2 Crônicas 14

2 Crônicas 14

Meyer - Lord, there is none beside Thee to help. (R. V.) Remind God of His entire responsibility.— “There is none beside Thee to help.” The odds against Asa were enormous. There was a million of men in arms against him, beside three hundred chariots. It seemed impossible to hold his own against that vast multitude. There were no allies who would come to his help: his only hope therefore was in God. There was none beside to help. It may be that your difficulties have been allowed to come to so alarming a pitch, that you may be compelled to renounce all creature aid, to which in lesser trials you have had recourse, and cast yourself back on your Almighty Friend. Put God between yourself and the foe.— To Asa’s faith, Jehovah seemed to stand between the might of Zerah and himself, as one who had no strength. Nor was he mistaken. We are told that the Ethiopians were destroyed before the Lord and before His host, as though celestial combatants flung themselves against the foe in Israel’s behalf, and put the large host to rout, so that Israel had only to follow up and gather the spoil. Our God is Jehovah of Hosts, who can summon unexpected reinforcements at any moment to the aid of His people. Believe that He is there between you and your difficulty, and what baffles you will flee before Him, as clouds before the gale. Identify your cause with His.— “In Thy name are we come…. Let not man prevail against Thee.” It is a great matter when a small State is so identified with a strong European power, as that an insult to one of its officials is deemed a causs belli by the more powerful Government; and whenever we are so delivered from selfish aims, as to be able to show that our cause and God’s are one, we are invincible. John Kitto - The Way of Help—II Chronicles 14:11 - Daily Bible Illustrations O Lord, Thou art our God, let not man prevail against Thee!” These were the words with which king Asa, full of faith, marched against the Cushite host. Great words they are, and deserve to be well considered. Observe the root of the idea from which they spring. At the first view it might seem more obvious and natural to say, “Let not man prevail against us;” but he says, “Let not man prevail against Thee.” This is a bold word. It assumes that the Lord’s cause and theirs was so much identified, his honor so much involved in theirs in this matter, that man’s triumph over them would be triumph over him—would compromise the glory of his great name even more than it would compromise theirs. If this notion rested not on strong foundations, it were egregious presumption; but if it were well founded, it was faith. On what, then, was it founded? We are left at no loss in this matter, for Asa himself declares the grounds of this strong, we may almost say daring, claim upon the Lord’s assistance. It was the conviction of his utter helplessness, and therefore of the absolute necessity of the Lord’s deliverance, and that all the glory must therefore be his. “Lord, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power. Help us, O Lord our God.” This is something. This goes a great way. It is indispensable that we should feel our own helplessness, in order to estimate at its true value the help that maybe given to us. The claim to help is not with him who thinketh that he has need of nothing, or only of a little help just to make out the “possible insufficiency of his own resources; but with him who feels that he has need of everything—that in himself he has no resources whatever—no works, no worthiness, no strength that may, so to speak, somewhat help the Lord to help him—that old delusion, that old snare, which has in all time kept so many souls from the help they might else have had from God. See that man drowning in the waters, and see that other coming forth from the shore with a strong stroke to save him. See the vain efforts of the first to help himself. He kicks, he struggles, be beats the waters, he rears aloft his arms, he will not be still. He thinks he is helping himself; but all the while he is only doing his utmost to aid his own submersion. If he would be but quiet, in the conviction of the utter impotency of all such attempts to save himself, he might float quietly upon the water until the deliverer came near.544 He is near—he grasps the sufferer by the hair, he holds his head above the wave, and propels him gently on towards the shore. Let not the thought of helping his helper cross his mind, or he is again undone. Let him lie still in the hands of his preserver—let him have faith in his power to save, and that strong arm shall bear him triumphantly through; but if he yet struggles to help himself, and lifts himself up to catch convulsively at every floating straw, there is no help for him—down he goes. Asa knew he was in himself helpless, and he knew where to seek an all-sufficient Helper, and he desired to know no more. In this he rested—“We rest on Thee.” This resting on God was both a cause and an effect. That he was enabled so to rest with undisturbed mind on God, was one of the grounds on which he expected help—“for we rest on Thee;” and so far it was a cause. But the capacity of enjoying this rest, in leaning so entirely upon the Lord, was an inevitable effect of the previous convictions which he had reached of his own helplessness, and of the boundless sufficiency of his Helper. These things belong to the life of faith, and are essentially the same, whether they have regard to our defence against the innumerable adversaries who disturb or threaten our bodily repose—or the spiritual enemies, within us and without us, that bring danger to our souls. In either case, perfect love to God, and perfect trust in Him, which trust is essential to love, gives REST—casts out all fear and doubt. “He that feareth is not made perfect in love;” and therefore he has not yet attained to perfect rest. To enjoy this rest, which is the result of perfect love and perfect faith, is a state of inconceivable blessedness, infinitely greater than that of those whom the multitude look up to with envy and admiration. It is the state of