How To Put Onthe Shield of Faith

What Did a Soldier’s Shield Do?

Water couldn’t put out a Roman fire dart, but a shield could. Paul didn’t name the small round shield of a duelist. He chose thureos, a word that comes from the Greek for “door.”³ His readers would have pictured the Roman scutum, a curved shield about four feet tall and two and a half feet wide. It was built from layers of wood glued together, covered with canvas and calfskin, and fitted with an iron boss at the center. It weighed about twenty-two pounds.² A soldier could crouch behind it and be covered from his shoulders to his knees. Enemy archers answered with fire. They wrapped arrowheads in tow and pitch, lit them, and shot them into the Roman lines.³ Dousing such a dart didn’t always help. The Roman historian Ammianus warned that “water poured upon it rouses the fire to still greater heat.”⁴ A good shield simply caught it. Several commentators say the dart would lodge in the shield’s thick wood and leather and burn itself out without harm.³ When soldiers locked their shields together in front, at the sides, and overhead, they formed the testudo, or “tortoise,” a moving shell that protected the whole unit from arrows.²

Faith works the same way. Long before Paul, God told Abram, “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward” (Genesis 15:1). David prayed, “But you, LORD, are a shield around me” (Psalm 3:3). Faith is how you take cover behind God Himself: “Every word of God is flawless; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him” (Proverbs 30:5). Faith isn’t a feeling you work up. It is “confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1), and it grows as you take in God’s Word, because “faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ” (Romans 10:17). As the David Jeremiah blog puts it, “Faith has to be appropriated; then it can be used.”⁵ A shield leaning against a rock protects no one. You have to pick it up. And you don’t hold it alone. Like soldiers in the tortoise, believers stand shoulder to shoulder and “encourage one another daily” (Hebrews 3:13).

How To Put It On

• Admitting your need is where faith begins. Tell God honestly where you feel weak.
• Keep a record of answered prayers and remember His past faithfulness.
• Choose to trust His promises over your circumstances.
• Pick up your shield every morning and evening. Read a promise from God’s Word and choose to believe it (Romans 10:17).
• When a fiery dart hits, name it, find it in the table below, and answer it with God’s Word.
• Stand with other believers. Ask a friend to pray for you and strengthen others when your faith is steady (Luke 22:32).