A Promise in Place

Reading of the Day: Judges 12-14

Judges 13:5: For, lo, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and no razor shall come on his head: for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb: and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.

By this time in our reading, Israel had gone through a roller coaster of up & down events...when a judge ruled over Israel, there was peace...but every time a judge died, Israel turned back to doing evil in the sight of The Lord. They could not seem to hold to everything they had been taught over many generations. There were victories, then there were defeats, constantly going from one extreme to the next. But even throughout all of this, a promise was still in place! God would always have someone else to raise up to lead the people. In this case & according to this Scripture, that person was Samson. God revealed this plan & promise for this child before he was even born! And the amazing thing is, although our lives seem just as up & down as the Israelites (maybe more at times!), the promise God has for us is still firmly in place-no matter how shaky the world around us can be! And God knew it before we were born! That's not to say that the Israelites were right in drifting from The Lord every time there was a change in leadership, but that does give us hope that when we mess up, we don't have to worry about being lost forever. We don't have to worry about our lives getting so messed up that God doesn't care about us anymore. We never outsmart God, because there is no life that's too broken for Him to fix! God can use many different situations to get us to the place we need to be. He will send many different voices to speak into our lives until we choose to listen. But that's just it, we have to be ready & open to receive the plan & promise He has in place for us! This Samson that was to be born would be the beginning of deliverance for Israel, but his story will be one of many mistakes as well once we continue through these chapters...but some how, some way, God uses Samson's life to continue His work, even through all the ups & downs! If you're at a point where you don't know where God is anymore, or you never have, just know that He is a friend that is closer than a brother (Proverbs 18:24)! The promise is in place, all you have to do is reach out to Him one more time & position yourself for a miracle in Jesus' Name!