Stand & See
In 1 Samuel chapter 12, Samuel gives His final judgment as the leader in the sense of the people of Israel. After Samuel places himself on trial and is found innocent, he commands the people to "Take you stand and see this great thing ." They were about to see the condemnation that Samuel had given the people moments before, not merely his opinion but agreed with by the almighty God. God brought rain when Samuel called for it at a time when rain was unlikely. God showed the people that they were not only standing on trial before Saul the king, Samuel the prophet, but also God the creator. The people saw that the God they knew was active and powerful, but it seemed they had forgotten these things. Today, we can be guilty of being like the people of Israel. We can focus so much on the future and what has not even happened yet that we forget what God has done in the past for His people. Some today say if I could just see the miracles, then I would believe. I offer the children of Israel as my case for why that could possibly not be true. They saw God's amazing and powerful acts and still denied Him and ignored His commands. We need to look and see what He has already done and use those accounts to remind us that He IS powerful and active in His people's lives. Paul assured those he wrote to in the book of Philippians that they should work out their salvation and that God was working in them. While some try to point to a specific instance and argue it was the hand of God, man cannot do this. However, from reading the scriptures and seeing how involved and active Yahweh, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit were in the early people of Israel and the early church of the New Testament, I believe we can have confidence that God's power is with His church today. He sent a powerful savior with a powerful message that if we follow it, it has the power to change lives and teach us of the past of men and women of God. Stand and see the great things the LORD has done already.
Challenge
Read through the 1st 12 chapters of 1 Samuel and list the ways you see God provide and work in the lives of the people of Israel.