Psalm 119:114 You are my refuge and my shield; I have put my hope in your word.
We can come to know God on a very personal level, but only through His Holy Word. Although there will be times that we will have to grieve and bear a tribulation in private, those times God is our refuge. He is the safe harbor in which we can securely rest (Psalm 46:1). When we begin to realize and accept that God is our refuge, we will trust Him more fully. We will never have to fear any situation or people that might jeopardize our security and comfort, either physically or spiritually. There will never be one heartbeat of our lives that God is not in control, and we will never find a safer place than wrapped tightly in the arms of God (Proverbs 18:10).
Then there will be other times that we are called on to fight the spiritual battles against the evils of this world. At those times, He will be our shield. The Roman shield (called a scutum) was approximately the size of an average door and could cover the entire bodily area of the soldier. Several soldiers could put them together to create an enclosure around the troops. Often the shields, made of wood, would be covered with animal skins that could be wet to extinguish any flaming arrows that came their way. Satan will be shooting flaming arrows at the tender recesses of our hearts every day that he has the chance. Our shield of faith will serve to protect us against the best Satan has to come at us with.
Paul tells us in Ephesians 6:16 to “take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.” God is our shield, but as Paul tells us, we must “take it up,” we must raise it to use it. If we only band the shield to our arm, it will not protect our hearts from the flaming arrows that Satan will be shooting at us. We must lift it and hold it high for it to protect us. A Christian that is ready, willing, and able to take up the shield of faith can be identified as a soldier in the Army of God.
The hope that we have is not like the hope that the world sees, ‘I hope this or that will happen,” “Hope in your word” is an assured belief that what God has promised in His Word, He will bring about (Romans 8:23-25; Hebrews 11:1; Acts 2:26; Romans 12:12).
God will never leave us or forsake us, and we can stand firm on every promise recorded in His Holy Word. Hope is Christ Jesus; however, sinners like us do not come naturally. We will have to become self-preachers and preach persistently and persuasively to ourselves, or we will be taken away by Satan to a discouraged and disheartened spirit. This hope that the world cannot comprehend will not only have a yearning and aspiration for great things to happen through God, but it will also count on it happening.
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