It goes to the 6th chapter of Ephesians, once again. Ephesians chapter 6. We'll begin reading in verse 11. Ephesians 6 and 11. put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenlies. Wherefore, take up the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand. Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. It will take the whole armor. The armor is God's armor, that is, the armor of God, which is Christ himself. Henceforth we have undertaken to expound on our loins being girded with truth, having our loins girded with truth, having on the breastplate of righteousness and having shod our feet for the preparation of the gospel of peace. Now we have three others that are prefaced with the word taking, taking the shield of faith, taking the helmet of salvation, and taking the sword of the spirit. which sets before us a little bit of an idea or more of an active part in this taking up the whole armor of God. Today we want to consider verse 16, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. This This is a unique piece of the armor in so much that it is the comprehensive piece. There are two shields that might be considered that the warrior used. There was a smaller one, about so big around, that he would hold in one hand and he would move it around from different places in his body. to protect a place that was in imminent danger, but while he had it in one place protecting one thing, the whole rest of his body was vulnerable. He could just only cover one spot at a time, move it around from here to there, shift it around. It was one little one. It moves around from place to place, protecting one part of the body while leaving the other open to attack. That's not the one I'm talking about here. The one that is envisioned here is the big one. Four feet high, two and a half feet wide, tall enough, wide enough to cover the whole man. All the time. Except, of course, for his face. You ain't gonna fight if you don't get behind that thing. Your head's got to be above it. We will get into that a little bit later when we talk about the helmet of salvation. But it covered the whole man except for his head, his big one. And it covered all the time, but it covered him in front only. He is safe, therefore, with this shield of faith so long as he faces his enemy. If he turns to the side, he's in trouble. He turns to the other side, he's in trouble. He turns his back and runs, he's in trouble. If this shield of faith is going to do you any good, you've got to face your enemy head on all the time. That gives you a place to divert to the side, to the left, or to the right, or to turn back. He's safe so long as he faces the enemy. Nothing in the armor or the backside, there are no retreat defenses. in this armor at all. And we have a little Greek preposition, ephi, translated above all in our text today. And there is a lack of consensus in the grammatical interpretation of what is meant by ephi, that is, above all taking the shield of faith. What's meant there? Well, it doesn't mean what we would think it means if we read it as above all what it generally means and indicates in our English language. In fact, both the old King James and the new King James renders it that way as incorrect. Incorrect in this Bible, incorrect in the old one. That does not mean first and foremost or most important of all, and it doesn't mean if you don't take anything else, take this. If you've got to leave something off, don't leave this. That means most important and first of all, and if nothing else, put this on. That is not what it means. It can't be what it means, because we've already seen it emphasized, take the whole armor of God. You've got to have it all. Nothing can be left out. It does not mean this is more important and should be done first to the neglect of anything else. That isn't what it means. It means this. Faith, of course, is not something that's merely more important than truth or righteousness or the gospel. Faith is something that is comprehensive. It covers all. It's involved in the truth, it's involved in righteousness, it's involved in the gospel, it's involved in those shoes, it's involved in everything. It's a comprehensive. What it means when he says, above all, he's saying, in addition to all this, besides all this, here he is, he says, you've got your loins girded with righteousness. You've got the, with truth, you've got the breastplate of righteousness. You have your feet shod with the gospel of the preparation of peace. Okay. You've got the lines, you've got the breastplates, you've got your shoes, but you need something else. In addition to having that, in addition to the breastplate, in addition to the girdle, in addition to those feet, those Those feet shod, in addition to that, take the shield of faith. You've got all this armor on, but you need a shield out there in front of the armor. It's actually, it is a doubling of the armor, you might say, so to speak. Not exactly, precisely. If you've got this shield and you've got the armor, then you've got you. But it is the first. It is the primary defense against the enemy's assault. And for that, this matter of faith, well fits to be pictured by that shield that's standing out there in front of everything else. They that come to God must what? Believe that he is. I believe. That's first. That's primary. That's the