Whether you play a sport, a board game, a video game or just a friendly game of cards, nobody plays to lose. If we are honest with our selves we have to admit we do not want to lose, we want to win, we’d love to be first and definitely not last, we’d like the strongest not the weakest, we want the fastest not the slowest. We want an asset on our team not a liability.
In that famous Bible Story, “The Battle of Jericho” the commander of the Israelite army, Joshua, was looking for an ‘edge’. He’d take whatever edge God would give him and rightly so. He was about to pass by a very heavily fortified enemy in an era where genocide was the rule. I certainly would have been worried about the men, women and children under my care.
In the last part of chapter five of the book of Joshua, we are told that when he is out doing some reconnaissance he stumbles across an angel of God holding a sword in his hand. Joshua’s response to this angel of God demonstrates his concern.
Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, “Are you for us or for our enemies?” “Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell face down to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?
And the angel simply replies, “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy.” (Joshua 5:13,14). That is all that we are told about that encounter. You’d think the story would be better served if the angel gave Joshua some instructions about Jericho or addressed his fears and concerns or at least provided some insight on entering the “promised land”, but nothing more is said. I think that was the point exactly.
Joshua’s concerns are normal and his focus proper. He is focused on the ‘game of life’, survival, avoiding disaster and as such is somewhat distracted from the ‘Giver of Life’. Many of us tend to think of God as a “ringer” in the ‘game of life’. We want to know, ‘are you for us or against us?’ But notice the lesson here. The issue is not if God is for us but if we are for God. The question is, will I set aside my agenda to focus on him.
When we are distracted with serious life concerns our focus too can miss the Giver of Life. When we encounter crisis in our lives we too may come to a “crisis of faith”, ‘will I believe or not?’ When we come to that crisis of faith in our life remember that God isn’t just a “ringer”, He is the Game. He told us, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door I will come in and eat with him and he with me” (Revelation 3:20) He offers us an entirely different distraction, an invite to an intimate dinner for two. He wants us to hear him and how much he truly cares no matter how crazy our lives may get. He too is out to win, only his goal is not about being faster, better or stronger, his goal is you and me.
Kasey VanderVeen, Pastor
Good News Fellowship
Winnipeg MB.