Invincible In Battle And Perfectly Supplied!
(Editor's note: The Hebrew notion of Salvation (Deliverance) included much more than forgiveness and eternal life. Salvation meant freedom from debt, worry, fear and sickness. Power over enemies, total victory and possession of a land was integral to the concept. Today many believers have been put off by hyper-prosperity teaching. This teaching may have been responsible for many believers retreating entirely from the True Gospel, which portrays CREATOR as SUPPLIER!
"Now the Jordan is at flood stage"The day after the Passover, that very day, they ate some of the produce of the land: unleavened bread and roasted grain. The manna stopped the day after they ate this food from the land; there was no longer any manna for the Israelites, but that year they ate of the produce of Canaan." Joshua 5:11,12 The people of Israel came out of Egypt and into the wilderness. They most likely had food with them. They came to the promised land. They refused to go in. They were turned again to the wilderness. They ran out of food. CREATOR sent them manna. This is a story about a Faithful CREATOR and FATHER. It is also a story about a faithless generation of HIS people. We have been studying a bit about the entering in to the Promised Land and how it symbolizes the crossing for the present day Believer into the full supply of the LORD! About manna: It was good. The people were hungry. They had rebelled against the LORD in refusing to have faith. HE could have let them starve and die in a short period of weeks. HE chose to have mercy and feed them from HIS Hand. That is how HE is! Merciful! More about manna. Tasted like honey. That is good. Well, how about for 40 years straight, with very little exception? Morning - noon - night! Manna - manna - manna. And more manna. Plain manna. Manna with manna sauce. Boiled, broiled and fried manna. "Hey, Mom! What's for dinner? Manna?" Flash to today. Is it possible that we are on a diet of manna? Well, here is how you will know. Are you barely surviving? Is life's supply very lean? Are you surrounded by debt? Do you have to borrow from one area of your income to pay bills in another area? Could it be manna? Just enough, but not more than enough? Is that bad? YES! Here's why. HE is EL SHADDAIH! THE GOD THAT IS MORE THAN ENOUGH! That is HIS Name. The problem back in the wilderness days is that by not having faith in HIM, HIS people had brought disgrace to HIS Name. Are we doing that? Are we standing on old religious tradition of being poor and thanking HIM for it? Is it a disgrace to HIS Name? We had best be careful. You
see, the Old People had disgraced their GOD.
The whole world knew what had happened. The escape from Egypt. The crossing of
the Sea. The flight to Canaan. Then the retreat in fear from the land of promise.
As was mentioned, they were a people lacking faith. What is faith, since we have
ruined the word by misuse and overuse? Faith is . . . . . . (ready?)
Faith is Trust! That is what it is. Trust. They would not cross that
Jordan because they did not Trust their FATHER.
That's it. So simple! |