They have taken crafty counsel against Your people, and consulted together against Your sheltered ones. They have said, “Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be remembered no more.” (Psalm 83:3-4)
As the psalmist reveals, the nations have always conspired with one another to plot Israel’s destruction. As we mentioned in the previous devotion, those who rise up against God’s people are motivated more by fear and dread than they are a sense of superiority. In order for Pharaoh to enslave Israel, he first convinced the Egyptians that the Hebrews were more and mightier than their hosts. That is why he convinced them “to deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and it happen, in the event of war, that they join our enemies and fight against us” (Exodus 1:9-10).
It should be obvious but we’ll note it anyway: it’s not so much that the nations fear us; in reality they fear the God of Israel. Let’s face it — God’s people are nothing without our God. We are no threat to anyone in and of ourselves because, as it is written, “The Lord did not choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples” (Deuteronomy 7:7). Nevertheless, because He has set His love and calling upon us, we are destined “to be the head and not the tail; you shall be above only, and not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 28:13).
It is that last statement in the verse that should stand out; the desired result will be attained IF we are careful to do as our God has commanded us to do. Let’s put it this way: when we walk upright before God, as we are supposed to, we are empowered to overcome our enemies and be the head and not the tail; we are to rise above them and not be trampled underneath their heel. When Jacob got into a wrestling match with God, he was renamed, Israel. From that moment until his death, he walked with a limp resulting from that encounter. In other words, he was given a new name and a new walk, both identifying him to the world as God’s chosen.
When we live in the way we have been called to, we are a threat to the kingdom of darkness. That is why they fear and why they wish to cut us off from being a people. Fear of our destiny as God’s people is why they want the name of Israel to be eradicated from the earth. As long as there is a people called by His Name, darkness must live with the threat that the Light poses. And as long as we abide in the Light and walk upright, we have nothing to fear. As it was said to Jacob when he became Israel: “You have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed” (Genesis 32:8).
Blessings and Shalom,
Bill
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