GOING FOR GOD
Going for God
Chris Hackney / General Adult
Going for God The Fear of the Lord; The call of Gideon; Jesus gives the great commission Judges 6:11–27; Matthew 28:16–20
Our fear often prevents us from accepting our calling from God. Once accepting, we must remove the idols from our lives.
Who is asking you to Go?
If someone makes a request of you, depending on your familiarity with who is making the request may depend on whether or not you take up the task.
For me, placing trust in someone I have not known could be difficult.
When God leads us to do something, He has already envisioned the accomplished task. For me to submit my own path to what God had in store for me was something I did not feel I was qualified to do.
But, once I began to study God’s word and begin to lean more on His understanding instead of my own, I began to see that the call for people to spread His message is not only for myself but for any willing to shed their former selves and respond to His call. (Prov. 3:5-6).
Who earns your trust?
Perhaps you have set out on a journey without fully trusting the directions you were given. How did you test the methods that were being given? Did you consult a map? Did you do any research into the area you were being sent? Did the person giving you instruction have your best intention in mind?
Troubled Times Test Your Trust
Perhaps the world has gotten to a place where it appears that God is not near. Where things in our country appear to have been leading away from God instead of towards him.
People around you may not follow the ways of the Bible. Your family may not attend church, read their bible, or believe in God.
If you are in a place of fear, which all of us at some point would admit we have been, then there is hope. The first placement of where your fear lies often determines where your idols lie as well. What do you fear will be taken away from you?
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 9
10The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,
And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.
Fear Redirected Becomes Awe inspiring Trust
The book of Judges gives us a historical time during the kingdom of Israel before kings were established to rule over the people. There were times of prosperity and times of fear and dread because the people were being overrun by their enemies.
A common thread throughout the book recognizes that each time the people turn away from worshipping God as their only God, their misplaced fear, awe, and respect turns elsewhere leading to times of despair for the country.
God calls up many throughout the book of Judges to restore righteousness to the land.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
11Then the angel of the LORD came and sat under the oak that was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite as his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the wine press in order to save it from the Midianites.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
12The angel of the LORD appeared to him and said to him, “The LORD is with you, O valiant warrior.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
13Then Gideon said to him, “O my lord, if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all His miracles which our fathers told us about, saying, ‘Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the LORD has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
14The LORD looked at him and said, “Go in this your strength and deliver Israel from the hand of Midian. Have I not sent you?”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
15He said to Him, “O Lord, how shall I deliver Israel? Behold, my family is the least in Manasseh, and I am the youngest in my father’s house.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
16But the LORD said to him, “Surely I will be with you, and you shall defeat Midian as one man.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
17So Gideon said to Him, “If now I have found favor in Your sight, then show me a sign that it is You who speak with me.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
18“Please do not depart from here, until I come back to You, and bring out my offering and lay it before You.” And He said, “I will remain until you return.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
19Then Gideon went in and prepared a young goat and unleavened bread from an ephah of flour; he put the meat in a basket and the broth in a pot, and brought them out to him under the oak and presented them.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
20The angel of God said to him, “Take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on this rock, and pour out the broth.” And he did so.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
21Then the angel of the LORD put out the end of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened bread; and fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread. Then the angel of the LORD vanished from his sight.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
22When Gideon saw that he was the angel of the LORD, he said, “Alas, O Lord GOD! For now I have seen the angel of the LORD face to face.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
23The LORD said to him, “Peace to you, do not fear; you shall not die.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
24Then Gideon built an altar there to the LORD and named it The LORD is Peace. To this day it is still in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
25Now on the same night the LORD said to him, “Take your father’s bull and a second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal which belongs to your father, and cut down the Asherah that is beside it;
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
26and build an altar to the LORD your God on the top of this stronghold in an orderly manner, and take a second bull and offer a burnt offering with the wood of the Asherah which you shall cut down.”
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 6
27Then Gideon took ten men of his servants and did as the LORD had spoken to him; and because he was too afraid of his father’s household and the men of the city to do it by day, he did it by night.
We see here that Gideon was hiding in a well threshing his wheat. Living in fear that the Midian raiders were going to come down and steal what he had worked so hard to keep.
Are your fears misplaced because of the idols you have placed before God?
If we were to examine the things that we are in fear of, often we would find the things that we place before God.
It may be our supply of food or where the roof over our heads may come from. It may be the well-being of our families or our wealth that we save up for retirement (Matt. 6:25-34).
We are still called today to stand up firm in our faith (1 Cor. 16:13). If we place our fear in the things which perish, then we become like the Israelites who decided to fear false idols.
Instead of turning to those idols when your family, church, and nation prosper, remember to keep our eyes focused on Jesus.
When we allow the things of the world to become more important than placing our awe in God, then we risk losing the relationship of being so close that when God asks us to do something we knowingly respond in trust.
Not because God has to prove to us as he did Gideon that He is who He is, but because we have maintained our relationship with Him through both the good times and the bad.
God brings His kingdom regardless of our Focus
In the end, let the church maintain its focus on what God desires for His people. If we begin in our own lives by searching for the things which blur the image of God in our lives because something else is standing in the way, we must ask the Holy Spirit to convict us of that to let us see that error.
When families fix their eyes upon the path that God has set before them, God asks “Have I Not sent you?” just as He did Gideon?
Many people later answer this call. Isaiah recognizes his own sin and after repentance responds that He will go (Isaiah 6:8)