He Is With You...

Bible Verse of the Day:

"The Lord is the One who will go before you. He will be with you; He will not leave you or forsake you. Do not be afraid or discouraged."  

--- Deuteronomy 31:8

These were the words spoken by Moses as he passed the torch of leadership from himself to his military commander and faithful steward, Joshua. Moses was 120 years old and God had already told him that he was going to die soon, that he would not be allowed to take his people into the Promised Land. That responsibility would fall on young Joshua's shoulders. And what a responsibility it was!

You see, the people of Israel were a stubborn group of people. Hard-headed, ungrateful, disbelieving, easily influenced, weak of faith -- you name it! I mean, they had witnessed with their own eyes the power of God as He parted the sea -- I repeat: parted the sea! -- and only a few days later they were mumbling and grumbling about wanting to go back to their lives as slaves in Egypt. I mean, what a bunch of ungrateful little...Urgghh! I'm sure that by the end of his life Moses was bald because dealing with people like that for forty years would surely have caused me to rip out chunks of my hair by the roots in frustration!

Before they were Moses' problem, now the problem belonged to Joshua. And get this: he had to take them into Canaan, the Promised Land, which was, unfortunately, filled with people already living there, and fight them. Now, he was used to the fighting part. (Remember, he was commander of the military force under Moses.) But before he was following orders, being led by Moses (who was led by God -- don't forget that!). Now, he was the leader. And if something went wrong...Yeah. That kind of responsibility can be kind of scary. At the very least it will give you pause.

But Moses knew that. If anyone knew how daunting this whole leadership thing was, it was Moses. I mean, he fought it all the way. The guy actually sat there and argued with God -- with God! -- when the Lord called him to lead His people. He put up a million excuses to try and get out of it until finally the Lord got pissed and said: That's enough: you are the one I chose and that's final!

Moses knew that Joshua's path wouldn't be easy and so he did something wonderful. He put his gnarled, old hands on young Joshua's shoulders, looked him straight in the eye and told him the most beautiful thing he could have said: Don't be afraid. Don't be discouraged. Because the Lord is the one who will go before you. He'll be with you all the way and unlike these fickle people of ours and soldiers who might decide to turn around and run at the last minute, He will never leave you. He will never forsake you.

Can you imagine hearing something like that? What a pep talk! To be told that the Lord God Almighty, the most powerful and Awesome God, is going to be with you, through thick and thin, no matter how bad or ugly things get, no matter how many thousands are up against you..Talk about humbling.

That's what it's like for us. Sometimes we find ourselves in these situations where it feels like the whole world is against ua. Or it feels like everything that could go bad in your life has. Or sometimes we find ourselves facing a new chapter in our lives which scares us to death -- a new marriage, a new job, a new child, the death of someone we love...We look through that window and think the same things Joshua probably did. How am I going to do this? I can't! It's too much. It's too hard. I'm too weak. I have no clue. I'm afraid. I can't do this anymore. I don't want to. Everybody hates me. Nobody loves me. I'm not smart enough. I'm going to fail. I'm just a loser anyway. Uhh....any of that sound familiar?

If you find yourself in a situation that's scary, that's daunting, that's overwhelming, if you find yourself facing relationships that are too much for you sometimes or facing a life crisis that makes you want to throw in the towel and simply give up -- don't! Remember the words of Moses: The Lord is with you. He will never leave you or forsake you! Even when everyone else does, He doesn't.

But notice that Moses told Joshua that the Lord would "go before you." That means it was the Lord who was doing the leading, not Joshua. Joshua's job was to follow Him. Follow. Not lead. In other words, recognize that you are NOT the one in charge: He is. If you want to get through this, you need to set your own self to the side -- your desire to control everything, to be in charge of everything (and everyone), you're "I can do anything and don't need nobody's help attitude" aside. (In fact, I would probalby throw that last one in the trash.) You have to leave things under His control because you know what? Whether we want to admit it or not, it's all under His control anyway!

Follow Him. Don't try to go your own way because news flash: you're own walk is only going to get you in trouble. Walk into a forest with no guide and no compass and -- unless you're an Army Ranger or Special Forces --  most likely you'll get lost. That's what life is like. We try to do things our way, to lead ourselves, and somewhere along the way, we get lost.

But God is always nearby. He's a patient guy. He's just waiting for you to realize that you're lost and that you need His help. You just need to wake up and open your eyes. You need to look up and realize that He's there, waiting for you, waiting to lead you. All you need to do is Follow. Once you decide to do that that second part of Moses' promise is yours, the part where he says that the Lord will not leave you nor forsake you. That challenge that you were drowning in, that part of your life that was spinning out of your control, well...it's not so daunting or so scary now because guess what? Now you have Jesus there by your side.

Joshua took Moses' words to heart. He went on to cross over the Jordan River with his people and conquered his first city in the Promised Land, Jericho. (That's a story for another day!) But he couldn't have done it if he hadn't chosen to accept the words of Moses as truth: that the Lord was the one leading him and that because of that, the Lord would never leave him. But he had to Follow first.

Will you?