[0:00] In 2 Chronicles chapter 20, we read in verse 17, You shall not need to fight in this battle. Set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the Lord with you.
[0:16] O Judah and Jerusalem, fear not nor be dismayed. Tomorrow, go out against them, for the Lord will be with you. You shall not need to fight in this battle.
[0:28] So, set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the Lord with you. This is a situation in which King Jehoshaphat has been subject to an unprovoked attack by the Ammonites and the Moabites, those who lived east of the Jordan, in a sense making a raid.
[0:49] That's all that we can really call it. It's not so much an invasion as a raid. The Ammonites and the Moabites were the descendants of Lot. You may remember how after Sodom and Gomorrah were overthrown, Lot fled into a mountain cave with his two daughters, who, having made him drunk, then engaged in incestuous relationships with him.
[1:12] And the offspring of those incestuous relationships became the founding fathers of Ammon and of Moab. And these nations, then, the Lord did not allow the Israelites to take over their land, just as Jehoshaphat mentioned, you know, that the Lord had prevented them.
[1:32] Verse 10, So likewise, the Edomites, descendants of Esau, the Lord wouldn't allow the Israelites to take their land either.
[1:58] But here is a raid. It's a raid obviously designed to simply take what they can of the goods of Jehoshaphat. If we were to turn back a couple of pages, we would see that Jehoshaphat is comparatively unusual, in that from the very beginning of his reign, he begins to seek the Lord, as his father Asa had done before him.
[2:20] Often a godly king in Judah was followed by an absolute pagan, and sometimes it was the reverse. A pagan king would be followed by a godly one. But here is the son of King Asa, then Jehoshaphat, becoming the king of Judah.
[2:35] Remember, a tiny kingdom. It's the old kingdom of Israel is split in half, and the northern ten tribes are now based in Samaria. So what was already a small kingdom is even smaller.
[2:47] Judah is very weak in earthly and military terms, but Jehoshaphat himself, having strengthened himself in the Lord, has built castles and watchtowers, and he has strengthened such armed forces as he has, but his defences are looking northward.
[3:05] They are looking in terms of any would-be attack from northern Israel against Judah. So such army as he has is in the north. It's not in the south.
[3:16] Such defences as he has are ranged in garrisons to protect the country from would-be invasion from the north, from the Syrians, from the northern Israelites, or from any other invader.
[3:28] What they weren't looking at was the possibility of a raid from the south. Now, if you've got a map at the back of your Bible, it might help to look at it. The Dead Sea will probably be marked there.
[3:39] About halfway up the Dead Sea, on the left-hand side, is En Gedi. It may or may not be marked in your map. Now, what's significant about En Gedi is that in the midst of that very low-lying Dead Sea plain, and remember the Dead Sea is absolutely saturated in salt, so nothing grows there.
[4:00] There's no fresh water there, except what flows down from the higher lands down into the Dead Sea. These wadis or rivers or springs or whatever, they are dry for most of the year.
[4:14] And then when you get the rains come, you'll get flash floods that then absolutely gush down the sides of these gullies into the Dead Sea, and then it could be over in a month or about. But En Gedi is a permanent spring, a constant spring.
[4:28] The N or Ayn at the beginning of the name means a spring or a well. And so here you've got this constant spring, this stream that's there at En Gedi. So anybody coming up the Dead Sea would head for En Gedi.
[4:42] They would head for that freshwater source about halfway up the Dead Sea. That would spring up at the left-hand side, halfway up. Now these attacks have come, that they have come down the south end of the Dead Sea from the eastern shore.
[4:59] They've come up at the left-hand shore of the Dead Sea there. Why would they do that? Well, we look at a map and we just see it as all flat. But with the topography of the Holy Land, remember the Dead Sea and the Jordan Valley are very, very low-lying.
[5:16] So those who are on the sort of plateau of the land to the left, to the west of that, in southern Judah, they can't see any armies that might be deep down in the gully of the Dead Sea there.
