Protect Your Head

“But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.” (1Th 5:8 AV)

Those last four words are precious to me.  In the dark days in which we live, hope is at a premium.  Last night, I preached out of Philippians chapter three.  In verses eighteen and nineteen, we read of one of the few times that Paul mentions a contrary emotion to the joy that is so prevalent in that letter.  He weeps for his captors because he knows what there live is and will be.  We have a hope which the world does not have.  Paul reminds the church in Thessalonica that the saints are not reserved unto wrath.  This is in the context of the second coming of Christ.  We will not suffer judgment that is coming upon a world that hates God.  Like Noah, those who love the LORD will be removed and judged separately from those who hate Him.  The wrath of God is reserved for those who despise Him and His word.  So, it we understand this correctly, our hope is in salvation.  It is not in our current condition.  The world will always hate God and His word.  Even those who claim to know God and turn against His word are truly not children of the most High.  Unless they repent, they too will suffer the wrath of God.  But we have this hope of salvation.  And this hope is worn on the head.  It is represented as a helmet!

In my childhood, we rode our bicycles without helmets.  Then came along a government that believed helmets were a good idea.  They were probably right.  In the infancy of American football, leather was used as the material for helmets.  This got replaced by impact-resistant plastic.  Innovation today is trying to mitigate the impact of a tackle even more by introducing impact-absorbing materials.  In the infancy of ice hockey, the players played without helmets.  Even the goalie. That was insane!  Having suffered three concussions, I think I would have been better off with a helmet.  The masters behind the push for helmets understand that the human head is the most valuable of all assets.  If the head is injured, it risks the entire body.  Several years ago, I had to get a scan of my brain.  We found the residual evidence of those concussions.  They will be with me for my entire life and may eventually lead to complications further down the road.  The head is the most important part of the body.  We cannot replace it.  We cannot live without it.  We can have an iron lung or a mechanical heart.  But there is no replacement for the head.

Perhaps this is why the hope of salvation is described as a helmet.  It is the most important piece for hope to reside within.  If we lose hope in salvation, we lose all reason to endure.  If we forget that we are saved and on our way to heaven, then this life becomes more disturbing.  If we forget that we are saved and nothing can remove us from the love of God, then the terrors of this world will overwhelm us.  There is a bright day coming.  We see it darkly.  But soon the glorious light of God’s appearance will be all that we see.  There is no reason to lose hope.  There is no reason to surrender our joy.  It doesn’t matter what the future holds.  It doesn’t matter if the world’s hatred for Jehovah God only grows.  We have the hope of salvation.  We may be sailing on a tumultuous sea.  But the shore of God’s kingdom is right ahead.  Don’t hang the head!  Wear the helmet of salvation with hope and joy!  Praise be to God!