1-2-3 Go!

Judges 19:20
A man and his concubine were traveling back home to Israel and stopped in a city for the night. This city was a Benjamite city and they thought they were safe. While there, this man gave his concubine to some worthless men to appease them from attacking him. The mob raped and abused her so much she died. The man told the Israelites what happened and they tried to get the Benjamites to bring the men who did this to justice. The Benjamites refused so the Israelites inquired of the Lord if they should fight against them---and God said yes. God instructed Judah to be the first tribe to fight. Interesting choice since Judah means praise……

So the battle ensued and even though God said yes they were to fight, the Israelites were defeated that first day at their first battle. Then the Israelites went to fight a second time once again asking God if they should go. God said yes—go! And they lost again!! Then all the Israelites---the entire army---went to the house of God, wept, prayed and fasted all day long till evening. There they offered burnt offerings, and peace offerings before God.
Once again, they inquire of God about going forth to fight, and God said go and fight---again! And this time God said He would deliver their enemy into their hands.
So they went forth to fight, but (v34) the battle was very hard.

This story proves God can lead us right into the jaws of defeat! Defeated they were, indeed, but since we know the end of the story we know not defeated in their quest to triumph over the Benjamites in the end. God’s people inquired of Him—should we fight Lord? In essence they were asking---will You be with us so we can prevail over our foes? God told them to go and fight and the people thought –if God is for us who can be against us?
But the reality was that they lost and their enemy had the victory. How often do we run up against a wall thinking God was with us, that He was going to deliver us, and because it didn’t happen the first or even second time, we then quit? These people were sure they heard God. They actually DID hear God. God told them to go fight. God allowed them to be defeated. When Paul said in Corinthians—thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph—it was never intended to mean without a fight. It wasn’t about instant gratification. The triumph came, but God did not allow it to come easily. We get this notion in the millennium Christianity we are exposed to that if God says to us ‘go and fight’, our victory will be quick. We think that God will do all the work and all He requires of us is to just stand back and watch because “the battle is the Lord’s”. The battle is His. His to decide when and where the victory comes. But we are to do the fighting. We are His army. And make no mistake; you can have victory in your heart without the outward manifestation of it. It is delineated by a relationship built on trust. The Israelites knew about this. Why else would they continue fighting after all the loss? Because they believed in Him, not in their expectations of what they thought He should do. They trusted God with the final outcome.

After expectations of God coming to the rescue did not appear, what did the Israelites do? They wept before the Lord. And after the second defeat---huge losses of life might I add---they went to the house of God and lay before the Lord all day, fasting all day, offering sacrifices for their sin all day, offering peace offerings, all day. Then God says, go and this time you will have breakthrough. After the fasting. After the prayer. After the offerings of self. After the repentance of sin.

We think just saying the words the right way---just reminding God of what He said will give us the quick, instant “victory in a box” our microwave society is used to. No----it must cost us dearly. Battles will be lost, casualties will be high, faith will be assaulted and self doubting will begin. We may say to ourselves, ‘was that really God? It sure doesn’t look like everyone says it should if it really was Him. People are dead and two times in a row we lose the fight and now those watching us are laughing at us.’

So what is God saying to us where we are right now?
First of all we need to ask Him what we should be doing, to inquire of Him and His ways for us, and to only fight the battles He has chosen for us, in order to prevent needless casualties.
Then we need to praise Him. It was no accident Judah was the first tribe that God Himself chose to go forth into the battle. We do not realize the power of our praise! Not the praise that says ‘I praise you Lord for defeating this enemy’, like our carefully placed words are going to win this fight, no, rather it is the praise from our hearts that will say---“Who is like our God? He is mighty to save! There is nothing to hard for Him!”
Then we must believe and trust that no matter how it looks, ultimately victory is ours if we do not grow weary in well doing, as we are instructed in Galatians 6:9. In fact, Paul tells us that if we succeed in fighting without growing weary then we will reap a great harvest!
If the battle is not being won, then we need to take spiritual inventory. We get into His presence and weep, and fast and pray and repent, and give ourselves as peace offerings to Him, so He can cleanse us, strengthen us, and make us ready for breakthrough. . If we keep fighting battles that are consistently lost, we need to determine whose battles they are. When the Israelites inquired of God it was through a man. God still uses men to divulge His purposes and intent. Do not be afraid to ask the spiritual opinion of a Godly acquaintance.

Finally, we must put forth the effort that goes into the fight! They said the battle was hard. It IS hard! It can be quite difficult to fight against our wrong attitudes and actions, to fight through discouragement and fear. We must equip ourselves with the heavenly armor He’s provided us. It can be hard to hold up our shield and wield our Sword of the Spirit. You cannot hold a shield you do not have, and a dull sword will not cut through as it should. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word. We must spend time, daily in the Word so our shield will be strong, and our sword sharp and ready to defend.
Even when God said, ‘okay guys, go up one more time and this time you’ll have your breakthrough.’ The Word tells us the battle was hard. We seem to expect things to be easy if they are God. This is not always so.
Let us grow up in the faith, let us take courage and strengthen ourselves, and find God through prayer and fasting, to enable us to run the race He has chosen for us.
In the end, disaster came upon the Benjamites. Almost the entire tribe was wiped out, and all because they would not allow the sin in their camp to be dealt with.
Let us glean a lesson from these, and when confronted with sin in our lives, run to the altar, repent, inquire of God what He would have us do, offer ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God, for all this loss could have been avoided if the sin had been acknowledged and dealt with. And always remember that fighting the good fight of faith wins the day!