The Holy One calls to me this morning after a long dark "Night of the Soul": A season when we do not understand what Adonai is doing in our lives and knowing we cannot fix it ourselves. I confess that waiting upon the Lord is not easy for my incessant "need-to-know" mind. I have received many Divine downloads that help me to understand more of His great Sovereignty in what I perceive as disasters during a personal time-out but finding out how it all connects is not easy.
Meditating on His word and trying to glean application truly is like a cow chewing on her cud. Tiny pieces begin to fall into place and a visual starts to take shape for my spirit eye to apprehend.
The times we are in can be quite confusing and very distressing when all our familiar comfort zones are under attack and we wonder, "God where are You?"
BUT none-the-less...we believe and trust that God is still Sovereign.
Yesterday a study of I Samuel 5-7 brought out a Biblical principal of God's Sovereignty even if His people are out of order. While it is the way of Adonai to co-labor with us, there are times when He seems to work alone, especially when we, His people, are on a disciplinary time-out.
When the prophet Samuel first came on the scene, the children of Israel, were under the authority of a corrupt priesthood and Yahweh had given Samuel the message that He was going to end the lives of Eli and his two rebellious sons, Hofni and Pinchas at some point in time. Samuel had received the word and warning concerning the priests when he was just a boy serving Eli in the Temple, but time had passed, and the priestly corruption continued and in fact had gotten worse.
It came to pass that the Children of Israel went out to fight their enemy the Philistines. The battle was fierce, and Israel was delivered a defeat losing about 4000 men on the battlefield. The leaders asked why Adonai had defeated them when they had prevailed in battles in the past.
Without a Godly leader like Joshua to seek the Lord for His guidance, the lesser leaders reasoned that it was the absence of the Ark of the Covenant on the battlefield, rather than their disregard for God's Holiness that resulted in their defeat. Right away they sent for the Priests to bring the Ark of the Covenant into their camp but still did not inquire of the Lord. Past experience should have told them, sin in the camp would ultimately cause Adonai to withdraw from His people, and that the Presence of the Ark did not guarantee the Presence of God in their war.
Once again Israel went out to fight the Philistines and once again, they were defeated but this time their losses amounted to a slaughter where 30,000-foot soldiers fell and the 2 priests, Hofni and Pinchas were among the casualties in fulfillment of Samuel's Divine prophecy. In addition to that devastating defeat, the Ark of the Covenant and symbol of Yahweh's Presence was captured and taken to the temple of the Philistine's god, Dagon. As a spoil of war and tribute to their god for the victory over the Israelites, The Ark of the Covenant was placed before the statue of Dagon, but the next morning, the statue was found face down before the Ark of the Covenant. They set the idol image upright but the next day, they found their idol again face down before Adonai's Ark, but with both arms and its head severed.
They connected the dots realizing it was more than a natural occurrence and remove the Ark from the temple sending it to another place in the city to avoid the humiliation of needing to return it to the Israelites. There the people were struck with tumors and a plague of rats infested their land. The Ark of the Covenant had become like a "trojan horse" in the land of the Philistines bringing the revelation of Yahweh's power and disaster directedly to the enemy of His people.
Wherever they moved the Ark, the Philistine people suffered. It was decided to return the Ark of the Covenant back to the Israelites, in an effort to stop the plagues. While they had defeated Israel's army, they could not defeat their God. A great reverence for Yahweh came over the Philistines and the Ark of the Covenant was returned with gold gifts as a guilt offering to Israel's God.
The point of this lesson for me, and application to our life and times is a reminder that even if we, God's people, are in need of discipline and correction, Adonai's power over His/our enemies is not diminished. His will and plan to deal with His/our enemies will continue with or without us, beyond what we may see during the moments of our chastisements.
When we face a defeat let's not assume God is angry or absent or inactive in our circumstances rather that He will bring victory over His/our enemies His way. We should seek His face to understand the reason behind any defeat we experience, and the cause for the discipline by Adonai that the defeat might signal. Repentance restores the broken relationship and enables us to co-labor in Godly victory again.
Taking proper action after the return of the Ark of the Covenant, Samuel offered up the guilt offering as commanded in the Torah. God then gave Israel a stellar victory over the Philistines, who provoked a war not realizing Yahweh was once again with His people. I see many situations in our church and nation where this principal can be applied. We, like Israel, have in many ways dishonored Adonai's Holiness, and are suffering a time-out defeat. Taking corrective action can place us back in the place of victory if we will but repent.
The Holy Spirit is calling. Can you hear Him?
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