How often do we men float through our days and weeks as if we’re on a lazy river, casually watching the view go by, pulled by the currents underneath and around us? We are commanded to have a bias toward action, to live with vigilance, soberness, and a hope rooted in the “already not yet” reality of our salvation.
Gird
The opposite of girding is to be unprepared and exposed. It is our default as men. Even the most disciplined men among us have a default mode of inaction.
Peter uses the physical act of girding the loins as metaphor of intellectual and mental preparation, literally a girding of the loins of the mind. The loins of a man are the very source of strength, energy, vitality, and legacy.
And this is our charge. Take every thought captive to Christ in order to protect our strength. We are exhorted to not let our minds be consumed with guilt, worry, fear, defeat, anxiety, insecurity, hatred, anger, or doubt. If we are to be men of action who are living to the glory of Christ, we are to abandon dwelling on both the successes and failures of our past. We must be equally wary of dwelling on past sins and failures as we should be of clinging to previous accomplishments, successes, achievements (Phil. 3).
Girding, in the physical sense, prevents tripping, stumbling, and enables freedom of movement and agility. Girding is not accidental, it's intentional. The preparatory actions to “gird” are done with the purpose to enable mobility and action.
The effort to gird must be a personal and individual effort, not something which can be inherited from an external source like a church, small group, or a cadre of close friends. The mental discipline and exertion cannot be outsourced or proxied.
And, like shaving, no matter how well you did it yesterday, you must do it again today..
God demanded Job “gird up his loins like a man” and brace for a confrontation with a divine reality. The harsh realities of the truth were about to shred Job’s pride and force him to shut his mouth and face his insignificance in the light of the majestic power of God’s sovereignty (Job 38:3; 40:7).
Keep
We do not gird up in vain. We gird up to be sober in mind. We are to be free from the intoxicating elements which diminish our vigilance. When our vigilance wanes, we are susceptible to deceit and our discernment is, at best, questionable, and, at worst, flawed. Being intoxicated in mind dulls our spiritual alertness, the same way alcohol dulls physical alertness. We become lulled into spiritual slobbery. Each of us know in our hearts of those particular elements which intoxicate us and prevent us from a sober-minded pursuit of godliness.
In combat environments, there is a trope plastered on plywood as a stark reminder to all who are lulled into a false sense of security and comfort: "Complacency Kills.” Spiritual complacency becomes intoxicating when we sip from the delicious cup of a comfort-driven life. We willfully exchange our vigilance for a fleeting dose of distraction. Our prayer life becomes virtually non-existent, and when we do pray, our prayers are shallow and dipped in earth tones. Our time in the Word is throttled by a box-checking mindset distracted with our upcoming agenda for work and life. Our leadership in home is abdicated to whomever or whatever will fill the void.
Our vigilance is not done for the purpose of being seen by men. The Parable of the Ten Virgins (Matt. 25) is a stark warning against having a lamp without oil. The oil of the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit must be there, indicating a regenerate soul. Merely owning and holding a lamp in the presence of men when it lacks oil reveals the hypocrisy of our hearts. We show up to church, we attend events, we smile and shake hands, we engage in pleasantries with the guy whose name we can never remember, and we are void of oil. Dried out. Spiritually empty.
Fix
We are not commanded to gird up in vain or become sober in vain. There is an end game.
We are to fix our hope completely on future grace, which we simultaneously possess in the current state and yes await for its fullness.
This fixation is to be in totality, in degree and duration. That is, without reservation or hesitation, and unwavering until the end, not just for a season. No stutter-stepping. No pump fakes. Enduring until the end. This fixation we are commanded to embrace should weather any affliction and storm.
We gird our sober minds so we can burn the ships at the coastline of eschatological, unmerited favor. There is no retreat to comfort. There is no backup plan. We are not to hedge our bets and give even an ounce of hope to another way, men!
Today, we live by faith in the hope of grace unseen but one day it will be unveiled.
Gird. Keep. Fix.
Men, having girded up, be sober-minded so you can fix your hope on the glory that awaits.