Soaking Our 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;” Ephesians 6

When we think of Roman Soldiers and their shields we often think of heavy steal armor. One place I read said that Roman soldiers fought with wooden shields covered by a piece of leather. Before they would head out into battle they would soak their shields in water.  Why?  The enemy would fight them with flaming arrows. They lit the arrows on fire so that the wooden protective shields would burn and they would be able to get through the frontline of the soldiers linked shields.   The Romans would soak their wooden shield so as soon as it was hit by these flaming darts the fire would be extinguished and the enemy could not come against them.

I wonder if in all the preparations of warfare if this one small act of soaking your shield in water was deemed unimportant?  I wonder if the big tough Roman soldiers as they obeyed this command for battle said things like:

• “This is insignificant...what a waste of time!”
• “Let’s just get out there and fight.”
• “I don’t have time for this!”
• “There’s got to be a better plan!”

It is important for us as Soldiers to soak in the water of Scripture and the Presence of the Holy Spirit before we engage in the battle.  Why? Our enemy has arrows that are meant to burn us...to burn up our faith in God’s power. The only way we can extinguish these arrows is to take time soaking in God’s Presence.  This is where faith for the battle comes from.  Still many of us don’t value this vital part of being a soldier.  We think spending time being in God’s Presence is not important, we don’t make time for it and we’d rather spend our time coming up with a new tactic, program or strategy. Tactics, programs and strategy of our mission is still important, but if we are not first grounded in the water of the Word and the Person of it, we will be taken out by Enemy fire.  It takes faith, friends to believe that our time in the Word and in God’s Presence is really part of the battle.  Sometimes it feels like we are accomplishing nothing and we see no results of doing it, but we trust that this act of showing up...soaking up.. can make us stronger and the Enemy’s hot arrows  will be put out!

Consider:

• What keeps me from time in God’s Presence?
• Do I believe in my own words or Scripture to fight the enemy?
• If time in Scripture/in God’s Presence feels dry, show up at the water!  Come as you are and ask Him for the faith to believe that this is where the rest and  power lies to fight those fiery arrows that come at our soul.