Who is God?

I am reading now into 1 Samuel.  I noticed something new this morning. (Isn't it amazing how you can read the Bible a hundred times and still find something new each time?)  Saul had just been annointed King of Israel.  He was immediately in heavy conflict with the Philistines and had to do battle against them several times.  This was the reason that the Israelites wanted a king in the first place; they were tired of being kicked around by their neighbors (which wouldn't have happened if they had trusted God and defeated all of their enemies immediately, as God had told them to do).  Anyway, Saul seemed to show this pattern of asking God, through the prophet Samuel, what he was supposed to do, then going off and doing it, but only partly.  He would go into the battle and fight and win, but when it came to following God's instructions, ie: destroying everything and not taking any person or property for himself, or performing a sacrifice in a certain way, or even waiting for Samuel to arrive at a certain time or place, Saul would do his own thing, and then try to justify himself after the fact.  Hmmm...this pattern reminds me of someone....

What I noticed, though, was that each time Saul met with Samuel, he would talk about "the LORD your God" rather than "the LORD my God."  I think this was the root of the problem.  Saul saw God as someone "out there" helping him, guiding him, but not really being a part of him.  The Bible says that the spirit of the Lord came upon Saul when he was annointed, but somehow Saul never really accepted God as part of himself.  He didn't see any connection.  It wasn't a personal relationship; God was just an advisor. 

So sad that this happens all too frequently to us as well.  Our concept of God really determines how we respond to him.  Do we follow him wholeheartedly, even when we are asked to do something that is not what we would like to do?  God instructed Saul to destroy his enemies and not take anything for himself.  He brought back the best of the livestock, supposedly for a sacrifice that God did not ask him to make.  Do we sometimes go against God's clear direction, telling ourselves that doing it our way will actually be more pleasing to him?   For example, one might say,  "Maybe I don't have time to spend with God in prayer or Bible study, but I am making a lot of money, so I can pay more to the church."  Would that really be acceptable?  If God is truly God in our lives, if he lives within us, if he is "my God" rather that just God, wouldn't that make all the difference?

The Land at Peace

Well, I am now finished with Joshua and reading into Judges.  I found it interesting that at the conclusion of every passage concluding the conquest of the Israelites over a particular king or tribe, the "Land found rest from war" for x number of years.  I realize that the point of this section of scripture is that whenever the Israelites would follow God, they would be victorious, but when they would reject God and start worshipping the idols of the surrounding cultures, they would lose ground and become enslaved by their neighbors or at least tormented by them.  God was trying to teach his "children" the way we teach ours, with privileges and punishements.

What got my attention, however, is that it is kind of the same thing in my life.  When I am in crisis, I cry out to the Lord for deliverance.  When he helps me, I find "rest from war" for a while.  Then, it seems, I get more lax in my prayer and devotion time and begin to think that somehow I am in charge of my own life and that I have it all together.  On my own.  No need for Him.  Then, the cycle starts all over.

I don't fall into idol worshipping, like the Israelites do, but I might as well.  I fall into the trap of self-sufficiency.  I become my own idol in a way.

I am so grateful for God's word, with the examples of his patient endurance while we mortals struggle to stay on the path he so graciously lays out before us.