They’re Messing with my Thimble

I just ordered the classic edition of the Monopoly board game on Amazon.  I have one that belonged to my family when I was growing up in the sixties. I didn’t need a second one, but I did want another thimble token. This week the Monopoly maker, Hasbro, announced they will retire the thimble. This news made me sad, sad, sad! I can’t fault Hasbro’s business move. They asked their fans to vote on their favorite tokens and the thimble did not make it. But it was my favorite!

You may have a favorite Monopoly token too. Everyone does, right? Somehow we latch onto the token that we identify with the most and it becomes our piece forever. We call dibs on it. We are willing to fight over it. There is always a life story to explain why our token is ours.

The thimble is my token because I come from a line of seamstresses. I treasure the hand sewn baby dress that my great-grandmother made for my grandmother.  The grandmother that wore that little baby dress, grew up to be a creative seamstress. She made my mother’s childhood dresses out of flour sacks during the depression and won ribbons in her local home and garden club. And then my mom blew away the previous two generations with her sewing abilities. She made everything from my frilly dresses to her tailored suits to my wedding dress to pleated draperies. Sewing was so much a part of her life that she collected over 100 decorative thimbles. My brothers kindly let me have her thimble collection when she passed on.

I began sewing the summer I turned eight.  My grandmother visited and gave me an assignment to make a 9-patch quilt top. Her assignment provided ample practice of sewing straight seams. I still have that quilt, but no longer have my first thimble. It was a big deal to get my own.  Mom bought the smallest size and then bent the metal to stay snug on my finger.

Why is the tiny thimble so mighty? The average millennial may not know what a thimble looks like or why it’s useful. It went out of vogue when we exchanged needle and thread for the convenience of “ready-made.” But a thimble comes in handy even to sew a button back on. This defensive little cup of metal shields fingers from the pricks of the needle’s blunt end. When my thimble is misplaced, my finger suffers. So I have learned to always use it.

In the spiritual realm, we have a piece of defensive armor that protects us on a larger scale than the thimble. Paul suggests the whole armor of God to fight against the powers of darkness in Ephesians chapter six. The belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, shoes of readiness for the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit

What strikes me about Paul’s instructions on the armor of God is that he gets more specific about the shield of faith.

In all circumstances take up the shield of faith,

with which you can extinguish

all the flaming darts of the evil one; [Ephesians 6:16 ESV]

 

He tells us exactly what it shields us from – the darts of the evil one. Perhaps you have felt the darts of accusation, shame, hurt, abuse, temptations, and lies that Satan fires at our souls.

 

Paul tells us how the shield works – not just deflecting the darts, but putting out the flame of these attempted assaults.

 

And he tells us when to use it – all the time.

 

My shield of faith is precious to me. It claims the very center of my identity. Walking with God doesn’t mean you don’t get in battles with life, but it does mean you have supernatural protection. But like the thimble, the shield of faith is powerful only if you use it. Faith isn’t meant to be put on just for Sundays or special occasions. It’s a way of life, to be carried all the time.