above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one
–Ephesians 6:16

When the children of Israel walked through the wilderness, they often complained and murmured against Moses and Aaron for bringing them out of Egypt. On one such occasion they said: “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread.” The manna with which the Lord fed them they called worthless bread. After the children of Israel began to murmur and call the food worthless, the Lord sent fiery serpents among them; they bit the Israelites, and many died. The Israelites came to Moses and asked him to pray to the Lord for them. The Lord said to Moses: “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.” Moses made a bronze serpent and put it on a pole. And when a serpent bit a person, he looked at the bronze serpent and lived. (Num.21:5-9)

When Jesus spoke to the Jews about manna, He said: “Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven…” (Jhn.6:49-51) It is also written in John’s Gospel that the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. (Jhn.1:17) The manna that the Father sent from Heaven is His grace and truth, and everyone who receives Jesus as his Lord and believes in Him eats this manna, and, as the Lord said, will never die but will live forever.

Paul, speaking to his Jewish brothers (note: to Jews, because at the beginning of the chapter he said “our fathers all passed through the sea”) and recalling this story, said: “nor let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents” (1 Cor.10:9) How can one tempt Christ? Peter, at the council of the apostles, addressing the Pharisees who had believed and who taught that one must be circumcised and keep the law of Moses, said: “Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?” (Act.15:10) So it turns out that teaching believers to keep the law of Moses is nothing other than tempting Christ Himself. That is why Paul wrote to the Galatians about those Jewish legalists who forced the Galatians to keep the commandments and ordinances of the law: “but he who troubles you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is.” (Gal.5:10)

The Strength of Sin Is the Law

The poisonous serpents that bit the Israelites are literally called fiery serpents in Hebrew. What are these fiery serpents? Paul writes to the Ephesians: “above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.” (Eph.6:16) The fiery serpents, or the fiery darts of the wicked one, are the condemnation he shoots at a person, because Scripture calls the enemy the accuser of our brethren. (Rev.12:10) When Jesus shed His blood, the wicked one, who accused and slandered God’s people before God, was cast down, and now he walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. (1 Pet.5:8) He shoots his fiery darts — the condemnation of the law — at a believer, and if the believer accepts this condemnation as coming from the Lord and thinks that the Lord is reproaching him, teaching him wisdom or is angry with him for some offense, then that fiery dart has hit its target, and the believer’s problems begin. The enemy’s poison starts to poison his life.

In his letter to the Corinthians Paul wrote: “The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.” (1 Cor.15:56) Where does the enemy get his strength, and on what basis does he condemn a believer? The law, for example, says: “Love your neighbor as yourself”, and I walked past a disabled man begging for alms and didn’t even tell him about Jesus or help him in any way. Then the wicked one comes and starts shooting his darts: “How can you say you love your neighbor, when you’re like that priest who passed by the needy man on the other side of the road and didn’t even help him? What kind of Samaritan are you?” And if I accept this condemnation, thinking that the Lord is teaching me to love my neighbors, it will be like poison that poisons and slowly kills.

“Paul, but you really did walk past and didn’t help a person in need!” Yes, from the law’s point of view I did not act like the Samaritan, but, brother, I am no longer under the law, and the law has no power over me, for I died to the law in the body of Jesus Christ, and now the wicked one has no power to harm me with his condemnation. Paul wrote to the Romans: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.” (Rom.8:1) Those who live according to the flesh are those who live under the law, and they are under the condemnation of the law. Those who live according to the Spirit live in the grace of God, and for them there is no condemnation!! So when the enemy comes and tries to shoot his condemnation, his fiery darts, what is the antidote?

The Shield of Faith

The word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying: “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.” (Gen.15:1) In this chapter of the book of Genesis the Lord preached the gospel to Abraham, telling him the story of Jesus Christ written in the stars. Abram believed the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness. Abraham’s righteous standing before the Lord God was not in his righteous deeds or exemplary behavior. It was in faith! Notice that every time Abraham lied, or in other words sinned, he became richer. He deceived Pharaoh and came out of Egypt with great riches. He deceived Abimelech, and the Lord made Abimelech give Abraham a thousand pieces of silver. Why is that? Because it was precisely at those moments that Abraham least deserved God’s blessings, and his righteousness was not from his deeds but from faith.

“So now I need to sin in order to receive grace and blessing from God?” someone will ask. The very fact that you ask such a question, dear friend, shows that you do not understand the grace of God. That is exactly what Paul was accused of when he wrote: “But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more.” (Rom.5:20) They accused Paul of teaching people to sin so that there would be more grace. And what is Paul’s answer? “How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?” Paul does not write: “We must not sin!”, because that would be law. Paul writes: “We died to sin.” The difference is that in the first case I try to behave well and not sin, and as a result I go on living under the law; in the second case I have died to sin and to the law in the body of Christ, and sin and the law have nothing to do with me. In other words, Paul says: “How can I break the law (sin) if I am not under the law and have died to the law!?” Paul’s answer: “Certainly not!” (Rom.6:1-2)

So, coming back to Abraham, the Lord said to him: “I am your shield!” A shield against whom or what? Against the wicked one and his poisonous bites, of course. Job did not have such a shield, so misfortunes happened to him. “Wait, Brother Paul, isn’t it written that the Lord made a hedge around him and his household and all that he had?” The difference between Abram and Job was that Abraham’s shield was the Lord Himself, because he believed the gospel of Jesus Christ written in the stars, whereas about Job it is said that he was “blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil” (Job.1:1). All these qualities came from his works, not from faith in Jesus Christ. He was like a Jewish legalist who believed in God but did not accept the righteousness that is by faith — Jesus Christ. (Rom.10:3) Abraham was righteous by faith, and Job by his works. Abraham’s righteousness was the Lord, and Job’s was his godly behavior. Abraham had faith, which was his sure shield, and Job had good works and all kinds of sacrifices, with which he protected himself from the wicked one for the time being.

So when the Galatians began to live like Abraham, and then submitted to the law and began to live like Job, Paul called them foolish. It is spiritual ignorance to try to please the Lord God with your own godliness, obedience to the law and exemplary behavior. Paul pointed the Galatians to Abraham: “just as Abraham “believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham.” (Gal.3:6-7) Believers are the children of Abraham, not of Job!

Beloved brothers and sisters, if there are some troubles in your life and the enemy is shooting his fiery darts and trying to condemn you for some deeds, take up the shield of faith — the antidote to deadly poison. Look at the cross, where Jesus was condemned by the law for every one of our sins, and now there is no more condemnation for us. When the venomous snake that came out of the fire bit Paul, it did him no harm. He simply shook it off back into the fire, which is the condemnation of the law. Instead of accepting condemnation from the enemy, Paul threw sin back into the fire and condemned sin in the flesh. God so loved us that He sent His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and condemned sin in the flesh, so that we would be forever righteous before Him. (Rom.8:3-4) Amen!