beginning. Nothing starts. Nothing moves. You have nothing until you bow the knee to God and say, I believe God. It'll make a difference what else you've got. If you do not have that, I believe. So, looking at this now, above all of that, in addition to all that, taking the shield of faith, What are we going to do with it? What's it for? What's this shield? How does it come into this armor, this protecting business? With which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. What are these darts? Fiery darts, quenching. What is this quenching function? I didn't know you'd use a shield to quench. You'd need a bucket of water for that. But here he is, he's talking about a shield of faith that quenches the fiery darts of the wicked. Well, I thought a shield was to stop something, not quench something. So what are we talking about here? Well, the word dart is translated from the Greek word belos. which is simply a missile. It's something, it's a missile, which is derived from ballo, which means to throw. When you throw a rock, that rock is a bellows, and you have engaged in ballistics when you throw it. It is the root from which our word ballistics and consequently ballistic missiles come. Think about that in connection with Psalm 91, a beautiful, blessed, comforting psalm. He talks about how the Lord is our protector and how he shelters us. Oh, I thought I'd just read that verse, but this is so good I've got to read down to it. He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in Him I will trust. Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence He shall cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you shall take refuge. His truth shall be your shield and buckler. You shall not be afraid of the terror by night." You can't see anything at night. You don't know what's coming. You can see things in the daytime, but you can't see arrows coming towards you. You shall not be afraid of the terror by night. nor of the arrow that flies by in the daytime. It's this arrow flying that you can't see coming. These darts are hurled. They are launched. They are fired at us by an unseen foe. We do not see the foe. We don't see it coming. We don't see them coming, and we're only aware of them after they've hit and done their I thought about that a little bit, about Brother Gaspar. They say a mosquito is what infected him, and he got that encephalitis. He didn't see that mosquito, didn't even know he was there, until he'd already infected him, and the poison was there. A lot of times you don't know a mosquito is biting until you feel it. Many times you don't know a bee has stung you until he done got his stinger in you. And most people who get snake bit don't see the snake until they feel his fangs hit them and the venom is already in them then. Too late. So this is something we don't, we can't, we can't deflect, we can't run from. And the only way we can be, you can't be dodged, you can't be side-stripped, and only a shield and armor continuously in place can protect us. Now these particular missiles, whether it's a rock, or it's a missile, or an arrow, or a spear, or a bullet, or whatever it is, These particular missiles are called fiery, and that's a perfectly good translation. I looked it up, that's what it means. It means to kindle, or to inflame, or to burn, or to ignite. And the allusion here is to arrows or spears that have been dipped in pitch, set afire, and launched at a site with the purpose of starting something that would cause far more damage than a barren missile could. You shoot an arrow at a fort or a building, something like that, it ain't going to hurt it too much, it's going to stick in there, it may knock a little hole in it. But if you let that thing afire, when it gets there, it sets the whole thing afire and can burn it down. An arrow can't do that, but the fire can. This shield here is set in place to deal with the fire, not the missile so much as it is the fire to quench the fiery darts, all the fiery darts of the devil. This shield of faith is not said to stop or deflect these missiles, but to quench them. The missile indeed may pass through the shield and hit the inner armor. Come right on through the shield, hit the breastplate, hit the girdle, hit the shoe, hit the helmet. They might come and hit the inner armor, but before it does, it's stripped of its fire. The missile, the fire has been stripped. Now, the metaphor, of course, breaks down here. spiritual things can not always be typified and illustrate accurately by material things. There is no such thing as a real shield that will quench the fire of a missile and let the missile pass through. There's no such thing as that. So we're not talking about a real shield. We're talking about the shield of faith. Spiritual realities cannot be fully represented by material things, but this is precisely what the comprehensive shield of faith really does. It's the primary defense of the believer. So how shall we consider this fire in spiritual realities? The metaphor here is an arrow, a spear dipped in pitch, set afire. burn something up. Well, it is something which, like fire, starts with a little thing. Now, James takes that up, and you're familiar with that passage in chapter 3 and verse 5, where James says, verse 4, he says, Although they are so large and driven by fierce winds, they are turned around