Author: admin

There will be times in your life that, if you did not know you were doing what God had asked you to, you would expect to experience certain failure. What God told Gideon to do was lethal. He would most certainly be killed. His own people would more than likely mock him or even kill him themselves. It was impossible. Gideon’s nation had been in abject bondage for seven years. Nothing had changed. The Midianites were just as powerful and fierce as they had always been. The Israelites were just as weak. The only difference was the call of God.

God did not promise He would provide Gideon’s men with the latest weaponry. He did not assure his fearful protege that he would have the best army or military tools. All God promised was that He would be with Gideon. The divine presence was worth far more than a division of chariots (or tanks).

This is why we must know when God has called us to a task. It may well be the only thing that sustains us when times become difficult. Do you know that what you are doing is something God called you to? Can you sense God’s presence with you as you do it?

We can be too quick to discount the presence of miracles in our life.

We read about God’s mighty power exercised in the lives of people who lived in biblical times. We study how God performed miracles throughout church history. Yet when it comes to our lives, we assume our time is different. Perhaps God doesn’t do that any more. Maybe we are so ordinary that we do not qualify for a miracle. When we do not expect a miracle, we do not experience one.

Gideon took the opportunity to ask God why He was no longer performing miracles on behalf of His people. The young farmer assumed the problem must lie with God. He would soon learn it did not. The problem with asking God a question is that you must be prepared for His answer. Because God is not working powerfully in your life, it does not mean that He cannot. It usually indicates that you are not in a place in your life where God is pleased to do a mighty work. It always takes longer for God to prepare His people for a mighty work than it takes for God to actually work a miracle.

We might well ask the same question Gideon asked so many centuries ago: God, why are you not working powerfully through my life?

Our focus is generally on our problems. It ought to be on God. As long as Gideon remained in a hole, dwelling on his enemies, his life would continue to experience defeat. Once God took control of the conversation, Gideon began to grasp the enormous possibilities for his life.

For Gideon, the key truth was that the Midianites were in the land. For the angel, the important truth was that God was with Gideon. Gideon was depressed. The angel was optimistic. When Gideon looked at himself, he saw a loser. When God looked at him, He saw a mighty warrior. Much of our success hinges on our perspective.

Have you ever considered the difference between what God sees in your life and what you see? Seek to elevate your view of yourself to God’s level! God is never content to view what you are today. He invariably looks at what you could become, with His help.

Never allow your past to define you. Let God’s call on your life, determine your identity.

When we find ourselves under the discipline of God, we know that in due time, a word from the Lord will be forthcoming. God is thorough in His refining, but He will ultimately reveal a means of deliverance.

In God’s divine timing, He sent an angel to an ordinary, working man, named Gideon. Gideon was a farmer, a minor figure in his home. He was so fearful of the enemy that he was attempting to sift wheat in a wine press. This task was normally only effectively accomplished on a hilltop where the wind could blow the chaff away from the wheat. Nevertheless, he was attempting to sift wheat while in a crevice in the ground where there was no wind. It was a futile effort by a fearful man.

We can find ourselves in such Gideon-like moments in our life. We are in a hole rather than on a mountaintop. Our enemies and problems seem insurmountable. And worse, we feel inadequate. If it were not for God, we might well be. Aren’t you glad that we are always just one fresh word from God from a radically altered life!

Once God reminded His people of their relationship with Him, He zeroed in on the crucial problem. God did not accuse them of a lack of doctrinal belief. Nor did He accuse them of not worshiping Him. God’s condemnation was that they had not obeyed Him. That is always the crux of the matter.

When we find ourselves out of fellowship with God and suffering the consequences of our sin, God will ultimately take us back to a moment where we failed to obey His commands. There is always a point in our life where we chose to do things our way instead of God’s. God will not allow us to sidestep our disobedience. There is no statute of limitations on our obedience. Seven years later or fifty years later, God will return us to the point of our disobedience.

God always personalizes our rebellion. God did not claim the Israelites disobeyed a command. He charged that they had not obeyed His voice. It was not a rule they were to follow. It was God. We cannot pick and choose what we will obey from God and expect to experience divine blessing on our lives.

Take an inventory of your obedience to God. Is there anything He has told you to do that you have failed to obey? Are you delaying your obedience? Are you excusing your disobedience? While you may have been fixated on what it will cost you to obey God’s word, consider what it is costing you not to obey.

Our sin always has a context. We do not sin in a vacuum. When the Israelites cried out for God to deliver them from their oppression, God began by reminding them of their love relationship with Him. God had found them when they were slaves. He had freed them and led them to a land flowing with milk and honey. God had protected them and provided for all their needs. As long as they had faithfully obeyed God, they had prospered. It was not God who had forsaken His commitment to the people. It was the people who had shamefully turned their backs on the One who had done so much for them.

