Stop Mininimizing the Power of God
While I was watching The Chosen, a show about the life and Ministry of Jesus Christ, a scene was shown with two Jewish men. One believed Jesus was the Messiah and the other was skeptical of the Lord and if He was the true Messiah. The Follower of Christ quoted Matthew 4:17 “The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand”. The Skeptical Jew frowned and asked, how could that be true if Romans still oppressed the Jews and demanded taxes? As a viewer, I laughed and scoffed at the skeptical Jew. I thought “The Lord had a bigger plan than to ride into cities on a white horse and slay Romans. He preached the Gospel so people, both Jews, and Gentiles, would be free from spiritual bondage.” The Holy Spirit began to minister to me. “Is that not what you do? Do you not construct in your mind how the Lord will move?” This question stumped me because the Holy Spirit wasn’t asking or saying if the Lord would move, He was trying to get me to see that no man knows how the Lord will move or by what means He will do something. The Jews knew that they were awaiting a Messiah. This was told to them by countless Prophets, Isaiah 7:14, Micah 5:2, and Jeremiah 23:5-6. But yet, the nation of Israel believed their Messiah would arrive dressed in military garments ready to wage a physical war against Rome. That couldn’t be farther from the truth. The Jew’s depiction of their Messiah is met with a lot of imagination, but I wonder how many times we have done the same thing? How many times have we crafted how we believe God will resolve something or bless us? Only to find out He did a completely different thing.
My Story:
In late January of this year, one of my friends told me that her church began this New Year's Challenge. The Challenge was to “ask God 3 things you can do for Him” and the second part of the challenge was to write down “3 things you want God to do for you”. Well, I took her up on the challenge. I made my list of three things for each section, one of my items was to have my education costs covered for the graduate school I was applying to. Looking back, I now chuckle. It was not in my Father’s plan for me to attend that school, rather He was moving me elsewhere. Initially, I thought that’s where He wanted me, but my Father said He was doing a new thing (Isaiah 43:19). A couple of weeks back there was a devotional published Let God Be God, this message spoke about something similar. We, the Lord’s creation, tend to want to put Him in a box. We so badly want to conceptualize how God will move or the process in which He does things. But Beloved what I’ve learned is:
No man knows the way God will make things happen, He calls us to have faith and to know that it will happen.
“Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?” Exodus 15:11
“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.” Romans 15:13
The second thing I learned is that trying to construct the way in which God will move is not Faith. It's merely a formula and flesh. God can do things greater than what we could possibly imagine, but you must believe He is who He says that He is.
8“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. 9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.10 As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. 12 You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands. 13 Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow. This will be for the Lord’s renown, for an everlasting sign, that will endure forever.” (Isaiah 55:8-13)
I have a friend who is a math major. Kudos to her, oof that is not my ministry, the Lord did not bless me with that math anointing. However, she is one to know math formulas like the back of her hand. Being that she is a Woman of God, she has to divide what is flesh from what is faith. Her knowledge of formulas is God-given, but her Faith in the Lord is not determined by her ability to comprehend a formula. Faith is contrary to this world. Faith contradicts formulas, being that it requires us to submit not only our flesh but also our thinking unto the Lord.
We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
The third thing I learned is that, when you don’t let God be God, you ultimately twist His will to fit your own agenda. Beloved whether this is intentional or not, it is still one thing, rebellion or in other words witchcraft. You may ask, how so? Simply, when something is not the Will of God, it's the adversary. It is Satan’s will to stop or try to halt the will or move of God. In the verses below, we will read about King Saul and what happened to him when he rejected the will of God and disobeyed God.
The Lord Rejects Saul as King (1 Samuel 15)
15 Samuel said to Saul, “I am the one the Lord sent to anoint you king over his people Israel; so listen now to the message from the Lord. 2 This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. 3 Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy[a] all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”
4 So Saul summoned the men and mustered them at Telaim—two hundred thousand foot soldiers and ten thousand from Judah. 5 Saul went to the city of Amalek and set an ambush in the ravine. 6 Then he said to the Kenites, “Go away, leave the Amalekites so that I do not destroy you along with them; for you showed kindness to all the Israelites when they came up out of Egypt.” So the Kenites moved away from the Amalekites.
7 Then Saul attacked the Amalekites all the way from Havilah to Shur, near the eastern border of Egypt. 8 He took Agag king of the Amalekites alive, and all the people he totally destroyed with the sword. 9 But Saul and the army spared Agag and the best of the sheep and cattle, the fat calves[b] and lambs—everything that was good. They were unwilling to destroy completely, but everything that was despised and weak they totally destroyed.
