There are many opportunities in life where we have the option to simply take the sensible, down to earth approach to a situation or decision. However there is one flaw in this very reasonable deduction; it often takes God out of our decision-making and approach to life. We can end up limiting our life and believing to only what we can physically see, touch, and feel and distance ourselves from the supernatural power and ability of God.
There is a famous account in the bible of a group of people who did exactly that and lived, or should I say died for it. (Exodus 2-14).The Israelites had been slaves in Egypt for over 400 years. They had been beaten down, were at risk of losing their identity, and couldn’t see any way out. Yet God broke through for them and sent a deliverer in the form of Moses. God used him to bring three million slaves out of captivity as He performed signs and wonders, led them by a pillar of fire by night, and a cloud by day, parted the Red Sea, and fed them in the wilderness.
But then the Israelites were faced with a decision. They had sent twelve spies out into the land God had brought them to possess, and ten had come back with a report of a land flowing with milk and honey. But it was also a land where the inhabitants looked like giants and they felt like little grasshoppers in comparison.
Ten spies came back saying how it was impossible to enter this wonderful place God had for them because of the giants, and declared it could not be done. They talked the facts they saw before them, and maintained a sensible, down to earth approach in which they had processed the situation logically and came to the conclusion that this land was unattainable. They had based their decision on an earthly perspective.
However two men out of the twelve spies were different. Joshua and Caleb stood up and declared that God is bigger and that they could win with Him on their side. Yes it was a challenge, but they could make it because God said so. They took a different perspective and chose not to just take the down to earth logical view of what was before them because they saw the situation as God saw it. They didn’t gain their wisdom, knowledge and perspective from the world, but from a higher place. That higher level was from a heavenly Godly perspective; that nothing is impossible, that God is faithful to His promises, and that He will make a way even when it may seem impossible to man.
The Israelites should have known that if God said, “this is your land, go and get it”, that He had a way to enter in. They should have known from the way He’d freed them from slavery, parted the Red sea, and had provided for them in the desert. But most of them did not. Why? Because they looked at their situation from only a “down to earth” seemingly reasonable viewpoint, and chose to take God out of it.
We too can make the same mistake as the Israelites. Even though Jesus’ work on the cross has done everything for us for our deliverance from sin, sickness, lack, strife, hopelessness and despair, we too can still look at our situation through the eyes of “worldly reason” and say it’s unreasonable to expect anything good to happen here.
But today I ask you, Isn’t it about time that those who confess to know Jesus and His Word think and believe for some “unreasonable” things. That we believe for those things that the world says are impossible; that we believe that the God who does not change is able to part “Our Red Seas”, to deliver us, to provide and sustain us, and that we too have all we need in God to enter our promised land.”
Today instead of reasoning away what God says and promises in His Word with a worldly point of view, how about we lift up our eyes and see every situation from heaven’s perspective and through God’s ability instead of ours! That we go beyond our reason to God’s reason, which declares that “nothing is impossible for God and to those who believe!”
For God says, “I am the LORD, and I do not change.” (Malachi 3:6)
“For with God nothing shall be impossible.”(Luke 1:37)
“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Philippians 4:13)
“And Jesus looking upon them saying, With men [it is] impossible, but not with God: for with God all things are possible.” (Mark 10:27)
Prayer: Lord I want to be more like Joshua and Caleb who chose to believe you and your promises rather than what the world or what others may say. I choose today to gain my wisdom, knowledge and perspective from heaven’s perspective rather than from man’s. In Jesus name Amen.
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