But you, O Lord are a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.

I cried aloud to the Lord, and He answered me from his holy hill.

I lay down and slept; I woke again, for the Lord sustained me.

Psalm 3

Are you like me? Wondering where this year has gone? In looking back over the things that have happened, I have no point of reference. Was it in April or September that such and such happened? This year has been memorable yet specific dates of incidences are hard to recall. In speaking with others, I hear the same thing- on one hand we are churning over so much in our heads and feeling very agitated, yet we can not release that pent up energy and in fact may feel sluggish. While we have lots of worries about life, the world, and our own personal situations, every day seems to melt into the next without any real change or activity. Sometimes I feel like the psalmist- while I do not have physical enemies around me, I feel that the emotional and spiritual ones are just as dangerous. I can get myself mentally mixed up- annoyed at my lack of motivation or lack of using my time wisely and having no focus or drive. I’ll continue my mental flagellation and start thinking that I am spending time and mental energy on the most mundane things while real issues are happening around me and work myself up into a royal mess. I feel like I am fiddling around while life is burning around me. I find that I am having trouble sleeping. And still, most of the worries and concerns are things that are totally out of my control.

In past blogs I have talked about turning worries into prayers and while I still recommend that practice, I would like to offer up an additional visual: God’s shield of faith protecting and surrounding us when the arrows of self-doubt, despair, or constant worry keep flinging into our beings.

In our Bible study this past week, we talked about a passage in the Bible that describes the metaphorical armor of God as outlined in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. (Ephesians 6: 10-20) One piece of armor that Paul describes is the shield of faith. Having faith defends us from the arrows of doubt that pierce into our souls: doubt about ourselves, the people around us, the world and God’s place in the world. I think David in Psalm 3 was describing that as well. When we have faith, it surrounds us with protection from the naysayers and the mental troublemakers in this world (even perhaps our own nay-saying).

But what was pointed out in our Bible study, we have to pick up the shield. We have to hold it. We have to claim and actually have the faith.

God’s protection with faith is not a force field, it requires some active participation of us. One of the most amazing things about God is that our faith doesn’t have to be huge. We don’t have to proceed through a series of tasks, each getting more difficult before we are rewarded with faith. We just have to believe. Just have faith. Even if we don’t have that much, we can declare like the father who asked Jesus to heal his son, “I believe; help my unbelief”. We can have the faith of a mustard seed. In the ancient world the mustard tree grew quite large but it started out as a tiny pencil point of a seed. The seed image reminds us that our faith can grow. How we start out is not how we will end. We just have to be willing to start, to pick up that shield and to hold fast and believe even as we wonder and question our unbelief.

There are times when I feel that I am holding on to the shield with all my might and other times just loosely holding it. But I do try and pick it up. While I do not understand God- certainly His ways are not my own- I trust and have faith that He is in charge, that things will work out for His purpose, good and glory and that I am privileged to be part of that plan (not designing the plan). While I still get agitated at times and wonder about this world, I can do something about it- pray and trust the shield.

One problem with the pandemic and the imposed isolation is that we are too much in our heads. Sure, we may be interacting with others through virtual meetings, social media and distanced outside venues yet I surmise that many of us spend time just by ourselves or with a very small group of people in our “pod”. While the introvert in me is quite fine with that arrangement, I do recognize that when we are too much in our thoughts there is the tendency to miss perspective and miss truth and to start doubting. We become vulnerable to the slings and arrows of our own mental poison.

The shield was invented by the Greeks to prevent harm from arrows and rocks. At the time that the Paul used a shield as a description, it most likely referred to the classic Roman shield. The interesting thing about the Roman shield was that while it protected an individual, by standing in formation and holding shields above and around the group, all would be protected. With our pandemic isolation I think we may need to reinstate the Roman testudo formation for our own and societal’s mental battles. Yes, we, individually need the shield of faith but I think only through the communal shields of faith can we protect our minds from the onslaught of false information about ourselves and others. We need to commune, to discuss, to even argue over ideas and thoughts in order to defuse the arrows of ignorance and mistrust.

What about you? How’s your mental, emotional, and physical state? Are you both agitated and paralyzed at the same time? How is your faith lately? Small? Large? Non-existence? Has recent events doubted your belief in others? In government? In God? Do you need a shield of faith? Have you ever picked one up? What was that like for you? Do you need the support of others’ shields?

What is encouraging about Psalm 3 is David’s honesty. While things are difficult for him and that he recognizes he is in real danger by picking up the shield of faith, he knows that God’s glory is seen and that God has sustained him. He can endure this difficulty through his faith in the One who hears and cares for him. Even with the trials and tribulations, David gets a good night’s sleep!

So too, we can be encouraged during this time of extreme difficulty that we need to pick up the shield of faith. We might be holding our faith loosely but we are holding it. We might be wondering if this faith thing is worthwhile, but we are willing to give it a go. We might have to continually remind ourselves to let go of our doubts, our worries and our concerns and let our faith in the One who hears us, handle the situation. We might have to reach out to others and join together in sharing our worries, concerns and faith. We might even get a good night’s sleep too!