for the LORD is not restrained to save
by many or by few."
I Samuel 14:6
Over the years of reaching out to aborting moms & dads with the gospel of life & eternity I have often been tempted to bemoan the fact that so very few Christians were willing to commit to evangelizing at abortion clinics every week. Now that I have served in this mission field of blood for 17 years I have come to see things differently. It has been my observation through study of the scriptures that the Lord is looking for ways not to INCREASE the numbers of those in His service, but to lessen their number by defining who IS & who is NOT a servant of the most High God. Consider the story of Gideon's army in Judges 7:
And the LORD said to Gideon, “The people are still too many. Take them down to the water, and I will test them for you there, and anyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall go with you,’ shall go with you, and anyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ shall not go.” So he brought the people down to the water. And the LORD said to Gideon, “Every one who laps the water with his tongue, as a dog laps, you shall set by himself. Likewise, every one who kneels down to drink.” And the number of those who lapped, putting their hands to their mouths, was 300 men, but all the rest of the people knelt down to drink water. And the LORD said to Gideon, “With the 300 men who lapped I will save you and give the Midianites into your hand, and let all the others go every man to his home.”
Judges 7:4-7
God provides that the praise of victory may be wholly to Himself, by appointing only three hundred men to be employed. Activity and prudence go with dependence upon God for help in our lawful undertakings. When the Lord sees that men would overlook Him, and through unbelief, would shrink from perilous services, or that through pride they would vaunt themselves against Him, He will set them aside, and do His work by other instruments. Pretences will be found by many, for deserting the cause and escaping the Cross. But though a religious society may thus be made fewer in numbers, yet it will gain as to purity, and may expect an increased blessing from the Lord... They grudged not at the liberty of the others who were dismissed...
Yes; (1.) God would hereby show that when he employed suitable instruments in His service Ge did not need them, but could do His work without them, so that He was not indebted to them for their service, but they to Him for employing them.
(2.) He would hereby put those to shame for their cowardice who had tamely submitted to the Midianites, and durst not make head against them, because of the disproportion of their numbers...
(3.) He would hereby silence and exclude boasting. This is the reason here given by him who knows the pride that is in men’s hearts: Lest Israel vaunt themselves against me. Justly were those denied the honour of the success. My own hand hath saved me is a word that must never come out of the mouth of such as shall be saved. He that glories must glory in the Lord, and all flesh must be silent before Him...
Cowards would be as likely as any, after the victory, to take the honour of it from God, and therefore God would not do them the honour to employ them in it...
Note, Fearful faint-hearted people are not fit to be employed for God; and, among those that are enlisted under the banner of Christ, there are more such than we think there are. (2.) He directed the cashiering of all that remained except 300 men, and he did it by a sign: The people are yet too many for me to make use off...
God saith, they are too many, and, when diminished to a third part, they are yet too many, which may help us to understand those providences which sometimes seem to weaken the church and its interests: its friends are too many, too mighty, too wise, for God to work deliverance by; God is taking a course to lessen them, that He may be exalted in His own strength.
~ Matthew Henry
May the Lord count us worthy to be one of His faithful few warriors in the battle for life & eternity, & may we always remember that the glory belongs to Christ alone.
Patte Smith
Sanctuary Ministries
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