the man who can say, in the quaint language of an old poet— “The God that made my heart is He alone That of himself both can and will Give rest unto my thoughts, and fill Them full of all content and quietness; That so I may possess My soul in patience, Until He find it time to call me hence. In Thee, as in my centre, shall The lines of all my longings fall, To Thee, as to mine anchor, surely tied, My strip shall safely ride. On Thee, as on my bed Of soft repose, I’ll rest my weary head. Thou, Thou alone, shall be my whole desire I’ll nothing else require But Thee, or for thy sake. In Thee I’ll sleep secure; and, when I wake, Thy glorious face shall satisfy The longing of my looking eye. I’ll roll myself on Thee, as on my rock, When threatening dangers mock.” —SCHOOL OF THE HEART. A man who has realized these convictions, and who has attained that state of rest, of reliance, of perfect freedom from all anxiety and care, who is fully clad in the armor of God—his hands are fit for war and his fingers for fight—he goes forth conquering and to conquer all the enemies of his peace, as well those who lurk in the corners of the soul’s dark cottage, as those that beset him round in his open walk, and prowl, and grin, and gibber about his path. He is fearless. Nothing can harm him; for he has that peace with him which all the world’s armies could not wrest from him, which the world’s terrors cannot disturb, which its foul breath cannot sully, and which the raging of its utmost storms can as little ruffle, as it can the “sea of glass” before the throne of God. It is because that Asa had attained to the state of “rest on God,” by which all these privileges became his—that he could say, “In thy name we go against this multitude.” This was his might. In this might he went, and he overcame. And it was because, feeling his own weakness, knowing where help was to be found, relying, resting upon that help and in that reliance, and in no other, going forth to oppose the Cushean host, that he was entitled and authorized to regard the cause as the Lord’s own, and to say—“O Lord, Thou art our God, let not man prevail against THEE.” Streams in the Desert - “Lord, there is none beside thee to help.” (2 Chron. 14:11, R. V.) REMIND God of His entire responsibility. “There is none beside thee to help.” The odds against Asa were enormous. There was a million of men in arms against him, besides three hundred chariots. It seemed impossible to hold his own against that vast multitude. There were no allies who would come to his help; his only hope, therefore, was in God. It may be that your difficulties have been allowed to come to so alarming a pitch that you may be compelled to renounce all creature aid, to which in lesser trials you have had recourse, and cast yourself back on your Almighty Friend. Put God between yourself and the foe. To Asa’s faith, Jehovah seemed to stand between the might of Zerah and himself, as one who had no strength. Nor was he mistaken. We are told that the Ethiopians were destroyed before the Lord and before His host, as though celestial combatants flung themselves against the foe in Israel’s behalf, and put the large host to rout, so that Israel had only to follow up and gather the spoil. Our God is Jehovah of hosts, who can summon unexpected reinforcements at any moment to aid His people. Believe that He is there between you and your difficulty, and what baffles you will flee before Him, as clouds before the gale.—F. B. Meyer. “When nothing whereon to lean remains, When strongholds crumble to dust; When nothing is sure but that God still reigns, That is just the time to trust. “’Tis better to walk by faith than sight, In this path of yours and mine; And the pitch-black night, when there’s no outer light Is the time for faith to shine.” Abraham believed God, and said to sight, “Stand back!” and to the laws of nature, “Hold your peace!” and to a misgiving heart, “Silence, thou lying tempter!” He believed God.—Joseph Parker. 2 Chronicles 14:12 So the LORD routed the Ethiopians before Asa and before Judah, and the Ethiopians fled. 2Ch 13:15-16 2Ch 20:22 Ex 14:25 De 28:7 32:39 Jos 10:10 Ps 60:12 Ps 136:17,18 1Co 9:26 15:57 SUPERNATURAL ROUTING OF THE ETHIOPIANS So - Don't miss this term of conclusion! What is it based upon (see 2Ch 14:11)? And what is the supernatural conclusion? The LORD routed the Ethiopians before Asa and before Judah - Who routed the Ethiopians? Was it Asa and the 580,000 soldiers? Of course not. It was the LORD of Hosts (armies)! How did Yahweh route the Ethiopians? (compare similar pattern of God's sovereignty over the battle in 2Ch 13:16+) The text does not give any details. God accomplished it and that settles it. Undoubtedly it was supernatural and God the Warrior was glorified. THOUGHT - Do you have any "Ethiopians" that are beginning to overwhelm you? Cry out to the LORD of hosts. Trust Him for the victory. Perhaps He won't route the Ethiopians like He did for Asa, but He is faithful to give you "the way (not "a" way but "the" way - keep your eyes peeled for "the way") of escape so that you might be able to endure" the trial (1Co 10:13+). Whatever your Father does in your particular case, be sure to give Him the glory before others saints, that they might be encouraged in the battle with their own "Ethiopians." We see the same pattern in King Abijah's victory over Jeroboam 2 Chronicles 13:15-16+ recording "Then the men of Judah raised a war cry, and when the men of Judah raised the war cry, then it was that God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah. When the sons of Israel fled before Judah, God gave them into their hand." And the Ethiopians fled - In short they re-traced their route (pun intended). Supernatural deliverance in the midst of battle is seen several times in 2 Chronicles (2Ch 13:14–18; 14:11–12; 2Ch 18:31; 2Ch 20:1ff; 2Ch 32:20–22). Paul Apple - When God goes up against His enemies, there are no buzzer beaters, no close calls, no tight skirmishes. He utterly vanquishes those who oppose Him. Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord! There’s Victory in Jesus! G Campbell