Is God Really on My Side?

My husband is a wild card when it comes to playing games with youth groups.  He has been known to switch back and forth to whichever team is needing a boost.  This flip-flopping is pretty obvious and appreciated in games like dodge ball, but it can be trickier in games that require stealth, such as capture the flag.  No one knows whether to tag him, run from him, or recruit him.  He is viewed with cautious suspicion until his current loyalties are made evident by his actions.  The students won’t come near him until their question is answered: is he really on our side?                 

Although we know God doesn’t shift, change, or flip-flop, our circumstances sometimes give us the illusion that He has done just that.  Then, the same question often sneaks into our hearts: is He really on my side?  Is He really with me and for me?  A posture of suspicion toward God makes believing His words and coming near to Him exponentially more difficult.  Not only that, but we find ourselves paralyzed – at a complete loss of what to do.    

The nation of Israel asked this question long ago.  As they wandered in the wilderness, they came to a place called Rephidim, according to God’s command.  One would think that a place with a name must be better than the wilderness, especially if God had specifically commanded them to go there.  However, Rephidim lacked one crucial necessity: water.  Have you ever been completely parched?  I remember feeling an urgent craving for water after spending part of a scorching summer day at the fairgrounds.  We talk a lot about being “hangry,” but I think that extreme thirst causes greater and faster changes to our disposition than hunger.  I have never experienced an equal to the frantic tunnel vision and rude desperation I felt that day.  The adults of Israel were not only feeling the effects of dehydration themselves, but they were legitimately concerned for their children and livestock.  From our perspective, they had every right to ask the question, “Is the LORD among us, or not?” (Ex. 17:7).  To them, the answer appeared to be no.  After all, their obedience to God is what landed them in this predicament.  They were so angry with Moses for taking them from Egypt just to die of thirst in the desert that they were borderline homicidal.  Their circumstances caused them to doubt God and His appointed leaders.

In their pain and fear, they completely forgot all that God had just done for them.  Were these not the same people who saw the mighty hand of the one true God as He sent plague after plague upon their Egyptian captors?  Were these not the ones whose families were spared on the night of Passover when all of Egypt grieved the death of their firstborns?  Were these not the ones who followed the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night?  Were these not the freed people who walked across the Red Sea on dry ground as the waters collapsed over Pharaoh’s armies behind them?  Were these not the same people who had already cried out for water once before and partaken of God’s provision as He made the bitter waters of Marah potable and then proceeded to lead them to the oasis of Elim?  Were these not the very same individuals who had complained of hunger and then woke to God’s abundant provision of quail and manna?  Of course He was on their side!  He had proven that fact again and again in ways that we can hardly even imagine! 

We look at all that they had seen and knew of God, and we are baffled that they could even ask the question.  Are we not the same?  Blinded by our own pain, fear, and circumstantial need, we forget all that God has done for us.  I know I am sure guilty of this.  Sometimes I get so caught up in the pain of infertility and the agony of loved ones who are fighting their own battles that I forget all of the times when I could so plainly see God’s loving hand in my life.  I forget about the wonderful childhood He blessed me with.  I forget about how He let me witness one of my best friends come to know Him.  I forget about how He held me the first time my heart was broken – and each time since then.  I forget how I have seen Him quench the chaos of the enemy in the hearts and minds of young children and teens engulfed in various cultures of darkness.  I forget how He took my train-wreck of a marriage and graciously put it back on track.  I forget all of the times I have heard His quiet voice speak to my heart.  I forget how He provided one house after another where we could keep our dogs.  I forget how He’s provided jobs, finances, friends, teachers, wisdom, and all that we could ever need in exactly the right time.  I forget how He’s called me.   

I forget how He bled for me.  How He took the penalty for my sin.  How He broke the power of sin and death in my life.  How He breathed into me physical and spiritual life.  How He has blessed me with every spiritual blessing.  Given me an inheritance.  Adopted me.  Given me value and purpose.  Saved me. 

Friends, He is on my side.  He is on your side.  He is with us and for us.  May we choose to remember and believe.    

“I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you” (Heb. 13:5b).

“If God is for us [and we know that He is], who is against us?” (Rom. 8:31b).

“I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Mt. 28:20b).

 Follow my blog with Facebook     Follow my blog with Bloglovin     Follow my blog with Instagram