(Summitview Men’s Retreat, October 21-22)
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“The LORD is with you, valiant warrior!” (Judges 6:12)
I just read these shocking words in my time with the Lord. This is what God said to the man, Gideon, at a time when all Israel was cowering in fear and defeat. Even Gideon himself was secretly beating out his meager portion of wheat in a winepress, desperate to conceal it from the powerful Midianites and Amalekites who would confiscate anything of value.
Gideon timidly asked, “O my lord, if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his miracles which our fathers told us about?”
Dear brother in Christ, have you ever been there? Are you perhaps there now? Consumed by fears, weary of battle, feeling defeated, on the defensive, alone in your fight, just trying to survive? Like Gideon, are you struggling to reconcile your circumstances with what you once believed to be true, to no avail?
Listen dear saint! God says to you now, “The LORD is with you, valiant warrior!”
Gideon saw himself as a man who was the least (youngest) of his family, whose family was the least among his tribe (Manasseh), and whose tribe was the least among all the tribes of Israel. This assessment was accurate. But… it completely failed to take into account the trump card which nullified it all: the earth-shaking promise of verse 16 where God declares, “Surely I will be with you.”
Gideon’s fledgling spark of faith was fragile. He needed many signs of confirmation. But in verse 34, when the Spirit of the LORD came upon him, he blew a trumpet and rallied with other men. Together, they readily defeated a formidable foe who (if you do the math) outnumbered them 450 to 1!
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Men! Brothers. Husbands. Fathers. Fellow soldiers! In just six weeks, we men of the tribe of Summitview, are going to blow a trumpet, rally together, and meet with the God who says to us, “Surely I am WITH YOU!”
We have not had a men’s retreat for over five years! (And we probably won’t again, for at least three more years.) So this is a RARE event and opportunity, indeed. Is it worth 24 hours of your time, to go from despondently beating handfuls of grain in a winepress… to being envisioned and empowered by God, to live out your God-given masculinity as a leader and conqueror, and to lock arms with other men who want to do the same?
If so, then it will cost you more than a trifling of your time and money. It will require faith. Faith to forget what lies behind. Faith to reject the status quo. And faith to respond to God’s invitation, and reach out for what he wants to give you, make you, and do through you.
Take one simple step in that direction. And as a band of brothers, let’s become the mighty men that God has called each of us to be.
On behalf of the Summitview pastors,
Perry
