I Have Laid Help Upon One Who Is Mighty

I am writing to build your courage as you stand in the fire of resistance at this time. Reading Hebrews 12:3-4, we eat words like, “endure”, “hostility”, “struggle”, “resist”. These are comforting words for those who understand that to serve our Lord Jesus Christ is to fight the good fight of faith (1 Tim 6:12) and to endure hardship as a good soldier (2 Tim 2:3).

Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. Heb 12:3-4

Brothers and sisters, see this time as a gracious opportunity to step into suffering and reproach for Christ’s sake. If we desire to reign with Him, we must suffer with Him. If we desire the Spirit of glory and our God to rest upon us, we must be prepared to bear His reproach.

If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him he will also deny us. 2 Tim 2:12

If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. 1 Pet 4:14

Many of us talk big but when the opportunity comes to step into the fire we choose to save our lives instead. Jesus and His reviving presence is always found in the extra-hot fire of resistance – He is never found in the bowing of the knee in compromise.

For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. Matt 16:25

Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished and rose up in haste. He declared to his counselors, “Did we not cast three men bound into the fire?” They answered and said to the king, “True, O king.” He answered and said, “But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.” Dan 3:24-25

The LORD of hosts is still looking for men of war – as He always has. He is searching for men of war, that He may lay help upon them.

Then thou spakest in vision to thy holy one, and saidst, I have laid help upon one that is mighty [NIV / NLT – a warrior]; I have exalted one chosen out of the people. I have found David, my servant; with my holy oil I have anointed him. Psalm 89:19-20

David was a man of war. Saul may not have recognised this (1 Sam 17:33), nor Goliath (1 Sam 17:42-43). But the Lord did. Even as a young shepherd, David was seen by God as a king and as a man of war. His warring experience was not with sword and spear but with the weapons that truly counted.

“…Fill your horn with oil, and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons.” 1 Sam 16:1b

One of the young men answered, “Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlehemite, who is skillful in playing, a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence, and the LORD is with him.” 1 Sam 16:18

Gideon was another man of war that the LORD searched out and laid help upon. Before Gideon ever led the charge against the Midianites, he was a man of war. He was a warrior even as a thresher of wheat.

The angel of the LORD appeared to him and said to him, “The LORD is with you, O valiant warrior.” Jud 6:12

Jehu was another man of war that the LORD of hosts found and laid help upon. 

When confronted with talk of peace through compromise, Jehu knew only the way of struggle and war in honour of the Lord’s name.

When Joram saw Jehu, he said, “Is it peace, Jehu?” And he answered, “What peace, so long as the harlotries of your mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts are so many?” 2 Kings 9:22 

What then is it to be a man of war? Many lay claim to being a warrior for the Lord and of being a soldier in His army. But what does it really look like to be a man of war, a valiant warrior? What does it look like on earth? There were 32,000 soldiers that gathered for battle in Gideon’s day but there were only 300 men of war that the LORD of hosts was willing to lay help upon.

A man of war knows what it is to ascend in worship and descend in war. A true warrior knows what it is to pursue the heart of God and do all His will on earth. The 'doing all His will' is the warring part.

And when he had removed him [Saul], he raised up David to be their king, of whom he testified and said, ‘I have found in David the son of Jesse a man after my heart, who will do all my will.’ Acts 13:22

To love God and gush over Him in worship does not mean much if we are not prepared to take up our cross and do all His will on the earth, in the face of persecution and rejection and reproach. Persecution is actually a good measure of how much we walk out His will on the earth.

Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. 2 Tim 3:12

Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. Mark 10:29-30

If we have not experienced rejection and persecution and reproach, we have been travellers on the path of peace through compromise. We, like King Ahab, have been trading with that cursed Canaanite princess, Jezebel.

And there shall be no trader (lit: Canaanite) in the house of the LORD of hosts on that day. Zech 14:21b 

We must be men of war to walk out God’s will on the earth. Why?

1) Separation from the world and idolatry is not achieved without a battle. Read 2 Cor 6:14-7:1 and then read Judges 6:25-32 to see what it looked like for Gideon to walk this out. Take time with this. Meditate on it. Put yourself in Gideon’s shoes.

2) Truth must be contended for against theft and persecution and allurements. Read Mark 4:1-20

3) Soldiering is different to civilian life. Read 2 Tim 2:3-4.

It takes courage to be a man of a war, to be a king, to be a judge. It takes a life of personal cleansing and purging (2 Cor 7:1; 2 Tim 2:19-21). It attracts the wrath of the god of this world (Heb 11:27). But we are not alone in this. The Lord Himself lays help upon us!

But the Spirit of the LORD clothed Gideon, and he sounded the trumpet… Jud 6:34

But truly I am full of power by the spirit of the LORD, and of judgment, and of might [NASB – courage], to declare unto Jacob his transgression, and to Israel his sin. Mic 3:8

Are we men of war or are we men of peace through compromise? Are we soldiers or are we soft-clothed diplomats of compromise? Are we warriors or traders? 

The Lord still searches for those who are warriors that He might equip them with His anointing and authority in a mighty way ... in order to establish His Kingdom on the earth.