Sin is never merely breaking a commandment. It is rejecting Someone who loves you and has done much for you. Sin is always personal. When God began to talk with His people about their sin, He began by going back to their relationship with Him. Sin had robbed them of the intimacy they had once enjoyed. Sin had brought separation, as it always does.

At times our primary concern can be for God to alleviate the consequences of our sin. But God is focused on our relationship with Him. He will not be satisfied until it is restored to what it once was. Do you remember what your walk with God was like before you sinned? That is what God wants to restore to you once more.

Prophets usually do not enter the scene until peoples’ situation has become intolerable. The Israelites suffered seven years of divine silence. For seven years heaven stoically said nothing as the people suffered because of their sin. For seven years the people attempted everything they knew to avoid the consequences of their disloyalty. But ultimately the people had suffered enough. They finally cried out to God.

At last God sent a response. He commissioned a prophet to be His spokesman. Prophets were troublesome to many people in the Bible because they told the devastating truth. They did not compose their message. They simply delivered it. If you did not want to know what God thought, you were best to avoid prophets.

When a prophet appeared on the scene you knew you were facing a moment of decision. A prophet’s message always required a response. You could not remain neutral. The prophet delivered God’s terms. If you heeded his message, God would deliver you. If you rejected his word, your suffering might grow worse.

For many people who are struggling today, their issue is not that they do not know what they should do. Rather, it is that they do not want to hear God’s answer to their problem. We want God to implement our answer to our problems. We don’t necessarily want to hear God’s prognosis.

God has a word for you as well. Do you want to hear it?

God will continue to discipline our lives until we finally cry out to Him for deliverance. It is tragic that so many people have a high pain threshold. They continue to suffer year after year from their sin but they refuse to turn from their evil ways.

The Israelites suffered intensely for seven years before they finally cried out in desperation to God. Yet there are people who endure their bondage for far longer because they will not humble themselves and return to God.

There was no point in sending a deliverer until the people acknowledged their need of one. As long as the people assumed they could somehow handle or endure their problems, God did not send a savior. A deliverer is pointless for the one who assumes he has no need of one. Likewise, God does not rescue those who refuse to change they way they are living. The reason God saves you is so you can live in freedom.

There are many places you can call to for help. You can call on your banker, friends, counselors, and accountants. But God waits for you to cry out to Him. It is not enough to cry out. You must cry out to Him. When you finally acknowledge that only God can free you from the predicament you are in, then He is prepared to respond. Are you ready to cry out to God for your need?

It is easy to open the door to allow sin into your life. It is not as simple to remove the intrusive guest and close the door once more. The Israelites had traversed down the road of apostasy to their God. They had rejected God’s standards and given their love to other gods. The result was that they became vulnerable to their enemies. By the time they realized this; it was too late. The Midianites and their allies were now encamped across the land as numerous as locusts.

Many a person has mistakenly assumed that they could be careless with their walk with God and yet “handle” the consequences. By the time the tide of sin had swelled up to their chin, the people realized they have bitten off more than they could chew.

There is no remedy for sin and its consequences apart from God’s provision. Only He can address every consequence and free us from the bondage in which we find ourselves. What may have begun as a careless sin in one area of our life soon spreads to every corner of our existence. Before long, the enemies of our soul have invited friends and our life is captivated by the marauding hordes that rob our life of everything that is good.

If you see the floodgates of sin overrunning in your life, don’t fool yourself into assuming there is still a way for you to escape. Matters will only grow worse over time if you do not cry out to the Lord.

Sin is a liar. It promises us riches but it leaves us destitute. It entices us with pleasures but ultimately makes us miserable.

The Israelites had been lured away from God by the idol Baal. Baal was a pagan god who promised abundant harvests and lavish wealth. The Israelites were assured they would become rich, if only they compromised themselves with Baal’s standards. So they did.

Yet rather than immense wealth, pillagers came and removed every possession they had painstakingly accumulated. Because they had forsaken God for riches, God refused to let them retain their possessions. It was a cruel irony. Because the Israelites cherished what the world valued, the world lusted after their possessions and ultimately stole them.

The world covets material possessions. It cares nothing for the eternal. When we value what the world does, we will always run the risk of losing what we have. When we treasure what God prizes, no one can remove it from us.

For some Christians, their life is dominated by their efforts to hold on to what they have. They live in constant fear of losing what they have collected. And, their fears are well grounded. For when we collect worldly trinkets, we become a target for worldly treasure seekers.

Examine your life. Are you spending more energy protecting your treasures than you are investing in God’s kingdom?