[5:28] They can't see over the cliffs and deep down there. So armies that were raiding sometimes used this route. Instead of crossing the Jordan and attacking straight into Judah, which would be the shortest route, but they would be seen, they would be known, they'd be recognized long before they got near their objective.
[5:47] They would come down the southern end of the Dead Sea, round its bottom end, and then up the left-hand side. They would always stop at En Gedi to get fresh water.
[5:57] And then you see what it says at verse 16. They come up by the cliff of Ziz. There is, in some maps, perhaps not your own, but a little bit marked about eight miles north of En Gedi.
[6:13] It is called the Ascent of Ziz. And this is a means by which it is possible, through the cliffs, to climb up out of the Dead Sea, sort of gully or defile, and up out onto the plateau of southern Judah.
[6:30] Which would mean that any army doing that is then now in the soft underbelly of southern Judah. Jerusalem is only 15 miles to the north. Tekoa is even nearer than that.
[6:42] And it's the wilderness of Tekoa that they go down to. So these people have almost kind of sprung a surprise attack on southern Judah. And Jehoshaphat is taken pretty much completely by surprise.
[6:55] At the time when they come up by the Ascent of Ziz, in verse 16, they are less than 15 miles from Jerusalem. And he doesn't have a strong enough army to defend them.
[7:07] He cannot defend himself physically and militarily against such an oncoming war. But this is possibly a good thing. In fact, certainly a good thing.
[7:19] Because it means that one who is already a godly king turns to the Lord. No doubt he musters such forces as he has as well. Perhaps he calls in his garrisons.
[7:31] Perhaps we don't know all that he does militarily. We are told that he is told to go out and face the fall such as he has. But that's not his first line of defense.
[7:44] His first and most powerful line of defense is the Lord. And this is what he does. Jehoshaphat feared and set himself, verse 3, to seek the Lord and proclaim a fast throughout all Judah.
[7:58] And Judah gathered themselves together to ask help of the Lord. Even out of all the cities of Judah, they came to seek the Lord. And it specifies in verse 13, all Judah stood before the Lord with their little ones, their wives and their children.
[8:13] Whole families were involved in this fast, in this seeking the Lord. Just as you know how we have in Zechariah in chapter 12. It says, "...The land shall mourn, every family apart, the family of the house of David apart and their wives apart, the family of the house of Nathan apart and their wives apart, the family of the house of Levi apart and their wives apart, the family of Shimei apart and their wives apart, all the families that remain, every family apart and their wives apart." Now the reason it specifies the wives too is not to emphasize separation, but rather to indicate that every part of the family is involved.
[8:55] And just as you see here at verse 13, with their little ones, their wives, their children, all Judah is trembling before the Lord here. Because if these raiders succeed, then it will be these very wives and children that will be carted off into slavery.
[9:12] It will be their homes that will be plundered. It will be their food and their riches and their wealth that will be taken. What's the incentive for the raid? The incentive for the raid is quite simply that Jehoshaphat, through his feet of the Lord and his wise governance, has begun to build up wealth and strength.
[9:33] In chapter 17, we see in 2 Chronicles from verse 10, the feet of the Lord fell upon all the kingdoms of the lands that were round about Judah. So they made no war against Jehoshaphat.
[9:46] War is an expensive business. So if you are spending money fighting wars, you haven't got money to put into your infrastructure. You haven't got money to build dams and build roads and plough fields and bring in the crops and engage in trade and markets and so on.
[10:03] Because everything's being eaten up by the military and by war and so on. So there's no war because the feet of the Lord has fallen upon the nations round about Jehoshaphat.
[10:15] Also some of the Philistines brought Jehoshaphat presents and tribute silver. The Arabians brought him flocks, 7,700 rams and 7,700 hegoes.
[10:27] And Jehoshaphat waxed great exceedingly. And he built in Judah castles and cities of store. Why do you need cities of store unless you've got loads and loads of grain to store in them?
