November 9, 2023

I Kings 20: 28 The man of God . . . told the king of Israel, “This is what the Lord says: ‘Because the Arameans think the Lord is a god of the hills and not a god of the valleys, I will deliver this vast army into your hands, and you will know that I am the Lord.’” (NIV)

God isn’t an impersonal force.*

Apparently, pagan gods are not general practitioners. Instead, man-made gods are specialists. When men imagined their own gods, they made them lord of something, not everything. Because the Arameans had the mistaken notion that the Lord of the Israelites specialized in hills and not valleys, they underestimated his power. Such thinking led to 100,000 casualties among the Israelites’ enemies – in one day. Another 27,000 fled to the city of Aphek where a wall collapsed on them. Seems the Lord is the God of cities, also.

Do not make the same mistake as the Arameans. Our God is the God of whatever we need at any given time. Yes, he is the God of the valleys, but he is also God of the mountaintop. He will be with you in trouble or joy. He is the God of details when those start to bog you down. He is the God of the big picture when you are overwhelmed. When you are tempted, afraid, discouraged, under attack – God is Lord of it all.

When the Israelite army was about to face the Arameans, God told the king of Israel that he would deliver the huge army into his hands and “you will know that I am the Lord.”  But they still had to fight the battle. You, too. God doesn’t promise that you won’t have a fight on your hands. But when the enemy has been defeated, you will know what our God is the God of!

I want God to act in direct, impressive, irrefutable ways. God wants to “share power” with the likes of me, accomplishing his work through people, not despite them.*