81. From Hiding to Victory: Trusting God in Tough Times!

G', day, Dave here.

Welcome to Stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

A big shout out to all the kids and staff at Toongabbie Christian College.

It was heaps of fun coming to speak at your Faith Week.

I hope you all keep trusting Jesus.

I should say, if other people are interested in having me come and speak at their school or church event or any other Christian event, I'd love to just get in contact@faithfulgod.net now.

Do you know there are going to be times in your life where things are going to seem impossible, where you want to do what's good and best, you want to do the right thing.

But it just seems like it can never happen.

There's no way forward in today's story.

That's how the Israelites feel.

Everything seems hopeless.

Thankfully, there's one man who remembers the power of his God, who remembers that they have a God who can do the impossible.

And remembering that makes him so brave, he takes on an entire army with just him and one other guy.

Get ready for our next episode of Stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

At the end of our last episode, the Israelites had been given a reminder.

They'd been reminded by Samuel to trust and obey God.

To not think that they don't need God, to not think that a human king can do a better job than God.

Of course they have a human king now, Saul.

His job is to trust and obey God, to let God use him to save Israel.

He'd done that really well when they fought against the Ammonites.

But there's another group of people he hasn't dealt with.

The Philistines.

That's right, the Philistines.

When Samuel had first anointed Saul as king, he'd suggested that he might want to do something about those Philistines.

But Saul had done nothing.

Now, though, after fighting the Ammonites, he has a huge army with him, hundreds of thousands of men.

And you know what he does with this huge army, with this huge army, with this massive amount of men?

He sends them home.

Oh, umm.

OK.

He chooses 3,000 men to keep working as soldiers.

He takes 2,000 of them with him to a place called Mikmash, and he leaves 1000 with his son Jonathan back in his home in Gibeah.

Well, his son Jonathan is not the sort of guy to hang around.

Just nearby, there's a Philistine garrison, a kind of small camp where the Philistines can keep an eye on the Israelites.

He figures we can't just have these Philistines living Here, trying to control us.

And so with his smaller group, he attacks them.

The Philistines, back on the coast in their cities, hear about it and let's just say they aren't very happy about it.

Saul's pretty worried.

He needs to get his army back quickly.

So he sends a message throughout Israel.

In 1 Samuel 13:4, this message goes, Saul has defeated the Philistine camp.

Now the Philistines really hate us.

Umm, hang on a second.

It wasn't Saul who defeated the Philistines, it was Jonathan.

Oh, well, it turns out the other part of the message, the bit that said the Philistines really hate them, is completely true.

The Philistines get a massive army together.

Verse 5 says that they have 3,000 chariots and 6,000 soldiers to ride in the chariots.

Chariots are really scary to fight against.

But as well as the chariots, they have a huge army on foot.

So many soldiers, it seems like there are as many as the grains of sand on the seashore.

Far out.

That's terrifying.

It seems impossible.

How could Israel possibly defeat such a huge army?

Well, if they remember their history, they'd be fine because the judge Gideon had defeated a similar size army with just 300 men.

Not because they were superheroes, but because they trusted God and God had won the victory.

Unfortunately, the Israelites don't seem to remember that and they freak out when they see the Philistines.

They run in every direction.

Verse 6 says they went to hide in caves and bushes.

They also hid among the rocks and in pits and wells.

Some Hebrews even went across the Jordan river to the land of Gad and Gilead.

It's like a really scary game of hide and seek.

To give him credit, Saul doesn't run away and some men even stay with him.

But even those men are shaking with fear.

Saul and his shrinking army are waiting at Gilgal.

Samuel had told them to wait seven days and then he'd come and tell Saul what to do.

Have you ever had to wait for something when you're afraid?

Waiting seems to make the fear even worse.

But they do wait.

One day, two days, three, four, five, six, seven days.

It's the seventh day and Samuel hasn't arrived yet.

More and more soldiers are running away.

The army is getting smaller and smaller.

Saul thinks if I wait any longer, I won't have an army left.

And so instead of bravely trusting God to look after him, he decides to do a job that's not his to do.

A job that Samuel's meant to do.

Saul makes a sacrifice To God.

He's trying to make God fight for them, just like the Israelites had tried to make God fight for them by bringing the ark.

He should know that you can't make God do anything.

You just need to trust him to do what's best.

Just as he's finishing the sacrifice, Samuel arrives.

If only Saul had waited just a few more minutes.

In verse 11, Samuel asks, what have you done?

And Saul replies with all the excuses he can think of.

He says, I saw the soldiers leaving me and you were not here.

The Philistines were gathering at Michmash.

Then I thought, the Philistines will come against me at Gilgal.

And I haven't asked for the Lord's approval.

So I forced myself to offer the whole burnt offering.

Do you see what he's doing?

He's trying to make it sound like he had no choice.

In fact, it was so important he had to force himself to do it, even though he didn't want to.

But it's all just excuses.

Samuel has come on the seventh day.

Saul should have waited, even though lots of soldiers are running away.

If he just trusts God, everything'll be fine.

But he hasn't trusted God.

He's tried to use God like a tool or a weapon, just like Israel had done so badly before.

And because of that, his family won't continue as kings.

Samuel says, you acted foolishly.

You haven't obeyed God's command.

If you had obeyed him, God would make your kingdom continue in Israel forever.

But now your kingdom will not continue.

The Lord has looked for the kind of man he wants.

The Lord has appointed him to become ruler of his people.

He is doing this because you haven't obeyed his command.

And with that, Samuel leaves.

He doesn't tell him how to fight the battle, which he would have done if only Saul had trusted God.

Saul looks around at his tiny army.

Now he only has 600 men, including Jonathan with him.

600 against an army so large, it's like the grains of sand on the seashore.