by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires. Even so, the tongue is a little member and boasts great things, but see how great a forest a little fire can cause. All that massive, awesome, horrible destruction going in the West right now started with a spark, this little spark. And I can't stop it. It keeps on going. I was thinking last night, and it seems it keeps on going. They're not making any progress, and God isn't cooperating. He isn't sending in rain. It's just getting drier and windier. Maybe this is the way the Lord is going to burn this world up. He could do it that way, you know. He could do it any time. But that's James sees it on that, just a little spark. See what a great forest a little thing consumes. This is what we're talking about here. That's exactly what is intended by a fiery dart of Satan. It comes through and it hits you, and it isn't so much the sting of that dart at that time, but it's what it'll do by what it puts in you. It may be compared with an infection from a bacterium or a virus, a little living thing so small you can't even see it, and yet it can kill you. It can wipe out a whole nation, just a little bitty thing. For the small beginning soon corrupts the whole body, brings the whole man down. The Bible speaks of laven, talking about sin, spreading throughout the whole lump. It talks about a root of bitterness springing up in the midst of a congregation. This little root, somebody gets bitter, and they spread their bitterness to somebody else, make them mad. Somebody else gets their nose out of joint. And first thing you know, the whole congregation is bitter and fighting and railing, and everybody mad. Just started with a little to the root of bitterness, and many become defiled. Lies, false doctrine. They grow and they enlarge and they take root and bring down a multitude in apostasy. Paul speaks of that in his second epistle to Timothy in verse 16. But shun profane and vain babblings, or they will increase to more ungodliness, and their message will spread like cancer. Hermeneus and Philetus are of this sort, who are stray concerning the truth, saying that the resurrection is already past, and they overthrow the faith of some. temptations, wrong thoughts, wrong impressions, wrong feelings. But I feel very strong about this. I'm strongly impressed. Well, where did that feeling come from? Where did impression come from? Are you not sure you have been infected by one of Satan's fiery darts with those things? But they are nurtured. They are hard to grow and get worse and worse. And this person comes and they'll give you his grievance and what's got him in such a fix. And you listen to it and it looks like such a silly thing, such an insignificant thing, such a meaningless thing. How could that have got this fellow in the kind of shape he's in? Well, it gets in there and it spreads and corrupts. And it's all together blown out of shape, out of proportion. One of those fiery dots that are nurtured and allowed to grow and get worse and worse, and anger and wrath festers and grows to resentment and obsession with revenge and getting even and hate and can even lead to murder, lust. and inflamed passions follow, and then sin and death. James, once again, speaks of that in the first chapter. In verse 14, he says, Don't say when you're tempted that God tempted you. God doesn't tempt anybody. By tempt, not in the sense that he's talking here. Verse 14 of James 1. Each one is tempted. when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. And then when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin. And sin, when it is full grown, brings forth death, and the warrior has fallen. Just as surely as the devil launches these missiles at us, they will surely hit us and make their intended destruction if we are not glad in the whole armor of God. The Bible tells us, if any man takes his staff, I can handle it, I don't need that. Take he, lest he fall. You might let your guard down, you might relax, but he hadn't. If we don't have this whole armor of God, we're going to tumble. Now, the inner armor that we've been talking about, this breastplate, this armor that girds the lords, is not suited to handle the venom of these nestles. The breastplate of truth is not suited to handle that. You might have your head full of absolutely persuaded of good sound, solid doctrine. But that truth and that knowledge will not strip the vicious lies of their pain and poison. It won't do it. It isn't intended to do that. Righteousness is ours in Christ. And in his sight and before God, we are spotlessly righteous. He's given us a love for righteousness and a hate for sin and ungodliness. But it is not intended to deliver us from demonically inflamed passions that rage in our mortal bodies and carnal minds. We're still cursed with this old body. This old carnal mind, free, founded, and stabilized in Jesus Christ, will nevertheless wobble and stumble when stormed by the tidal waves of fleshy turmoil. And I was thinking, just as I was talking about this, how the Bible says that Abraham staggered not at the promise. And we talked about that a few weeks ago. It looked to me like he did a lot of staggering. He stumbled around considerably. But the time came when he had to stand, and he did stand, finally. Now, the reason that he sets forth this shield of faith here, so