Enjoying God’s PROTECTION in our DAILY BATTLES!
April 1 Bible
Reading: 2 Samuel Chapters 7-9
Enjoying God’s PROTECTION in our DAILY BATTLES!
"When the Syrians of Damascus
came to help Hadadezer king of Zobah, David killed twenty-two thousand of the
Syrians. Then David put garrisons in Syria of Damascus; and the Syrians became
David's servants, and brought tribute. The
Lord preserved David wherever he went. And David made himself a name when
he returned from killing eighteen thousand Syrians in the Valley of Salt. He
also put garrisons in Edom; throughout all Edom he put garrisons, and all the
Edomites became David's servants. And
the Lord preserved David wherever he went." (2 Sam 8:5-6, 13-14)
When David
became established as king internally within the country of Israel, he looked
at the neighboring heathen countries that surrounded Israel from all directions
and saw that they could attack Israel at any moment as they had done in the
past. So, instead of waiting for an attack from outside, David led Israel to fight
with the enemies of Israel. 2 Samuel 8 gives us a brief record of the major conquests
of David, which included Israel’s battle with the Philistines (v.1), Moabites
(v.2, 12), Zobahites (v.3-4), Syrians (v.5-8, 13), Ammonites (v. 12), Amalekites
(v.12) and Edomites (v. 14). David was victorious in all his military conquests and he managed to subdue all the enemies of Israel!
However, a
close reading of the passage brings out the role that God played in those
battles, and this is repeated twice in verses 6 and 14 that “the Lord preserved David wherever he went”.
During any of the battles, David could easily have got hit by a stray arrow and
got killed instantaneously. However, God had installed a protective covering
around David, so he was not hurt, let alone killed, during the numerous battles
that he fought. So the question arises – why
did God preserve and protect David wherever he went?
To get the
answer of this question, we should examine one of the psalms in the Bible –
Psalms 121, which ends with these verses: "The
Lord shall preserve you from all evil; He shall preserve your soul. The Lord
shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth and even
forevermore" (Psalms 121:7-8). This is a unilateral promise from God
that applied to David’s life completely. However, this promise is not available
to everyone, but only to that person who literally looks up to God
for help. Let us examine that psalm and see how it starts: "I will lift up my eyes to the
hills--from whence comes my help? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven
and earth" (Psalms 121:1-2).
There is a
lesson for us from today’s passage – if
we are to enjoy God’s protection in our daily battles as well, we should
literally look up to God every day for help. Remember, God made the heaven
and earth, and we can never find a better person than God to give us
protection. Unlike King David who had heathen kings and their armies as his
enemy, we have a ‘real’ enemy in
Satan and his legion (Ephesians 6:12), who is attacking us every day from all
fronts (1 Peter 5:8-9). Can we look to
God for help today so that He will protect and preserve us in all our daily
battles as well?
