Stephen continued his series on the armour of God last night, looking at the shield of faith (‘take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.‘ Eph 6:16)
Shields come in all kinds of different sizes and shapes. The gladiator shield (pictured below) was quite small and soldiers had to rely on skill to get in place in time because of its size:
A Viking shield was also small, but was more defensive than the gladiator shield:
A Roman shield, used by the infantry, was about three-quarters of a man’s height and was therefore much bigger:
Because of its size, it gave more coverage of the body and therefore more protection. Its curved shape also gave protection from the sides, not just from the front. This kind of shield gave the Roman armies a big advantage, for when the army formed a ‘tortoise’ shape (lining up in squares), they were almost impregnable.
In Roman warfare, flaming arrows were launched in attack, but the Romans soaked their shields in water to put out these arrows. For us, however, our shield is the shield of faith, which is invisible to the natural eye (rather like the Klingons’ cloaking device in Star Trek which made their ships appear invisible to the enemy and therefore harder to engage in attack!)
The Bible has much to say about shields. Gen 15:1 reminds us that God is our ultimate shield. Ps 3:3 reminds us that God is a shield about us, protecting us and guarding us. God’s faithfulness is our shield (Ps 94:1) and our faith helps us to sing and have joy, even in the midst of battle, allowing us to put out the flaming arrows of the evil one, which seek to destroy us. Most of the armour parts mentioned in this section of Ephesians 6 are defensive, looking at our protection. It is this defensive armour which enables us to move forward in God, fully equipped in His strength. He is our refuge, our shield, our rampart and therefore we can move forward in faith, knowing that He will bring us the victory we long for.