effectual to deal with these things, is because not only the existence but the prominence of an ineffectual faith. that's found in Christendom. There is an effectual faith, there is an ineffectual faith. The Bible says four times, the just shall live by faith. That's more than being justified by faith. Not only are we justified by faith, That is, we are saved, we are forgiven from our sins, we are counted righteousness before God. Not only do we have peace with God through faith, that's so. We're justified, condemnation is gone, we have peace with God through faith, but we actually, as the scripture says, live. We walk and we stand by faith. Our life is a life of faith. We walk by faith, we stand by faith, we live by faith. It's a whole life. Faith, this is something you'll, I believe God. Well, I got peace with God. Yeah, I done done that. No, no, no, no, no, no. Faith is something you live with, you walk with. That's that shield of faith that's got to be in place all the time. We live by faith. We stand by faith. Romans 11 and 20. tells us Gentiles to not boast against the Jews, because of unbelief they were broken off. And you stand by faith, and that's the only way you stand. If you continue in faith, otherwise you'll be broken off too. We stand, we live by faith. There is a frivolous, false, any factual faith that is rampant in professing Christianity. This faith is not the gift of God, but the work of man. I suppose in everything and in all things, I'm looking for something that doesn't have any explanation except God. If it can be explained, demonstrated by something man done, I'm scared of it. I'm afraid of it. I've got a bit of confidence in it. I'm looking for something supernatural. Always! Something that has no explanation for it except God Almighty. Now soul winning, getting people to make professions of faith and believe is just something that men can do. I don't want a part of it. Where's God? I'm glad it's hard for us to believe in God. It ought not to be hard, but I'm glad it is. I'm glad it's something only God can do. Otherwise, none of us would have any confidence or hope. I believe God must be at work. The Bible says this is a faith according to the mighty power of God. It is not something that is wrought by the will and power, that is, this frivolous faith is not something that is wrought by the will and power of God, but by the will and flesh of clever human psychology. It's made of the same earthy stuff that is employed in sales, and politics. The rules of other men, the most common thing in this world. It is what we use our lying lips and deceitful tongues for more than anything else. to persuade and entice and impose our will upon other people. As in all of these, this false ineffectual faith may look very much like the real, and may be permitted to endure for a long time. It may indeed appear to do great and marvelous religious works. Get folks to profess and act like Christians. Even work signs and wonders. Get wealth and power. And that may go on for an indisterminable long time. I know many of you have lived long enough and been Christians long enough to be utterly shocked. to stand with your mouth open in sharp disbelief, to see people whom you thought really believed God, who were really Christians, to see preachers, to see works, at times it looked like that they were real, that they were really God, to see them prove to be nothing, just completely utterly fall by the wayside, to flop. Its fecklessness will be made known when it is hit by one of these fiery darts of the wicked one. That is a false faith. A faith is not true evangelical faith. It will be exposed by the gun and tape of one of Satan's fiery darts, to expose it for what it is. That is why all faith must pass through a fiery trial. That's what the Bible says. 1 Corinthians 3 and 13, Paul tells us something like this. It says, Paul, Apollos, Cephas, all of us, we're just God's helpermen. You're God's building. I planted all this water. God gives the increase. I laid the foundation. Another man builds their own. But let every man take heed. I can build their own, whether he builds with gold, silver, wood, hay, or stubble. The day will try it. How's it going to be tried? It will be tried by fire. The fire shall try every man's work of what so he talked about before. The faith got all these converts fired. They're putting a fire on it and say, I can't stand it. God doesn't do that. Every one of us, our faith has got to be tried by these fiery darts of the wicked one. 1 Peter, chapter 1, verse 5 and 7, we read that for a responsive reading. That day, your faith may be found more precious than gold may be tried in the fire. Yes, there your faith is going to be tried, but the fire is not going to burn it up. If it would burn up, it needs to be burned up so you can get rid of it and get the real thing. You don't have to be afraid of the fire. The psalm says, the fire shall not hurt you, I only desire. your faith to refine, your goal to refine, and whatever it says. I don't remember. You remember it. Sing that song. Our former foundation, our greater foundation. When the wicked one is ready to harvest his evil fruit, all he has to do is fire one poison missile. This superficial faith will pass the poison right on to the victim's body and he'll fall. But there is a gospel faith. That's what