[10:41] And he had much business, means commerce, merchandise, trafficking in the cities of Judah. And the men of war, mighty men of valor, were in Jerusalem.
[10:51] So in other words, the kingdom is prospering. Things are good because the Lord is blessing Jehoshaphat because he is seeking to the Lord in all things. But the very fact that his kingdom is prosperous makes it a target for the greedy and for those who are disaffected to the Lord.
[11:11] These Moabite and Ammonite raiders have come up under the soft undervalue of Judah to take what they can and to attack the kingdom.
[11:21] So Jehoshaphat is turning now to the Lord. He hasn't got military strength to fight them with because his men are in garrisons and castles and store cities and so on.
[11:35] He doesn't have enough military power to fight them off. What is he going to do? He turns to the Lord. And that in one sense is what we should always be doing. But the tendency of us is that if we are stronger in terms of this world, we are less inclined to turn to the God of the next world.
[11:53] Because we think, well, it's only heaven he's concerned with. He's not concerned with little me and my affairs and my daily life. He's got heaven to run. He's got big affairs of state. He's concerned with turning wars into peace.
[12:04] He's concerned with saving souls in faraway countries. He's not concerned with the nitty-gritty of whether or not I can pay my gas bill or whether or not my child can make it for this appointment at school or whatever the case may be.
[12:16] He's not concerned if I've got a cough or an ache or a pain. He's not concerned with these things. Surely. Well, he is. He's concerned with every aspect of our ordinary daily lives.
[12:28] He's concerned with those who wait upon him, who fear him, and who ask him for help like Jehoshaphat does. The Lord doesn't answer Jehoshaphat just because he's a king. Plenty of kings of Judah and of Israel were evil men.
[12:42] There had no thought of the Lord, and God dealt with them accordingly. But Jehoshaphat here, despite the fact he's a wee bit naive from time to time, and he goes and helps the northern Israelites in their battles and risks his own men, and we read in chapter 19 at verse 2, Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him, and said to King Jehoshaphat, Shouldst thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the Lord?
[13:11] Therefore is wrath upon thee from before the Lord. Nevertheless, there are good things found in thee, in that thou hast taken away the groves out of the land, and hast prepared thy heart to seek God.
[13:23] You might think, well, surely it's a good thing if Judah and Israel are getting on well together. Surely it's a good thing if they're cooperating in this way. But Jehoshaphat is one who seeks and loves the Lord.
[13:37] It was in an alliance with northern Israel, which in the days of Ahab, remember, had made it its business to hunt down the prophets and servants of the God of Israel, and to exterminate them.
[13:51] That's why in the days of Elijah, remember, there was Obed, that faithful servant, who had hidden the prophets of the Lord by fifties in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.
[14:02] Why did he have to hide them? Because Jezebel, Ahab's queen, wanted to kill them. She wanted to kill all the prophets of the Lord. It was a persecuting nation. And here was Judah going merrily, hand in hand, with northern Israel, this persecuting nation.
[14:17] It's as though if our own land had been a Christian nation, if we were to go into political alliance with a neighboring nation or another nation, somewhere else, who made it its business to exterminate its own Christians, would that be pleasing to the Lord?
[14:34] Would that be something that would be good? So he says, Now I think, well, that's a bit rough.
[14:46] You know, having a God Jehoshaphat here, who's faithful to the Lord, it is those who have the fewest sins who feel their sins most acutely. If you've got a hanky that's absolutely saturated in dirt and blood and stains and whatever, then you think, oh, dirty hanky, and you put it for the wash.
[15:04] If you've got a hanky that's pristine white, and it is absolutely beautiful. And yet there's one splob right in the middle of it. You think, wow, you really notice that one mark, don't you?
