Day 27- Reckless or Reliable?
In 1 Samuel chapter 14, Saul continues
to make rash decisions, but his son, Jonathan, follows
God by taking a doozy of a trusting step. I want to
focus on Jonathan today since he is displaying an
awesome amount of trust and faith in God.
Without telling Saul, Jonathan and his
armorbearer left their camp and snuck over to the
Philistine garrison (gathered body of troops). Now,
this would be dangerous in any case, but the Philistine
army outnumbered Saul’s troops by something
ridiculous like 50 to 1. But Jonathan is certain that
the Lord is leading him there. He even says in verse
6, “For nothing restrains the Lord from
saving by many or by few.”
His armorbearer obviously believes that
Jonathan is being led by the Lord, otherwise he would
probably not be so willing to follow him, “Do
all that is in your heart. Go then; here I am with
you, according to your heart (verse 7).”
I mean, it’s not exactly the normal rough, manly
army talk when someone is just following commands.
You can tell there is much more going on here than
a good sneak attack strategy, because really this
wouldn’t be much of a sneak attack since the
Philistines saw them coming and even told them to
come up.
As a matter of fact, the Philistines
telling Jonathan to come up to them is the sign God
gives so they know He will deliver them. So as Jonathan
walks up to them, they fall before him and his armorbearer
comes up after Jonathan and kills them. This event
strikes fear throughout the Philistine camp and complete
mayhem breaks out. The troops were scattering all
over the place in fear, so as the Israelites see this,
they run in after the Philistines taking advantage
of the confusion and chase them away.
Jonathan didn’t tell his father,
Saul, that he was going to do this because Saul would
have thought it was a reckless plan. But Jonathan
knew he was being led by God and that God would take
care of him. Oh how I wish I could trust God like
Jonathan did on a daily basis! There are times when
I know God is telling me to do something, but it sounds
reckless or crazy, so I back out. Or I’ve gotten
very excited about doing something God has placed
on my heart, but people in my life try to talk me
out of it, so then I start second-guessing God. Why
would I ever second-guess God? When has He ever let
me down? I’ve been through some seriously rough
times in my life, but it was never because God let
me down. He is my comfort, my rock in those times.
The times I actually want to get mad at God and blame
Him for things, when I settled down enough to look
at the situation, I’m usually the one who has
led myself there by taking the steering wheel from
God and trying to drive to my own destination. Driving
from the passenger seat usually leads to a crash.
My biggest challenge right now is to
trust God regardless of what other people are whispering
in my ear and as reckless and crazy as sometimes that
path appears. If I can confirm through prayer, His
word and waiting on Him that this is the path He wants
me on, then I will joyfully walk it. Hey, maybe this
time around, I’ll even skip.
Lord,
Thank You for not letting me skim over this issue
of trust that I’m battling. I know trusting
You is something I’ve been able to do in the
past, but I also know it’s a decision I have
to make daily, sometimes many times a day. I know
I’ve fallen down on my walk so many times, but
You have always been there to pick me back up and
dust me off. You’ve even carried me through
many hard days. Lord, I don’t want to listen
to my own voice or the words of the world. I want
to hear You loud and clear and say, “Yes, Lord!”
I want to be excited to trust You, not scared. Thank
You for giving me the opportunity each day to choose
to trust You. I know each day I trust You it will
get a little easier and a little less scary.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
