Embedded at the heart of idolatry is the implicit belief that there is someone or something that is equal or superior to Jehovah. This is categorically untrue. There is none like Him nor is there any God besides Him (2nd Samuel 7:22). It is utter blasphemy and complete heresy to believe otherwise.
One of the facets of Jehovah’s utter uniqueness is declared in Proverbs 2:7; here, it is written: “He is a shield to those who walk uprightly.” What a wondrous metaphor!
This is not the first use of such picturesque language in Scripture. After Abram’s successful military rescue of Lot and his refusal of compensation from the king of Sodom, Jehovah came to him in a vision and said, “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward’ (Genesis 15:1). What a shield!
Because of Job’s wise choices to be blameless and upright, one who feared God and shunned evil (Job 1:1), Satan complained that God had made a hedge around him (Job 1:10). When the testing Job occurred, Satan was only allowed to do what God, Job’s shield, gave him permission to do (Job 1:9-12, 2:4-6). What a shield!
The final words spoken by Moses in his final address to Israel declare that Israel was blessed among the nations because they were a people saved by Jehovah, the shield of their help (Deuteronomy 33:29). What a shield!
The sons of Korah preferred to be doorkeepers in God’s house over dwelling in the tents of wickedness (Psalm 84:10), because the Lord God is a sun and shield to His people (Psalm 84:11). What a shield!
Jehovah’s protection, which guards and preserves (Proverbs 2:7-8), is not reserved for an elite few like Abram and Job. It is for all those who walk uprightly in the paths of justice and the way of holiness. What a shield!