[15:15] You really notice that. If you happen to be one of the brainy kids at school, I wasn't, but, you know, maybe you were. And let's say you maybe struggle getting off 13 out of 20 or, you know, 11 out of 20, but you're the whiz kid in the class.
[15:31] You get 19 out of 20. And your dad, when you get home, might say, so what went wrong with the other point? You know, why didn't you get 20 out of 20? The one thing that's missing is the thing that everybody would focus on.
[15:43] The one thing Jehoshaphat isn't so good at, it draws attention to it. So you could say, because there's a bit of wrath in them, this is why this raid comes, this is why this little attack comes.
[15:55] We could speculate. It wouldn't really help us. But two things we should notice here. One is that when we are following the Lord, God does not say to us, yeah, follow Jesus, nothing bad will ever happen.
[16:12] It'll all be sweetness and light. You'll never get any attacks. You'll never get any problems. It'll all go smoothly. And Jesus never promises that. And yet we do tend to, we're all guilty of it, think, oh, Lord, come on, why is this happening to me?
[16:27] Why is this difficulty arising? Why is this attack coming? Why am I getting this thing going wrong in my life? Why is this happening? Surely, Lord, if I'm trying to be faithful, I'm trying to pray, I'm trying to follow you, I'm trying to do everything that you want me to do, this shouldn't be happening.
[16:43] If I'm being faithful and you love me and I love you, then these bad things shouldn't be happening. That is not what God says in his word. It is not the experience of the Lord's people.
[16:54] It is not the record of his word in the Bible. It is not what Jesus teaches. But however, what we are assured is that when these things come against us, and they may come against us because of wrath, or because of the need for a wee bit of chastisement, or discipline, or whatever the case may be, when these things come against us, if we are trusting in the Lord, we will be enabled to overcome them.
[17:21] You are not promised there will be no battles. But you are promised that if you're trusting in the Lord, then the battle is his, not yours. That if it becomes his, then his is the burden and the problem of winning it.
[17:37] You don't have to worry about whether or not you'll get a victory, because it isn't your battle. It says, that's what we read, verse 15, Thus saith the Lord unto you, Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude, for the battle is not yours, but God's.
[17:55] They may be coming against you, but they're not coming against you because you're you. They're coming against you at the human level, because they want what you've got, or they don't like what you stand for, or whatever, but really they're coming against you because you want the Lord's.
[18:11] That is why so many attacks that happen against the Lord's people, whether it's in little things in their daily lives, or major things that affect them, their families, their homes, or if it's persecution in other countries, or whatever the case may be, these things come against them because they are the Lord's.
[18:30] And ultimately, this is why this chastisement, this discipline, this attack, this threat is coming against Jehoshaphat. We can't say the reason why God is allowing it, but we can look ahead in the chapter that we read.
[18:46] We stopped, remember, with them going out to battle, verse 21, praising the Lord for a victory they hadn't yet got. But here they are, obeying the voice of the Lord, praising him as though they have already won, because God has already told them that they're going to.
[19:02] So they trust him. They walk by faith, not by sight. They don't say, oh, well, hang on a minute, Lord, you know, let's have the battle first. And then, when we've got the victory, okay, then we'll praise you afterwards.
[19:14] Then we'll give you thanks. No, they say, we know we're going to win because the Lord has told us. So here they are, praising God, going forth with victory songs, praising his name, as though we had already won.
[19:28] And then, when they had begun to sing and praise, it's significant in verse 22, if we have gone on to read it. When they began to sing and to praise, the Lord sent ambushments against the children of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir, which will come against Judah, and they were smitten.
[19:46] It was when they praised the Lord, trusting him as though they already had the victory, God began to work. God began to do the victory himself. The battle is not yours, but God's.
[19:57] Ye shall not need to fight in this battle. God said, set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the Lord with you.
[20:09] And ultimately, after they had won, verse 26 would go on to tell us, they assembled themselves in the valley of Berecha, which means the valley of blessing, or the valley of benediction, and they blessed the Lord.