10 Then the word of the Lord came to Samuel: 11 “I regret that I have made Saul king because he has turned away from me and has not carried out my instructions.” Samuel was angry, and he cried out to the Lord all that night.
12 Early in the morning Samuel got up and went to meet Saul, but he was told, “Saul has gone to Carmel. There he has set up a monument in his own honor and has turned and gone on down to Gilgal.”
13 When Samuel reached him, Saul said, “The Lord bless you! I have carried out the Lord’s instructions.”
14 But Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?”
15 Saul answered, “The soldiers brought them from the Amalekites; they spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the Lord your God, but we totally destroyed the rest.”
16 “Enough!” Samuel said to Saul. “Let me tell you what the Lord said to me last night.”
“Tell me,” Saul replied.
17 Samuel said, “Although you were once small in your own eyes, did you not become the head of the tribes of Israel? The Lord anointed you, king, over Israel. 18 And he sent you on a mission, saying, ‘Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; wage war against them until you have wiped them out.’ 19 Why did you not obey the Lord? Why did you pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the Lord?”
20 “But I did obey the Lord,” Saul said. “I went on the mission the Lord assigned me. I completely destroyed the Amalekites and brought back Agag their king. 21 The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the Lord your God at Gilgal.”
22 But Samuel replied:
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as much as in obeying the Lord?
To obey is better than sacrifice,
and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
23 For rebellion is like the sin of divination [Witchcraft],
and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,
he has rejected you as king.”
24 Then Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned. I violated the Lord’s command and your instructions. I was afraid of the men and so I gave in to them. 25 Now I beg you, forgive my sin and come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord.”
26 But Samuel said to him, “I will not go back with you. You have rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord has rejected you as king over Israel!”
27 As Samuel turned to leave, Saul caught hold of the hem of his robe, and it tore. 28 Samuel said to him, “The Lord has torn the kingdom of Israel from you today and has given it to one of your neighbors—to one better than you. 29 He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind.”
30 Saul replied, “I have sinned. But please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel; come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord your God.” 31 So Samuel went back with Saul, and Saul worshiped the Lord.
32 Then Samuel said, “Bring me Agag king of the Amalekites.”
Agag came to him in chains.[c] And he thought, “Surely the bitterness of death is past.”
33 But Samuel said, “As your sword has made women childless,
so will your mother be childless among women.”
And Samuel put Agag to death before the Lord at Gilgal. 34 Then Samuel left for Ramah, but Saul went up to his home in Gibeah of Saul. 35 Until the day Samuel died, he did not go to see Saul again, though Samuel mourned for him. And the Lord regretted that he had made Saul king over Israel.
First, Samuel 15 depicts King Saul falling out of the Lord’s will simply through disobedience and rebellion. King Saul was ordered by the Lord to kill the Amalekite nation completely. Prophet Samuel was given orders from the Lord to pass to King Saul. The orders contained that Saul and his men go to the Amalekites and kill the women, men, children, infants, and even livestock. But Saul didn’t do it, instead, he and his men lusted after the fattened life stock and spared the Amaleite king, Agag. Because Saul tried to twist the Lord’s command, the Lord took the Nation of Israel from Saul that day. And Saul made enmity between him and the Lord. With an emphasis on verses 22 and 23, the Lord does not take kindly when His creation tries to undermine or rewrite His good and perfect will. Although Saul was King of Israel, rebellion no matter who commits the act is still wrong. Let us not force our own agenda on the Lord, because as we can see, it will not prosper. Frankly, you will face more opposition going against the Lord than going against the Kingdom of Darkness. Case and point, look at Saul’s downfall. The Lord sat Saul down and then anointed David as king (1 Samuel 16).
I have learned from my own walk with the Lord that trying to construct how the Lord will move or trying to force our will is not faith but flesh. Our Father calls us to not walk by flesh but to walk in faith and in the spirit. The Lord is just, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). Beloved if you have done any of these things I ask that you say this prayer with me.
Prayer: Heavenly Father, I come to you today and ask that you forgive me for the sins that I have committed. Father God, I repent of my sins of rebellion and acting out in flesh. Lord, I ask that your Holy Spirit come and cleanse me. Lead me Lord to walk more righteously with You. In Jesus' Name, I pray, Amen.
Go in peace Beloved, and sin no more.