we're talking about here. This is the one which is wrought in regeneration. It arises from nothing less than the divine nature of the life of God. of Christ himself by the Holy Spirit in the inner man. This is a faith that is of Christ himself. Galatians 2.20, the apostle Paul says, I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life I now live, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. It's a faith that has the intercession of the Savior. He tells Peter, Peter, Satan wants you. In fact, he came around begging me for you. He wants to sift your wheat. But don't worry, I'll pray for you that your faith will not fail. Isn't that marvelous? It's a faith whereby Jesus is praying. You don't know whether you're going to make it through this trial or not. Yeah, I know it seems that way sometimes. I told somebody recently, hang it long, I said, I feel like I'm hanging on by the tips of my fingers, but I know underneath are the everlasting arms. He's prayed for us. We're not going down. That's the kind of faith we have. The Christian believes. Indeed we know God. He's not an outer, it's not an outer persuasion that he has, but an inner one. He might be able to point to a thousand reasons one ought to believe God, all of which the unregenerate man might see But the power that locks him and binds him in faith to God is an inner persuasion of the Spirit. How come you believe? You give a thousand out of red why folks ought to believe the Bible, ought to believe there's God, but that's not why you believe. Why you believe. I just believe. I believe! I believe! I got it! I believe! Tell me why. I can give you a reason for it, but you still won't know why I believe. It's in the inner persuasion of the Spirit. The true believer is assaulted and he's hit by every one of these wicked missiles. He is. In fact, he's hit by more of them than the apostate is. Apostate, he'd get by one, he'd go. He keeps on firing at us because they're not doing any good, so he keeps shooting them. Even more than the false professor. But the true believer continues to stand after all the false ones fall. Temptations, lusts, yeah, they're going to hit you. Pride, oh yeah, that'll hurt you. Worldly ambitions, greed, selfishness, yes sir, it'll hit you. Strife and fear and worry, yes. Anxiety, doubt, grief, sorrow, yes sir. Disappointment, betrayal, catastrophic loss, perplexities, they all come flying in. unseen, unexpected, jarring our very spiritual foundations. And they're not stopped by the shield of faith. They are allowed to enter on and assail our souls. But they have been stripped of their deadly poison by the shield of faith. They cannot kill us. They cannot They cannot turn their eyes from looking to and trusting our blessed Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The lusts hit you, yeah, the temptations. You'd like to do a lost man? Why don't you sin? Why don't you give in? You believe. What do you believe? I believe God. I believe God is right here. Shall I commit fornication in His presence? You can't! You can't! You build God? Anger? Strife? Worry? Fear? That comes in. Yes, sir. Where do you come from? On those fiery dots. Shall you let the sun go down on your wrath? No, because the Holy Spirit is grieved and you've lost your communion and fellowship with God. You don't like it. Jealousy and resentment? Yeah, it comes in, and you deny it for a while, and after a while you admit that's what it is, and you're ashamed of it, and it makes you sick. Betrayal and abandonment? Yes, sir. And it has with it that poison, that bitterness. It makes you a cynic. It makes you mean. It makes you a lash out at everybody else. But when a Christian doesn't do that, it just makes him sweeter. It drives him to trust in the Lord more. Oh, forsake me, yet God stood with me. He has God. Catastrophic loss? Yes. Though He can't take anything with us anyway. We have a treasure in heaven. We gladly renounce all of that for Him. We believe. That's that inner persuasion. Finally, in our text, we ought to notice this, we'll close on this, reading it once again, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. We notice that this shield of faith must be actively employed. Faith is not something that is a gift of God that we have, it is that. But it's something we must do. We must believe. Besides all this, in addition to the armor, taking this shield of faith, by which we shall be able, you shall be able, To quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one, you felt a sting, you see the poison coming, you repudiate it, you renounce it, or have that, you can't get that hold on me. Going back to the analogy of a bacterium or a virus or poison that hit us, you don't have any defense, it's done in your body. It isn't a perfect analogy here. You know that poison. You know that it'll kick you. You know that you can't live with that. You know that's not a part of you. It got stuck. It can't get any root. It can't go any further. Can you do that? Yeah. Yes, you can do that. You have to do it. The evil is coming. You feel it. It hits you. It hurts. It causes pain, sorrow, grief, and all of that, but you know you can't dwell on that. You can't have that. You can rise above it, because we have a God who will be defeated, who will be hurt, and he will deliver us. We are unable to do this. We will do it. Amen.