Trusting in the Wrong Thing

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Do we?

Israel was living in some of their darkest days.  It was the time of the judges, and the rule of thumb was that "everyone did what was right in their own eyes."  They had woefully fallen short of the commands of God to go into the Promised Land and dispossess all of the people living there.  So those very people became their enemies, thorns in their sides.

One of their fiercest enemies was the Philistines, who were stronger, bigger, and had implemented iron into their weaponry.  Fierce doesn't begin to describe them.  Unstoppable.  That was what they were.  

When Israel received word that the Philistines were about to draw up battle lines, the elders declared this to the people, "Why has the LORD defeated us today before the Philistines?  Let us take for ourselves from Shiloh the ark of the covenant of the LORD, that it may come among us and deliver us from the power of our enemies."  Yes indeed, the people were doing whatever they wanted.  No corporate prayer, no fasting, no discussion with the priests, no High Priest consulting the Urim and Thummim in his breastplate to determine the will of God.  They were doing what was right in THEIR eyes."

At that point, they were trusting in the ark of the covenant to defeat their enemy and be their protection, not in the God that had delivered them countless times before.  One commentator said that, "They trusted in the Ark of God instead of the God of the Ark."  And the result in trusting in the wrong thing?  The Bible tells us that the Philistines destroyed Israel with a great slaughter--30,000 soldiers to be exact.  But that was the primary victory.  The Philistines also captured and took away the ark of the covenant, God's very real presence with Israel.  (I Samuel 4: 1-11)


Israel trusted in the ark instead of their God to carry them through.  Seems ridiculous until we realize that we do the very same thing.  So often when something comes against us, or when life becomes more difficult than we like, we are just as prone to turn to everything else but God.  We soothe our hurt feelings in so many ways:  food, anger, bitterness, shopping, gossip, dumping our story out over and over and over. We withdraw so we don't have to deal with our life by hiding ourselves in TV, the internet, romance novels, work.  We will do whatever it takes to keep from taking care of it with God.  We trust in everything else out the God who can help us win the battle! 

One of the worst ways is to throw ourselves into our ministry or benevolent works, trusting in them instead of God to overcome our enemy.  This attempt to defeat the enemy in our lives  looks just like the Israelites who trusted in the ark, not God!  And the end result of trusting in these kinds of idols will have the same type of result.  We will eventually be overtake by them.  They will win the battle, not us.

So what would it look like to trust God first?  The Israelites figured it out just a few chapters later.  We would do well to follow their example.  (I Samuel 7: 5-11)   Samuel, their spiritual leader now, called the Israelites together  and they began to trust the Lord together.  This is what they did, and it is what we should do as well.

When faced with an enemy, Israel:

• Prayed, crying out to God, pouring out their hearts before Him, including in that prayer
• Confession of sin
• When they saw the enemy advancing, they cried out AGAIN to be saved from the enemy
• They made a sacrifice to God

What should you sacrifice to God?  Yourself!  It is you that must die.  It is you who must crucify your flesh.  You must surrender to the will and hand of God, and let Him fight your spiritual battles if your intend to win them!  Israel constantly learned the hard way.  How long will you?  Who do you want fighting for you?  You weak and ineffective gods or God Almighty, the Lord of the Heavenly Hosts?