[20:23] Therefore, the name of the same place was called the valley of Berecha. Then they returned every man to Judah, Jerusalem, and Jehoshaphat in the forefront of them, to go again to Jerusalem with joy, for the Lord had made them to rejoice over their enemies.
[20:37] And they came to Jerusalem with solemnities, and harps, and trumpets, unto the house of the Lord. And verse 29, if we needed a reason why God has allowed this attack in the first place, here we have it at verse 29.
[20:49] The fear of God was in all the kingdoms of those countries, when they had heard that the Lord fought against the enemies of Israel. And nobody says, oh, it's because Jehoshaphat, he's such a brilliant military commander, because his army is second to none, because you should have seen the way that he dealt with those Ammonites, and Moabites, and Edomites, oh, he fair showed them, he didn't lift a finger, he didn't do a thing.
[21:14] They came against him to attack, and they ended up killing each other, literally. They came on the battlefield, and it was all dead bodies, fallen to the earth, and none escaped.
[21:27] When Jehoshaphat and his people came to take away the spoil of them, they found among them an abundance, both riches with the dead bodies, and precious jewels, which they stripped off of themselves, more than they could carry away.
[21:39] And they were three days in gathering of the spoil. It was so much. Verse 25 there. Now, you could say, oh, that's why God did it, so they would be enriched, so they would be blessed.
[21:51] No, that's a side effect. That's a benefit. Yes, that's an added little bonus. But the reason why God does what he does, whether for good or ill, we might say, is ultimately to give glory to his men.
[22:06] And God is glorifying and showing to the world, and to the kingdoms round about. Now, this wasn't Jehoshaphat that did this, by the way. This was me that did it. This is the Lord.
[22:17] While the fear of God was in all the kingdoms of those countries, when they had heard that the Lord fought against the enemies of Israel, verse 29. And this is why they are told, verse 17, you don't lift a finger here.
[22:32] You don't do anything. You go forward. You stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord. Fear not, nor be dismayed. Go out against them, for the Lord will be with you.
[22:43] What it doesn't say is, that's okay. You don't have to lift a finger. Stay in Jerusalem. Eat, drink, be merry. Sit in your hands. Sleep. Don't do a thing. No, they still have to turn up.
[22:53] They still have to go forward. They still have to act. On what the Lord is doing. They must still do it. They must still show face. They must still turn up and go forward.
[23:06] And act on what the Lord has promised. But God is the one who does the heavy lifting. God is the one who does the fighting. God is the one who takes the battle on himself.
[23:18] And so often, even in our prayer life, perhaps, we take on battles that weren't meant to be ours. We lift up our petitions to the Lord as though they were our burden and our concern.
[23:34] And in some ways, at the surface level, they seem as though they are. But we are taught in God's word to bring our burdens to the Lord and leave them there. And if they are part of his cause for his glory, they become his burden, his battle, his concern.
[23:51] You won't need to fight in this battle because, verse 15, the battle is not yours, but God's. You bring the issue to the Lord. You lay it at his feet, and you leave it there.
[24:02] And you let him, who has the power to win these victories, let him win it. You can't win it. You don't have the strength. I don't have the strength.
[24:13] We don't have the muscle. We don't have the means. We don't have the military capability to defeat even one enemy that would come against us. We don't have the power to overcome one single sin ourselves.
[24:27] We can try and control a bad habit. But as most of you, I'm sure, will know, and as I certainly know, you can win a victory against Satan ten times in a day.
[24:38] And the eleventh time, he'll come back and get you. Just because you've won a little skirmish here and there doesn't mean you've won a battle. He will always win against you because he is a spirit.
[24:50] He is a fallen. He is an angel. He is demonic power. You and I, we are just flesh and blood. We don't have the strength that he has. He is not afraid of you.
[25:02] He is terrified of Christ. Christ is the one who has already defeated him. That is why when Jesus would come across somebody who was demon-possessed, the demon would cry out and say, what have we got to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth?