The Philistines are clearly not worried about Saul's tiny army.

They feel really safe.

So much so they split up into three groups to attack whoever they find.

They're also not worried because they have a super weapon, or at least they have a super metal to make weapons out of iron.

Up until around this time in history, people tended to use the metal copper and mix it with other metals to make bronze.

You might have heard people calling this part of history the Bronze Age.

Iron is much stronger than bronze, but for a long time no one could work out how to get it hot enough to melt it and make it into tools and weapons.

But now the Philistines have blacksmiths who can do it, and they've made sure that the Israelites don't.

So all the Israelites had to go to the Philistines to get their iron tools.

One thing the Philistines don't sell to them is iron weapons.

That means in the whole of the Israelite army, only Saul and Jonathan have swords and spears.

So if you thought it was bad only having 600 soldiers, now you've got to think, oh, it's much worse than you imagined.

Most of them don't even have up to date weapons.

How on earth can they possibly ever defeat the Philistines?

One of the Philistine groups is at the top of a hill at a place called Micmash.

Jonathan comes up with an idea.

Remember, he doesn't just like waiting around.

So in chapter 14, verse one, he says to the guy who carries his armour, come, let's go over to the Philistine camp on the other side.

Umm, say what now?

Just the two of you?

Unsurprisingly, he doesn't tell his dad what he's about to do.

Saul, his dad isn't getting ready to attack anyone.

Instead he's sitting down under a tree.

He's actually moved further away from the Philistines.

He's got a few people with him.

He has his 600 terrified soldiers.

He's also got a priest with him from Eli's family.

You know Eli's family, the one that had been cursed because they were so evil.

So a sitting down king, a scared tiny army and a cursed priest.

Not the sort of people you'd want as your saviours.

The person who isn't with Saul is Jonathan.

Jonathan's back talking to his friend.

And when you listen to what he says, you found out why he's happy to go and attack the Philistines.

Why he's not worried that it's just him and his armor bearer, why he's so brave.

It's because he trusts that God can win the battle.

He says in verse six, come, let's go to the camp of those men who are not circumcised.

Maybe the Lord will help us.

It doesn't matter if we have many people or just a few.

Nothing can keep the Lord from giving us victory.

Jonathan's trust in God has made him brave.

Because Saul doesn't trust God.

He's really scared.

Jonathan's friend says, do whatever you Think is best.

Go ahead.

I'm with you.

They're standing on the opposite hill to the Philistines, and there are steep rock walls in between them.

Jonathan comes up with a plan.

He says in verse eight, we will cross over to the Philistines.

We'll let them see us.

They may say to us, stay there until we come to you.

If they do, we will stay where we are.

We won't go up to them, but they may say, come up to us.

If so, we'll climb up and the Lord will allow us to defeat them.

This will be the sign for us.

So they climb down one steep side and back up the other side and let the Philistines see them.

By this stage, the Philistines think the Israelites are a joke.

They know that so many have run away.

So they laugh and say in verse 11, look, the Hebrews are crawling out of the holes they were hiding in.

Come up to us.

We'll teach you a lesson.

This is exactly the sign Jonathan's been looking for.

He says, climb up behind me.

The Lord has given the Philistines to Israel.

And so, trusting God, they climb up the last little bit and start attacking the Philistine army.

Two men against an army.

Oh, wait, that's not quite right.

That'd be crazy.

No, it's two men and one God against the Philistine army.

In that first fight, they kill about 20 philistines.

God makes the Philistines panic.

He makes the ground shake.

They're freaking out.

Meanwhile, Saul and his little army can see the Philistines in the distance, panicking and running in every direction.

They work out that someone's done something.

And they discover that Jonathan's missing.

This is Saul's moment.

This is his chance to step in as God's chosen saviour.

Sure, Jonathan's kicked off the battle, but now it's time for the rest of them to charge.

This is Saul's opportunity to be really brave.

And now, at this key moment, Saul says exactly the wrong thing.

He says to the priest in verse 18, bring the ark of the Covenant of God.

What?

Saul, what are you doing?

That's exactly the mistake the Israelites made back at the beginning of 1 Samuel.

They thought that if they had the ark, God must be with them.

But Jonathan hasn't needed the ark.

He knew that God was looking after him.

Saul, stop being so silly.

Meanwhile, the confusion among the Philistines is growing and growing.

If Saul doesn't go now, he's going to miss the battle.

Finally, he decides to act he stops.

The priest gets his men into their fighting positions and they march out to the battle.

When they get there, it's absolute chaos.

The Philistines are so scared and confused, they're hitting each other with their own swords.

Do you remember how the Israelites only have two swords?

That isn't a problem for God.

He's just using the Philistine ones.

Finally, the Israelites who'd been hiding decide to come out and join in the battle.

There are even Israelites who'd switched sides and gone over to the Philistines.

Now they finally realize which side they should be on and they start fighting the Philistines.

The Philistines run because the Lord God has saved Israel.

The Israelites are all excited now.

But before the battle started, there was only one man who trusted that God would give them victory.

And because he trusted God, he was really brave today.

God doesn't want his people to make an army and go and fight people, but he does want us to trust Him.

He does want us to be brave.

He wants us to be brave and keep trusting and serving and obeying him, even when other people don't want us to.

Even when other people laugh at us, even when they get angry at us for following Jesus.

You see, we know that God will look after us.

We know that he's put his holy Spirit inside us.

We know that one day Jesus will raise us from the dead and make us alive with him forever.

No matter how bad things seem, no matter how scary it might seem to follow Jesus, we know we can trust the good, powerful, faithful God.

Back in Israel, the battle is going on all day.

The Israelites are getting really tired because Saul made them make a really silly promise.

A promise that could mean that a lot of Philistines escape.

But that's a story for next time.