My Thoughts On Judges 8:4

Judges 8:4 “And Gideon came to the Jordan and crossed over, he and the 300 men with him, exhausted yet pursuing.”

This is a story in Judges about the very small army that Gideon was leading and the Lord fought the battle for them. There is little to nothing about this story and this verse that relates to my life right now. I am not on the battlefield with three hundred men fighting a battle. I am not busy. Life is not hard. I am not exhausted. Well, in a way I guess I am. Right now we are going through a weird phase in our lives that doesn’t involve much outside of these four walls. Our days are very slow-paced and kindof unsatisfying. We do a lot of homework, reading, and spending time with each other, but the Lord in his sovereignty has not allowed us to be with the children of Guatemala much at all in the past month. Why? I don’t know. I know He has a plan. I know He is sovereign in both our lives and the kids we so long to see, but sometimes it is discouraging. In a weird way I long to be on the battlefield with Gideon following the Lord in a way that sets my heart on fire, but here I am: sitting in my bed getting homework done. Where is the ministry? Where is the fire in my heart? I love the feeling of hitting the pillow exhausted, but with a smile on my face because I know that I went out and loved God’s children hard that day. For the past month, though, I haven’t gotten that. What stuck out to me though in this verse was not the battlefield or the three hundred men, but was the phrase that said “yet pursuing.” I think we could take this verse and enter our own life story into it. We could write down all of those excuses for why our life is hard and we could spell out all the things we are struggling with, but would we be able to truthfully finish it with the words “yet pursuing?” Austin spoke on this passage during our commissioning, one of the last nights of training. I was expecting to be exhausted for these six months. I was excited for the rush of busy busy busy and going all day long. I was anticipating the feeling of being exhausted, yet pursuing. But for me in this time, that isn’t the case. Yet am I still pursuing?

Application: I will take time each morning for the next week to pray and ask the Lord how I can serve Him in the small ways that day? How I can serve Him even in just these four walls?