Devotional - God's Always Working

adult child of family dysfunction. I'm excited to be with you guys today because I'm going to talk about one of my favorite Bible stories in the Old Testament today and it has to do with Israelites and I draw a lot of comfort and encouragement from this story and I'll get into that after I want to read the story first and then I'll tell you guys why this story means so much to me and hopefully it can leave you guys with some encouragement as well. So we're in the book of Numbers and the Israelites have been in the desert for quite a while. Now Moses is leading them through the desert and they have been traveling, they've been having a lot of success against their enemies and at this point we are in chapter 22 of Numbers and we're going to start right at the beginning. And right at the beginning they go, they enter the plains of Moab and like I said, they've been having a lot of success. God has been with them, he's been guiding them and leading them and they've been having a lot of success against their enemies. So when they get to the plains of Moab, the king of Moab, which is Balak, gets a little bit scared. He sees them and he goes, "Oh no, I don't want these guys in my territory at all. I've seen what they've been doing to all the other guys, no thank you." So he sends for a guy named Balam and I don't know if I'm saying these names correctly but that's what I'm going to call them right now. But so Balam is a, they say prophet, diviner, but he's not exactly a prophet of God but he is famous and so Balak sends for him because he wants him to come and curse the Israelites. He wants him to come and curse them so that they cannot have success over him in his territory. And so he sends for Balam and what's interesting here, I'm not going to get into it because we don't have enough time, it's Balak, sorry, Balam, their names are so similar. Balam, the prophet, has a little journey of his own when it comes to whether he decides to go or not but he doesn't deciding to go or God sends him and he gets to Balak. And Balak says, "I want you to curse the Israelites." And he goes, "Why didn't you come soon as I sent for you?" And he said, "Well, I had a little journey of my own getting here."

But and he goes, "I want you to curse." And Balam says to him, "I can only say what God tells me to say." And he goes, "Okay, great." So in verse 41, at the very end of chapter 22, it says, "Then it came about in the morning that Balak took Balam and brought him up to the high places of Baal. From there he saw a portion of the Israelites, okay? So in my mind at this point, I see here's the desert down here and this is where the Israelites are, their camp, their camp is set up, they're in their tents and there they are living their lives. And then I imagine up here in the high places is where Baalak has taken Balam and they can, in my imagination, they can see a portion of these lights that are above them here and they can see them down here. And this is where chapter 3 picks up and Balam says, you know, Balak says, "Okay, go ahead and curse them." And he asks him to do it three times. So Balam goes to God and God says, "Nope, you're not going to curse them. You're going to bless them." So at the third time, and by the way after the first time when Balam doesn't curse them, Balak goes, "Great, let's go to a different place. Maybe this isn't the right place." So he tries, he keeps moving them, he gets to the third place and he's like, "Okay, curse them." And Balam goes, "You know, I only can say what God is telling me to say." And I love it because, I don't know if you guys can hear those sirens going by, I love it because he's talking about in this third blessing that God has given him to speak over the Israelites in Balak's presence. He's talking about the strength of the Israelites. And one of the lines that he says is that he will devour nations, his adversaries, and he will crush their bones and pieces and shatter them with his arrows. It says he bow down to rest, he lies down as a lion and as a lioness who dares to rouse

him. And I love the picture of that because when a lion lays down or when a lioness lays down, they're kind of top of the food chain. So when they lay down, they're the predators, they're like, "Who do I have to worry about? I can lay down anywhere I want and take a nap because I know that no one's going to come after me. I'm the top of the food chain and I love the confidence that Israel was supposed to be so confident in who they were in God that they could just camp anywhere and lie down anywhere and be safe because ultimately they were the top of the food chain because God had them." And so I just love that visual of Israel being compared to a lion or a lioness and having that confidence of, "I don't have to be scared because I'm top of the food chain because God has got me." finishes the blessing and Balak gets angry in chapter I'm sorry chapter 24 verse 10 he says it says then Balak's anger was kindled against Balim and he struck his hands together and Balak said to Balim I called you here to curse my enemies but behold you have done nothing but bless them these three times and so Balim said well I told you I could only say what God told me to do and then he goes on and does another fourth blessing which of course makes Balak angry he finishes the blessing and then it says in verse 25 of chapter 24 it says then Balim arose and departed and returned to his place and Balak also went on his way so Bal I kind of laughed at that because I think you know all this preparation he spent all this time and bringing this prophet out to curse his Israelites he blesses them four times instead he finishes the fourth fourth blessing and Balak and Balim are kind of like okay bye and they part ways and and things move on in chapter 25 it starts with saying Israel settled and remained in the area and then it goes on to tell about what happens next with Israel and so what I love about this story is we see so much we get so much inside perspective of Israelites down in the desert and what their daily life is looking like with Moses leading them but in this particular instance we get a

little side shot of something that was happening on this side and in this situation somebody was trying to hurt them Balak was trying to curse them he pulled a guy in who was shady and kind of known for doing things shady not about and he thought he had an easy win bringing this guy in he's like this guy will do it he'll curse these people it's great so he calls for the known guy who will do this the known guy comes and he says I can only say what God tells me to do and I love this because in my mind again they're up here Israelites are down here and the Israelites have no idea what's happening here somebody's plotting against them the king of Moab is plotting against them to curse them and they have no idea but God knew and he still protected them and that's what I love about this story it reminds me that even when I don't see it God is still fighting for me even when I'm facing a scenario that is scary and I just don't see any way out I don't feel God I don't see him in the scenario with me he's there working behind the scenes and even better than that there are situations that I am that I am we are we are all avoiding all the time that we don't even know is happening attacks that are happening against us that we don't even know about but God knows and he is still fighting for us I love the comfort of that I love the comfort of the story because here we get a little sneak peek of God protecting the Israelites when the Israelites didn't even know that they needed protecting and the same applies to us because God is the same then that and he is the same God now so God is protecting us all the time even when we don't even know that we need protecting and I think that is so comforting and encouraging and I love that so again the story is in numbers starts in chapter 22 if you want to go back and read it for yourself also when I think of this story and this concept of God protecting us and and always fighting for us even when we don't know it I think of the worship song called Waymaker and in the oh my gosh you guys I can't remember what it's called but this is the part of the song that you sing over and over again the chorus I think it's called the chorus is some of the lines in the chorus say even when we don't see it he's working and even when we don't feel it he's working he never

stops he never stops working and so I I think that song and these Bible verses and numbers are great ways for me to remember that God is always working he is always fighting for me when I see it when I don't see it when I know that I need it and even when I don't know that I need it he is still there fighting and working for us and he loves us so much thanks for letting me share