[25:17] They don't address the person who's demon-possessed. They don't address the person and say, oh, lead me inside so-and-so. I'm very comfortable here.
[25:27] They're not concerned with the person at all. They're not afraid of that person. They're terrified of Jesus. And the devil is still terrified of Jesus. God alone has the power to defeat him.
[25:39] Don't make it your battle when you haven't got the strength of it. The battle is not yours. It is not mine. It is God's.
[25:50] You shall not need to fight in this battle, but you still need to turn up. You still need to do what the Lord requires of you. You still need to go forth into the battle.
[26:03] Now, because Jehoshaphat went forth in the battle, because he was ready to stand and be faithful and go forward praising the Lord, trusting in him, what fell upon the nations round the bank was the fear and the knowledge that God fought Jehoshaphat's battles for him.
[26:21] If he had stayed in Jerusalem, eating and drinking and being merry and forgetting about it, oh, the Lord's got it all in hand. I don't have to worry about it at all. I can do what I like. I can be whoever I want. God will do it all for me.
[26:34] Then not only would God not have fought the battle, because there wouldn't have been a battle to fight, but also, even if they had still slaughtered each other, people would have said, that was a strange thing that happened in the wilderness of Tekoa.
[26:46] You know, the Edomites and the Anilites, they all pounded each other. What a curious thing. I wonder why that happened. By the way, he left an awful lot of spoil behind and we really managed to fill our pockets with that.
[26:56] Where's the glory to God? Where's the glory to Jehoshaphat? Where is the winning formula? Because if Jehoshaphat hadn't acted on what is promised and prophesied, if he hadn't responded to this attack in the feet of the Lord, even if the enemy had ended up killing each other, there would have been no glory, no victory, no enrichment of himself and his kingdom.
[27:21] He would have lost out on so much if he hadn't been prepared to do the thing he was afraid of. To take the Lord's strength to himself, but still to go out and face the enemy.
[27:36] When David faced Goliath, did we really think he wasn't afraid? Did we really think he was just a cocky little teenager with a slingshot? He said, no, I'm going to win this. He said, no, you come against me, he said, with a spear, a stave, a shield, but I come against you in the name of the Lord, whose armies you have mocked.
[27:56] The battle is not mine. The battle is not yours. The battle is the Lord's. Be not afraid, verse 15, nor is made by reason of this great multitude, but the battle is not yours, but God's.
[28:11] Very few of our attacks or our problems or our difficulties come singly and individually. I don't know about you, but certainly my life constantly seems to be, I could manage fine with this problem or that problem the next day, if all these other ones would get out of the way.
[28:28] If they would just leave me in peace to focus on this particular issue or that particular problem, I can handle it fine, but they never do. You didn't get a rain shower that's just one rain drop.
[28:39] You get a deluge, it's going to soak you. You get problems that come in by the tongue, by the difficulty. They are a multitude of enemies in that sense.
[28:50] You are not to be afraid of those enemies. The battle is not yours. It never was. The battle is God's.
[29:01] And you bring these things to the Lord. It's not like, well, I can set my hands, I'll just take it easy, let the Lord do it. Does Jehoshaphat take it easy? No, he takes the threat seriously. He feared, verse three, and set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah.
[29:19] And Judah gathered themselves together to ask help of the Lord. Even out of all the cities of Judah, they came to seek the Lord. Time enough for feasting when the victory is won. Just now they are fasting.
[29:31] Just now they are praying. Just now they are coming together to the temple. Men and women and boys and girls and little babies. Little infants as well. It says they are little ones, their wives and their children.
[29:44] They are all gathered as families before the Lord. They are feeling before the Lord, but they are bringing their burden to the Lord. And God speaks to them. Now when the Spirit of God speaks, he is not a respecter of persons.
