Thursday, April 30, 2009
1 Peter 1:4-5 . . . you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.
SHIELDED THROUGH FAITH
Not all God's promises are to be fulfilled in the distant future. Here Peter says that through faith Christians are shielded by God's power until Christ returns.
When we think of God shielding us, we tend to think of Him protecting us from physical harm. Turning the car that was going to hit us. Causing our body to eradicate the cancer that it couldn't even see months before. But here Peter isn't talking about physical things. He says that THROUGH FAITH we are shielded by God's power.
In the Old Testament book of Job, the Devil appeared before God. God asked Satan if he had considered God's good servant Job. Satan told God that Job was only faithful because God blessed him so much. So, God let Satan take away Job's wealth, his children and his health. Though Job felt cheated and questioned God, his faith remained. God was still standing by Job shielding him. Even though he had lost everything by human standards, Job testified:
"I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes -- I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!" (Job 19:25-27).
We might imagine God the Father standing next to us at all times with a big shield. And every time Satan throws something our way to pierce our faith in Jesus and kill it, God blocks the spear.
Paul must have imagined something like this when he wrote, " . . . take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one" (Ephesians 6:16 NIV).
Until your dying day, or Jesus descends down through the sky, may the shield of faith protect your soul in Christ Jesus.
