I Chronicles 11-12

These two chapters stirs up the warrior nature in my heart as a bold and courageous man of God. All of Israel including the elders come together and anoint David as the king of Israel, promptly David marches to the Jebusite occupied city of Jerusalem, that is Jebus, that is the fortress of Zion - which is the City of David. Because God's hand of authority and favor was resting on David and he was obedient to the leading of the Spirit David grew in increasing greatness. 

I Chronicles 11:9 (NIV) "And David became more and more powerful, because the LORD Almighty was with him."

David assembled his mighty warrior men and named chiefs to support his kingship all throughout the land and the LORD brought about great victory and exploits through these faithful men. Most interestingly I find throughout scripture the men on whom the Spirit fills are used in miraculous and superhuman ways because of the supernatural enabling of the Holy Spirit including prophecy, we see this with the roar of agreement from Amasai from his unifying utterance in I Chronicles 12:18. What is most unique about David's kingship is that the allegiance and commitment from all the men of Israel compounded exponentially day after day such that the writer of Chronicles notes that David's Israeli army was like the army of God. The KJV translation uses the metaphor host of God the LSB uses camp of God, the original Hebrew, according to the translator notes from the NET Bible indicate that the men came to help David until [there was] a great camp like the camp of God. Thinking back to the book of Judges, Gideon's initial army of 32,000 pales in comparison even to the men east of the Jordan river who came to David - the tribes of Reuben, Gad and Manasseh: 120,000; Imagine the war cry from this entire assembled army, this has to be one of the largest armies ever assembled in the ancient world to this point. Aside from the many mighty warriors and 340,822 from all over Israel, it's not the quantity or fierceness of the men that is impressive, for apart from God these men would not be great, courageous or remembered, for it is the Spirit of God and submission to His authority that declares the glory and majesty of the LORD God Almighty. 

Today I am reminded freshly that we fight a spiritual battle each day and weaponize ourselves with the Word of God and prayer, no matter the enemy faced God is greater and the God of angel armies is by our side helping, strengthening and encouraging us each step of the way to operate in faith not in fear of our circumstances. Whom shall I fear? Paul writes to the Romans a word of encouragement to walk each day in victory, winning the day. 

Romans 8:37-39 (NIV) "In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. for I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Deuteronomy 1-2 (Psalm 69)

In these first few chapters of Deuteronomy after Israel's exodus from Egypt and 40 desert years Moses reviews their history of God's hand of power, provision, protection and purpose. Consistently the Israelites are faced with the decision of operating in faith and courage in the way God has for them though they continually with stubborn hearted rebellion walk in fear and discouragement. The theme of presumption continues to resurface in the story of the Israelites and I am greatly convicted of this even in my own life. Deuteronomy 1:42-43 (NKJV) "And the LORD said to me, 'Tell them, "Do not go up nor fight, for I am not among you; lest you be defeated before your enemies."' So I spoke to you; yet you would not listen, but rebelled against the command of the LORD, and presumptuously went up into the mountain." This presumption is referring to when the Israelites invaded the Amorites on a mountain after the 12 spies came back with a bad report from Can...
Read more

Genesis 16-18

 Today's reflection in Genesis 17 and 18 is on how God said he wants Abram to walk faithfully and blameless, similar to Job in his blameless and upright life, I align my life in a way that pleases and honors God by being faithful (consistent, demonstrative of unwavering trust in action). Additionally, I found the comparison of God's will for the destruction of Sodom and Nineveh (in Jonah) to be interesting. In Abraham's case he pled for God to be merciful and spare Sodom, while for the Ninevites God intended to display the liberality of his grace all while Jonah wanted God to destroy the people.  Psalm 86:15 "But you LORD are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness." As an image bearer of God, we must aim to be faithful like God is. The mighty God we serve is unendingly faithful and full of unfailing love - I want to be more loving and faithful the older I get! 
Read more

Exodus 22-24

 Exodus 23:2 (NIV) "Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong." I was watching NHL hockey with my wife the other night and the teams that were playing began getting frustrated and consequently began playing unfairly and fighting. When penalties are given it's not indicative of cheating per se, though you would be hard pressed to find a definition making the distinction between a cheating scandal and a game misconduct or penalty. Often penalties can be properly called by the official referees, though at times it seems the calls are made incorrectly - it's ultimately the best judgment of the ref on the ice at the time and sometimes after the time the rule infraction was witnessed, many times to the great dismay of those in attendance of the hockey game even when the hockey players admit guilt in some instances. Fighting is an entirely different scenario. In just the past 3 years I have noticed a marked increase of violence in the NHL though I'm told that "original...
Read more