[29:59] It doesn't say, and the Lord filled so and so, the high priest, who came out of the temple and said this to Jehoshaphat. It's not a great big person. I don't think we probably hear about this individual who gets filled with the Spirit here before or since.
[30:14] It's Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat the son of Zethaniah, the son of Benaiah, the son of Jehiel, the son of Mataniah, a Levite of the sons of Asaph. Now the sons of Asaph tended to be singers, those who sang the praises in the temple.
[30:25] They didn't tend to be prophetic individuals. They weren't big high priests. They weren't great men in the religious hierarchy of Judah. This was an ordinary commoner garden little Levite, upon whom the Lord poured out his spirit, filled him with his spirit, and opened his mouth.
[30:44] The wind bloweth where it was to. Now he is the sound of it, but canst not tell when it's come upon it, where it goes. So is every one that is born of the spirit. God works as and when and how he chooses, through such individuals as he chooses.
[30:59] This individual, we don't hear of him before, we almost certainly don't hear of him again afterwards. But for now, he is given this word that makes the difference between victory and defeat.
[31:09] Makes the difference between joy and blessing and overcoming the enemy, or just continuing to tremble. Tomorrow will go ye down against them. Behold, they come up by the cliff of Zirz.
[31:20] Ye shall find them at the end of the brook before the wilderness of Jeriwab. Ye shall not need to fight in this battle. It doesn't mean you don't turn up. It doesn't mean that you just act as if everything's okay and you don't have to worry.
[31:33] You act with solemn responsibility. You go forward as though you were to fight, but you trust that the actual fighting will be done by the Lord.
[31:44] Ye shall not need to fight in this battle. Set yourselves. Stand ye still. And see the salvation of the Lord with you. Tomorrow go out against them, for the Lord will be with you.
[31:59] Now you notice Jehoshaphat's response. He teaches the people, tells the people to start praising God for what he believes he has already done.
[32:10] And this response pleases the Lord. When they began to sing, verse 22, and to praise, the Lord sent ambushments against the children of Ammon, and Judah.
[32:21] The battle is in yours. The battle is in mine. The battle is the Lord's. It's whether or not we are prepared to act on that in faith, to walk by faith and not by sight, because I guarantee you, in this coming year, there will be multitudes of problems will come against you.
[32:41] Multitudes of difficulties and challenges, and you'll think, why, Lord, is this happening to me? I'm trying to seek you. I'm trying to be good. I'm trying to be faithful. I'm trying to be a good person. Why is this happening to me?
[32:52] Lord, it shouldn't be happening to me. If you love me, you wouldn't let this happen to me. Bad things will always keep happening. And some of them will happen precisely because you are the Lord's.
[33:03] They will raid, they will attack, and sometimes they will come up at the soft underbelly that you weren't prepared for. Maybe somebody you love. Maybe a child in your family.
[33:13] Maybe a relative or loved one that you thought, well, if it was me, that would be fair enough, but surely not them. The devil will always attack when he thinks you are weakest. But it doesn't make any difference to the battle.
[33:25] The battle is still not yours. The battle is the Lord's. Take it to the Lord. Make it the Lord's. Lay it down before the Lord. Fast, pray, do whatever it takes, but bring it to the Lord.
[33:38] And let him fight for you. Let him deliver the victory. Let him show you how weak you are, but how strong he is. That there is nobody that can win against the Lord.
[33:52] The devil is not afraid of you, but he is terrified of Jesus. Ye shall not need to fight in this battle. If you make the battle, the Lord's.
[34:03] The problems that come against you, the challenges that you face. Yes, you must work. Yes, you must make whatever preparations are appropriate and right in the situation.
[34:13] But don't make the battle yours. The battle is the Lord's. Let him fight it. Ye shall not need to fight in this battle.
[34:24] Ye shall not need to fight, we might say, in this coming year. Whatever be the enemies against you, whatever be the challenges, the problems, make it the Lord's fight and let him win the victory.
[34:39] Let us pray.