Saturday, May 8, 2010

Being Prepared for Battle - The Shield of Faith


This is the forth of six posts.


The Shield of Faith
"In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one;" (v16)

There have been days in my life where I have felt spiritually attacked by Satan all day long. And it sort of feels like Satan is shooting a bunch of flaming darts (or arrows) in my direction with a sinister laugh. Those darts, in my life at least, are Satan's lies. And there are some days when he just likes to rattle them off into my ear without ceasing; he has a whole quiver full of them that he likes to use.

Here are a few of the big ones in my life:
  • You are worthless and no one really cares about you.
  • You deserve this thing that you want.
  • You are amazing!
  • God won't forgive that sin.
  • You should be ashamed!
  • I can't believe you did that. No one else would have done what you did, you sinner!
  • Good thing you aren't her.
The list can go on and on. I'm not even sure that there's an end to the lies Satan can tell me. And sometimes it's really hard to not believe them. I think that's why it's the shield of Faith. Because it really takes genuine faith to believe the truth over the lie. I have to be certain of what I do not see (Heb 11:1), because sometimes I just don't see how the truth can be right when the lie looks so real. But the genuine faith that God has given me in Christ, has the power to extinguish any flaming dart Satan shoots at me. Satan is no match against my Shield of Faith because it was created and perfected by God himself (Heb 12:2).

And there are times when I feel like that Shield of Faith is just too heavy for me to lift and I feel bombard by flaming darts. But praise the Lord, that in his grace and mercy, he can and will lift it for me if I just ask it of him.

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