As kids our parents sometimes used words we didn’t understand. “Please put out the lazy Suzan before the guests arrive.” The lazy Susan? What are you talking about? “Stop being so onery?” I would if I even knew what that meant. As Children of God, we can have the same struggle. There are words and phrases in Scripture we read and don’t understand initially—such as the armor of God. What is the armor of God? Is that literal armor? Or is that a metaphor? And if it is a metaphor, what exactly does it mean?

Ephesians 6:10–17 introduces us to the armor of God and commands us to put on the full armor of God so that we can stand against the devil’s schemes. But what is it? A reflection upon the Old Testament is insightful. In Isaiah 59:17, God Himself took on armor when He put on the breastplate of righteousness and the helmet of salvation.

In Isaiah 11:5, God’s Messiah will come and wear righteousness as a belt and faithfulness around His waist. Thus, before we are commanded to put on the full armor of God, we see God and His Messiah put on armor. What then is the armor? The answer seems to be attributes. God is shown as wearing attributes—His attributes—like armor. The imagery from Isaiah informs us that God is acting as divine warrior in His divine attribues!

Now when we read Ephesians 6:10–17, we are lead to understand this armor of God as taking on His attributes and living out His character. Paul is going to now “urge his readers to take up the armor that, in Isaiah, Yahweh and his Davidic king use to fight for and establish truth and righteousness in the era prior to Israel’s restoration…” (Carson and Beale, Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, 832)

So what is the armor of God? It is God’s attributes given to His church, likened to real historical Roman armor which visually demonstrates the power and protection of these attributes. And these are the means by which we are strengthened in the Lord for the day of evil and stand firm against the schemes of the demonic realm.

The enemy would lie, we stand in truth. The enemy would tempt to wicked behavior, we stand in righteousness. The enemy would tempt to disunity, we stand in peace reconciled to God and each other. The enemy would tempt to doubt, we stand in faith. The enemy would tempt to selfdeliverance or self-righteousness or someone else’s righteousness, but we stand in God’s salvation.

We must realize that God has already defeated the devil and his followers and that God’s armor is stronger than all the schemes of the devil (Hoehner, Ephesians, 836). How great is our God that He has saved us from sin and evil and now gives us everything we need to stand in His victory until He comes to take us home. Let the Church find the incredible ability to stand and live, living out God’s attributes in this cosmic battle.