- Name 47 of 70A Sun and Shield
- HebrewShemesh umagen
- In plain wordsThe God who gives light and keeps you safe
- Where to find itPsalm 84:11, a pilgrim song of the sons of Korah
In Psalm 84:11 the Bible calls God a sun and shield. The words come from a pilgrim song, sung by someone who missed God's house so much it hurt. The name means the God who gives you light and life, and the God who stands between you and harm. In the King James Bible the line reads For the LORD God is a sun and shield
(Psalm 84:11).
A homesick singer from a doorkeeper family
The heading over Psalm 84 says it belongs to the sons of Korah. That family had a hard past. Their ancestor Korah led a rebellion against Moses in the wilderness, and it ended in disaster (Numbers 16). Yet his family line did not end there. Generations later, Korah's descendants served at God's house as gatekeepers, the men who guarded the entrance (1 Chronicles 9:19). They also became singers, and several psalms carry their name.
The singer of Psalm 84 is far from the temple, and he aches to get back. He opens with a cry of love for the place where God was worshiped:
How amiable are thy tabernacles, O LORD of hosts! My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the LORD: my heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God.
Psalm 84:1-2
Amiable is an old word for lovely. Tabernacles here means the dwelling places of God. He even envies the little birds. Sparrows and swallows have built their nests near the altars, and he wishes he could live as close as they do (Psalm 84:3).
Then the psalm turns into a road trip. It pictures travelers heading up to Jerusalem for the feasts, passing through the valley of Baca
. Nobody is sure where that valley was. The Hebrew name probably means weeping, and some older word books connect it with a kind of balsam tree that drips sap. Either way, it was a dry, hard stretch, and the pilgrims turned it into a place of springs. The next line says they go from strength to strength
. The road was long, but they got stronger as they went, not weaker.
Near the end comes the line many people know by heart, and it sounds even sweeter from a gatekeeper's family:
For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand. I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.
Psalm 84:10
The man would rather stand at the door of God's house than live in comfort anywhere else. And the very next verse tells you why. God is a sun and shield.
Shemesh and magen: the two Hebrew words
The Hebrew phrase is shemesh u-magen. The little u in the middle simply means "and."
Shemesh is the everyday Hebrew word for the sun, the same one used for sunrise and sunset. Strong's dictionary, a standard word list for the King James Bible, gives its plain meaning as the sun, from a root that has to do with being brilliant.
Magen is a shield. It was usually the smaller, round shield a soldier carried on his arm, the kind the King James sometimes calls a buckler. In the Psalms it often becomes a picture of God guarding His people, as in But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me
(Psalm 3:3). You can read more about that word on the My Buckler page.
Put side by side, the two words make a striking pair. The sun is far away, yet it reaches you every day. A shield is right next to you, close enough to hold. The sun is about giving: light, warmth, growing crops. The shield is about guarding: stopping the arrow you never saw coming. Most of us need one or the other on any given day. The psalm says God is both.
It was a bold picture for an Israelite to use. The nations around Israel worshiped the sun as a god, and the Law of Moses warned God's people never to do the same (Deuteronomy 4:19). Later, a few kings of Judah even kept horses dedicated to the sun near the temple, until King Josiah took them away (2 Kings 23:11). The psalmist was not bowing to the sun. He was saying that the One who made the sun gives to his life what the sun gives to the earth.
Grace now, glory later
The verse does not stop at the name. It goes on to say what this sun and shield hands out:
For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.
Psalm 84:11
The Hebrew word for grace is chen. It means favor and kindness, the warm goodwill someone shows you when you did nothing to earn it. The word for glory is kabod, which at its root has the idea of weight or honor. Grace is for the road you are walking now. Glory is where the road ends.
Then comes a promise that sounds almost too big: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly
. To withhold is to hold back. To walk uprightly means to live honestly and wholeheartedly with God. It does not mean being perfect. It describes the direction of a life.
The psalm closes with a quiet sentence that sums up the whole song:
O LORD of hosts, blessed is the man that trusteth in thee.
Psalm 84:12
More King James verses about God's light and protection
Psalm 84 is the only place God is called a sun and shield in those exact words, but both pictures show up across Scripture. God told Abram in a vision Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward
(Genesis 15:1). Isaiah looked ahead to a day when the light of the sun would not be needed at all:
The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but the LORD shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory.
Isaiah 60:19
And the very last book of the Old Testament promises that unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings
(Malachi 4:2). Christians have long read that sunrise as a picture of Jesus.
Living under a sun and shield today
Think about the sun for a second. It came up this morning whether you noticed or not. You did not ask for it. It warmed the air, lit your way to school or work, and kept the food growing that ended up on your plate. A great deal of the good in your life arrived the same way, quietly and without being requested. This name invites you to see those gifts and say thank you.
Now think about the shield. Some days you will know you were protected: a near miss on the highway, a bad choice you almost made. Most of the time you will never know. The shield works on arrows you never see.
And remember the doorkeeper. Maybe your job feels small. You stack chairs, run the sound board, watch toddlers in the nursery, or sweep up after everyone leaves. The family that wrote this psalm stood at the gate, and they said a single day there beat a thousand anywhere else.
- Make a list of five good things you have today that you never asked God for.
- Ask yourself which you need more this week, light for the road or protection on it, and tell God plainly.
- When you feel God is holding out on you, read Psalm 84:11 out loud and choose to trust the Giver.
A Sun and Shield is name 47 of the 70 in the book. The next name moves from the road to the city gates: the King of Glory. You can also browse every title on the names of God in the Bible page.
