Breastplate of Righteousness
By: Tyra Penn of Dallas, Texas
Two weeks before we were to be married, my husband gave me a charm bracelet. It held only three charms then but has since become a chronicle of our life together, with charms added to commemorate travels and other milestones. One day, I will pass the bracelet along to my daughter, assuming she wants it. The item will be hers, but the memories will not. She won’t look at the dainty leaf and remember the Colorado aspens shimmering in the wind. She won’t touch the tiny kayak and remember the feeling of the waves in California. She’ll just see the bracelet and remember me.
There are many things that get passed from one generation to the next. Some are tangible - jewelry, furniture, photographs – and we treasure them because seeing and touching them triggers memories of the past. Others are intangible – names, stories, traditions – and we treasure them because we know they live on solely through our protection.
But some of the things we treasure most cannot be passed along at all. Our values. Our beliefs. These are the things each generation develops on its own. Such is the case with our righteousness. We are called as children of God to live righteously (Titus 2:12). The idea of “right living” is a continual striving to be Christ-like. It is a calling at which we, by our very human nature, will fail (Romans 3:10). God, of course, knew this and gave us the righteousness of His Son Jesus through His death on the cross (II Corinthians 5:21; Romans 5:18-19).
Righteousness takes the form of a breastplate as Paul outlines the armor of God in Ephesians 6. At the time of its writing, the passage would have conjured a clear image of a Roman soldier, fully suited, a foreboding figure with his breastplate front and center. Reading that passage today, we cannot as easily relate to the idea of a metal breastplate. The one we are called to put on is figurative. But as we visualize both ours and that of the Roman soldier, we recognize they both serve a singular, significant purpose: protection of the heart. With our breastplate – righteousness - front and center, our heart has an extra layer of protection to guard it from hardening or going astray: “The righteousness of the blameless keeps his way straight” (Proverbs 11:5).
An armor bearer, as referenced in scripture, is one who accompanied a warrior into battle, tending the armor until combat was imminent. As mothers, our nurturing spirit might lead us to paint a picture of ourselves as spiritual armor bearers, walking alongside our children into battle, ready to arm them when danger approaches. But that’s not the case. If our children choose to one day take up the fight against evil, they can only be dressed for battle by their heavenly Father through a relationship with Him. The righteousness of God’s Son, their spiritual breastplate, will be given to them when they make the personal decision to take up arms and enter into fellowship with God through baptism. As with many other things we hold dear, it cannot be passed from one generation to the next.
But that doesn’t mean we, as parents, have been rendered useless in preparing our children.
In 1955, Dorothy Law Nolte wrote a poem entitled “Children Learn What They Live”. “If children live with criticism,” it begins, “they learn to condemn.” It goes on to list several behaviors and characteristics. “If children live with ridicule, they learn to be shy...If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.” Nolte has been quoted as saying, about the poem, “Children do learn what they live. Then, they grow up to live what they’ve learned.”
What a child is continually exposed to, they will absorb. It’s the very idea behind Deuteronomy 6, when Moses is speaking to the Israelites and tells them, about God’s laws, “You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” Your children, Moses was telling them, will learn God’s laws if you make them a continual part of your life.
Our calling is this: Live righteously (Titus 2:11-12). Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness (Matthew 6:33). Hunger and thirst after righteousness (Matthew 5:6). Our calling is not just to protect our own heart from “the fiery darts of the wicked one” (Ephesians 6:16), it is also a call to write the need for and blessings of righteousness on the doorposts of our children’s hearts. As each successive generation sees the one before it modeling righteous living, the lessons will be learned: Be on guard. Protect your heart. “Even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed.” (I Peter 3:14) “Righteousness guards him whose way is blameless, but sin overthrows the wicked” (Proverbs 13:6).
They must see us making that choice. If children live with prayer, they learn to rely on God. If children live with scripture, they learn to seek wisdom. If children live with God, they learn to feel protected. Living righteously will not ensure our children take up their own breastplate, but it exposes them to the value and protection that striving for Godliness provides.
At the moment I rose from the waters of baptism, my Father gave me my breastplate of righteousness. Were it a tangible item, it would, by now, be a chronicle of my spiritual walk with dents and dings from those times when I faltered and spots worn smooth from times I clung to it. But I cannot pass it along to my daughter, even if she wants it. My breastplate of righteousness cannot be hers, but if I have worn it well, the lessons of it will. She won’t know each prayer or deed or choice that poured from or strengthened my righteousness, but my prayer is that she’ll remember it and think of her Father.