When my children were young, the Lord had clearly called me home to train my children up according to His ways and His purposes. To heed that calling meant to walk away from my career that I had prepared for through four and a half years of an academic boot camp of nursing school. Nonetheless, I wanted to obey my Heavenly Father. Following Him was more important than financial gain.
At times, as you can imagine with 4 children under the age of 5 ... then 8 children under the age of 10, things financially would get tight for our home. In my squirming under the pressure, my knee jerk reaction was to throw my hands up and say, "I can fix this. I have an education and can double our income. I know the way out of this." Seldom did Jesus let that thought stir in my head very long.
By the time I was glancing at job posting number two, the Lord would begin to press in. "Really Mika, is that how you want this to be go? You want to provide for yourself ?"
"Ugh. No. Lord", I would cry out in blend of repentance and brokenness and frustration. There was this very real tearing of my flesh crying out for relief and my spirit longing to obey... My eyes had settled on my circumstances and not on my Helper - the Maker of Heaven and Earth, who faithfully provides every time right on time and in such a way that He gets all the glory and others get to see Him- not me. Oh, that my life would consistently point others to Him- the Author and Perfecter of my faith, the One who is victorious and always overcomes- that they too might find the Hope in Jesus that has found me and set me free from my sin, my insecurities, and my fear.
In my early years of motherhood, I had trusted the Lord to bring me into motherhood, into the call, surrendering my womb to Him, but daily I had to choose to trust Him to bring me through it. As I read through Judges 1, I remembered those days... Here we see the Israelites trust the Lord to bring them to the battle, but they don't trust Him to bring them through the battle in His ways. In verse 1, we see it recounted of how Judah seeks the Lord and He sends them into battle. They received their call, their instruction to go forth with a promise that the Lord had already given the land into their hands.
Because they don't trust the Lord to bring them through the battle, we see compromise through incomplete obedience. Because of their complacency, generations to come are greatly impacted. Their "slight" sin that in the moment could have been excused and maybe even approved of or agreed with by their peers became snares for their children and their children's children. They set up generations after them to further reject the Lord in disobedience and in grander ways. They would begin to intermarry with their enemy and worship false gods.
As I look through Judges 1, there were 3 main excuses that stood out to me as to why they did not press through all the way in obedience starting in verse 19. First, we see that the Lord is with the men of Judah. When He is with us, we are victorious. His promises will endure. He will fight the battle and bring forth the victory. We do not go out in our own strength. Because the Lord is with them, they are fully capable to do the thing He has called them to do. 1 Thessalonians 5:24 says, " He who calls you is faithful, He will do it. " Yet, it is says they were unable to drive the people from the plains because their chariots were fitted with iron. It reads as a complete contradiction. The God of Heaven and Earth is with them and yet they are unable. Why? They set their sights on the strength and ability of their enemy. Judah set their assurance upon the ability and faithfulness of their enemy to rise up and overcome in the battlefield rather than fixing their eyes on their God and focusing on what they could accomplish in the strength of the Lord - The One who was and is and is to come and His promises of victory. Focusing on the strength of the enemy births their first compromise. We do the same thing when we set our sights on our circumstance and how big it is and how certain we are that it will have victory over us. Then we cave because our eyes are not set on the Lord the One who our help comes from. Our eyes must be set on Jesus, not on our sin when the stronghold seems to outweigh our ability to break free or an external situation posing as our enemy. It is not us that breaks strongholds and sets free. It's Jesus.
The second compromise we find is they seek direction for the battle from a man that crosses their path. Then, in verses 24- 26 that man builds an entire city because he is spared for his insight. We are to look up for our instruction and wisdom, not out. Yes, God often uses man to communicate through and provide help, but first we must seek the Father and allow man to confirm the Truth that has already be revealed to us from the Lord. We must trust the Lord to direct our steps. When we allow our enemy or our sin to linger because of a horizontal commitment, honoring the horizontal over the vertical commitment to the Lord, we will find ourselves in trouble. The unimpressive singular sin will multiply like weeds in a garden. Soon it will not be one issue but multiple impacting every area of our lives. In the book of James, we read that sin always leads to death. Sin must be annihilated. We are designed to live an abundant, fruitful life not one choked out by the weeds of the enemy. When the Lord says drive out the enemy, annihilate it, there should be no remnant of it. When the Father says something is off limits, we can not entertain it, dance with it, or excuse it. It is for our good that we have nothing to do with the sin that so easily entangles us. (Hebrews 12:1-3)
The third compromise we see occurs from verses 27 - 36 time and time again. We see it happen four to six times. I think that's because it is the compromise that we are most prone to. In these verses the people go forth in their strength. The Bible says at this time they were strong. Ya'll it's when we perceive that "we are strong and able" that we are most vulnerable. In their strength, they enslaved what the Lord said to evict. Scripture clearly states that the Lord lifts up the humble and brings down the prideful. It's in our humility and our weakness that we see our Jehovah Jireh. We must not detest our weaknesses but boast in them as we glorify the Lord. In their strength, when it seems that they can "handle" the presence of their enemy, we see God's people enslave their enemy as oppose to drive them out or annihilate them. First off, it's disobedience to the call and therefore can not be blessed. The work of our hands must be blessable first before it can be blessed. The deeds of our the flesh are a stinch to the nostrils of our Father. Deeds of faith catch His eye as He roams through and fro throughout the earth looking for those of whom He can strongly support. Secondly, we are not to take in and use what we are told to cast out. We too excuse our sinful behavior and convince ourselves that our sin is serving us. It's producing income, relaxation after a long day, needed affirmation, and so on and so on.
Friend, as we see in Judges, the sin or enemy that we compromise with because it is too strong to drive out will become our stronghold, the seemingly insignificant singular sin will indeed multiply, and the sin that we think is serving us will most certainly enslave us in due time.
When the Lord calls us to battle and to each of us He has, as evidence in Ephesians 6:12 when we are told that "our fight is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, and against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places," we must trust Him to see us through it. Our help in the battle comes from the Lord. He is able to provide everything we need that we might not look to the left or the right for our equipping, our strengthing, our comfort or our peace. Look to the Lord. Friend, He knows what you need before you even ask. (Matthew 6:8).
Truths to Remember:
I lift up my eyes to the hills-- where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. Psalm 121:1
So he answered and said to me: “This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: 'Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,' Says the LORD of hosts. Zechariah 4:6
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. Colossians 3:2
Now faith is the assurance that what we hope for will come about and the certainty that what we cannot see exists. Hebrews 11:1
Worship Him!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NAYz0zh_Es , " Look Up Child," Lauren Daigle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skQA9ZYfb60 , "Catch Me," Elyssa Smith
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