Faith Capsule: Failure to keep testimonies terminated the Israelites in the wilderness.
1 Samuel 17
The word of God that never fails promised, “Blessed are those who keep His testimonies, who seek Him with the whole heart!” (Psalm 119:2) There is good in keeping testimonies of God and there is evil in not keeping His testimonies.
The good of keeping the testimonies of God are evident in David’s life:
David waged a victorious war against Goliath through testimonies. (1Samuel 17:33-47)
David kept God’s testimonies and sought the Lord with the whole heart and God declared him as a man after His own heart (1Samuel 13:14)
David kept the testimonies of God and sought God when he went all out against Goliath. It was the testimonies of God that granted David the permission to go after Goliath when he spoke to King Saul “Your servant has killed both lion and bear; and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, seeing he has defied the armies of the living God.” Moreover David said, “The Lord, who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, He will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine and Saul said to David, “Go, and the Lord be with you!”” (1 Samuel17:36-37)
At the time he was to unleash his force against Goliath, he spoke in Goliath’s face, “Then David said to the Philistine, “You come to me with a sword, with a spear, and with a javelin. But I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you and take your head from you. And this day I will give the carcasses of the camp of the Philistines to the birds of the air and the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.” (1 Samuel 17:45-46)
The evil of not keeping the testimonies of God is evident in the journey of the Israelites in the wilderness:
The failure to keep His testimonies terminated the Israelites journey in the wilderness. Act of complaining is avenue to termination. Rebellion is encased in complaining. Due to their incessant complaining against what God was doing in their life, God responded in Numbers 14:22-23, “Because all these men who have seen My glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have put Me to the test now these ten times, and have not heeded My voice, they certainly shall not see the land of which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected Me see it.” God promised to take them to the Promised Land. He showed them great and mighty signs in Egypt, and on their way out of Egypt but they could not remember to cling to God’s testimonies.
Prayer for today: Ask for the grace to know and be a keeper of God’s testimonies.