, but because it's anchored to Someone who is perfectly righteous, whose righteousness never shifts in the sands of world belief.
This changes everything.
The world's definitions of right and wrong shift constantly. What was celebrated yesterday is condemned today. What was shameful then is praised now. We're told that morality is subjective, that each person must define their own sense of right and wrong. It's exhausting, this constant recalibration, this endless adjustment to cultural currents.
But God's righteousness is always perfect. It doesn't change with trends or polls or popular opinion. It's the same yesterday, today, and forever. And when I put on this breastplate—when I choose to let God's just righteousness protect me as His disciple—I'm guarding myself against the relentless ways of my innate human nature.
Because left to myself, my heart is deceitful. I rationalize. I compromise. I find ways to justify what I want to do rather than what I ought to do. My internal moral compass drifts. I need something outside myself, something stronger than my feelings or my culture, to protect the vital center of who I am.
The breastplate of righteousness does exactly that.
It guards me in ways I cannot fully understand. It protects me from the arrows I see coming and the ones I don't. It covers my heart when accusations fly—both from others and from my own conscience. It reminds me that my standing before God isn't based on my perfect performance but on His perfect nature.
I'm learning not to see this breastplate as a burden or extra weight to carry. Yes, living righteously—choosing God's ways over my own, His truth over cultural convenience—can feel heavy sometimes. It requires effort. It goes against the grain of a world that says, "Do what feels right to you."
But it's an essential piece of armor. And like that soldier carrying his metal breastplate into battle, I'm beginning to understand that the weight isn't a problem—it's a promise. The promise that my most vulnerable places are guarded. That my heart, so prone to deception and compromise, is covered by something stronger than my own resolve.
I buckle on the belt of truth. Then I secure the breastplate of righteousness. And I walk into each day knowing that what matters most is protected—not by my strength, but by His.
