Thinking That Horses Can Help
2008-03-31

Psalms for today: 119

I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways.
I will delight in your statutes;
I will not forget your word.--Psalm 119:15-16



Day 128

Isaiah 31:1-3

Doom to those who go off to Egypt thinking that horses can help them,
Impressed by military mathematics, awed by sheer numbers of chariots and riders--
And to the Holy of Israel, not even a glance, not so much as a prayer to God.
Still, he must be reckoned with, a most wise God who knows what he's doing.
He can call down catastrophe. He's a God who does what he says.
He intervenes in the work of those who do wrong, stands up against interfering evildoers.
Egyptians are mortal, not God, and their horses are flesh, not spirit.
When GOD gives the signal, helpers and helped alike will fall in a heap and share the same dirt grave.

If God and God alone provides ultimate security and comfort, why do you think we turn to him for help only as a last resort? If we truly understood God's power and control--his sovereignty--how might that change how we live?

Those are hard questions. I'm not sure I have a suitable answer for the first part, other than it's just human nature. We like to feel like we have some control over our lives. This is why the "semi-Pelagian" or Armenian theology systems are so popular and Calvinism or Augustine's theology is not. We don't like to feel helpless. But if God initiates and causes everything, that puts us in a pretty helpless position. So we only turn to God for help when we have tried everything else that is at our disposal

As for the second part, my life would be so infinitely changed that I can't even imagine what it would be like. I have a great bit of "head knowledge" of God's power and control.



Father, help me see what things I put my trust in. What are my "horses and chariots?" Let me see them, confess them and lay them at your feet. Let me trust only in you.


Watch out for those "chariots and horses" in your lives. Remember that they only tell lies. They are completely futile.

Grace and peace, friends.



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