800:1 Odds
2 Samuel 23:8
June 12, 2022
Last week we started talking about a guy named Benaiah who wrestled with a lion in a pit on a snowy day and walked away from it victorious. He also took care of a rather tall Egyptian and a couple of heroes from Moab. Some of us would say Benaiah was courageous, some might say he was a little crazy, maybe a lot crazy.
But we can learn from him, because lots of us have fears of walking into some unknown area and having to face a lion, when in reality, God is calling us to move forward and if God is calling us, then by all means we should follow the call of God
As I said last week, many of us are waiting for God to give us opportunities that are safe, but I believe God is waiting for us to seize those opportunities which are above what we think we’re capable of doing - - - because the only way we can do them is through the power of God in our lives.
This is the second in a three-sermon series on David’s mighty men. I want to introduce you to a man named Josheb. His story is a whopping 1 verse. It’s found in 2 Samuel 23:8 - - -
8 These are the names of the mighty men whom David had: Josheb-basshebeth a Tahchemonite; he was chief of the three.
He wielded his spear against eight hundred whom he killed at one time. - 2 Samuel 23:8
I want that guy on my team. I’m not sure how 800 cannot defeat 1, but when I watch movies and see a bunch of guys against one, they all seem to take their turns, otherwise they run into each other and I would guess after a bit, some seem to fade away as they realize their not winning the battle.
Josheb didn’t back down. The odds were totally against him, in fact 800-to-1 odds is pretty awful. We wouldn’t even place a bet on our favorite team with those odds. I mean the odds of the Bears winning the Super Bowl are 65 - 1. The odds of the Cubs making it to the World Series is 90 - 1. I wouldn’t even place those bets, even with your money.
The odds were totally against him, but if you remember the theme for this series is to follow God’s call AND with God there is no such thing as impossible. When the odds seem impossible, that’s when God does His greatest miracles. But we have to have our eyes, spirit and heart open.
If it was simple, where would the glory for God come from? If it was easy, and we could all do it, then we would say, I did it. I didn’t need God, who needs God when it’s a simple fight. I mean, put me against most 3 year olds, and I don’t think I’m going to run away. Put me against some big dudes, and I’m thinking about how to escape or hide.
We base a lot of our life’s choices on the odds. If it seems possible, doable, then we are more apt to go after it. We tend to avoid the situations when the odds seem against us. But when we do that, aren’t we robbing God of the opportunity to do something supernatural?
If Josheb goes up against me, honestly, who cares. That’s not going to get him anywhere on his resume. 800-to-1 odds?! Now we’re talking about someone I want as one of my bodyguards. And more than that, David called Josheb to be the chief of his 3 mightiest warriors. It doesn’t get much better than that.
Some may say it was a chance encounter. And maybe it was. Maybe he was in the wrong place at the right time. But the issue is what he did with it. Of course, let me stop for a moment and say, don’t go out tomorrow and quit your job willy nilly. Use God’s leading and wisdom to make those decisions. Don’t jump at nothing. Jump because God told you to jump at the opportunity.
But I don’t believe this was a chance encounter. I believe this was a God ordained moment. I don’t believe in coincidences. I believe coincidences are really God in disguise. That’s crucial to understand and really to believe in. I’m not a big person to wish you luck. Luck is chance. Maybe I’ll roll a 7, maybe not. That’s luck in my opinion.
Instead I believe God has all of this under His control. Even when it makes no sense. Even when we look up and we see our enemy, 800 strong . . . even when we see that lion staring us down . . . even when we see 2 heroic big dudes coming at us. God has it under control.
I love the story in Daniel of Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego. These guys were faithful to God, but they were in ancient Persia, taken from Jerusalem when the people were exiled. They didn’t care about worshiping the gods of the Persians. It was against the law to not worship their gods, but they didn’t care.
So, they were set up and captured and stood before the king.
14 Nebuchadnezzar said to them, “Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods or worship the golden image that I have set up?
15 Now if you are ready when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe,
and every kind of music, to fall down and worship the image that I have made, well and good.
But if you do not worship, you shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace. And who is the god who will deliver you out of my hands?”
16 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter.
17 If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king.
18 But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.” - Daniel 3:14-18
One of the things I love about this passage is that the king gives them an out. He says, ‘when you hear the music, fall down and worship our gods and I won’t throw you into the fiery furnace.’
They know if they don’t worship the image, they’re breaking the law and as much as the king didn’t want to kill them, it was out of his hands. The law is the law. If he lets them go, he looks weak. So, they’re thrown into the fiery furnace.
After they’re in the furnace, Nebuchadnezzer looked into the furnace and said - - -
25 “But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.” - Daniel 3:25
Isn’t that great. They followed the call of God. I think walking into a fiery furnace is pretty much a guarantee of death. But this time it wasn’t. These guys believed they would come out alive, but they were also realistic. They told the king, ‘if we don’t make it, know we were always true to our God, not your cheap, worthless idols.’
We just don’t know where or how God is going to show His power and majesty. We have to be open to His calling, even to take a risk, which isn’t always easy.
Sometimes faith is taking the first step before God reveals the second step. We don’t always get the play book before we start the game. I once read a leadership book called Building the Bridge as You Walk On It. That’s a great title and illustration of what we’re called to do. You walk on the bridge as you build it.
The greatest illustration is from the movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. They’re in search of the Holy Grail and Indiana Jones has to cross an invisible bridge, with the only clues coming from a little book of notes.
He has to take a step of faith onto a bridge he can't see. That if we were to really admit it, it’s difficult to take. We tend to trust in what we can see and taste and touch. We don’t like moving into the unknown, yet often times that is exactly the call of God.
It’s to fight those addictions
To do battle with the ways the world is pulling us
To embrace the call to go to war with the enemy
It’s to make the difficult decisions, yet the right decisions
And at the same time . . . and this is the beauty and power all wrapped together . . .
It’s to intentionally move towards God.
To follow His call in our lives.
To discern and talk and pray
It’s making a difference because God has made a difference in our lives.
Think about concentric circles. You know what it’s like when you drop a rock into water and you see the impact and then the ripples. Those concentric circles ripple out further and further and further.
The same is true of our lives. Every action we take, every decision we make has a cause - and - effect impact beyond our ability to comprehend and beyond our ability to control.
Our actions and inactions, our decisions and indecisions have a ripple effect way beyond us. We don’t recognize and maybe we just don’t believe that there’s an impact from the decisions and non-decisions we make in our lives. But there are. We just don’t always see their results.
My point is that all of our decisions make a difference. What God is planning today is going to come to fruition, maybe not next week or next year, maybe not in our lifetimes, but in God’s plans which are above our plans, it’s going to happen on His timetable, ultimately for His glory.
You are one risk away from a totally different reality.
You are one idea away from a totally different mentality.
You are one decision away from a totally different eternity.
I would assume Josheb was NOT looking for 800-to-1 odds. It just happened. It was God ordained, but not in his mind when he woke up that day. Josheb didn’t think, ‘hmm, I wonder what it would be like to go against 800 enemies. When it all happened, I wonder if Josheb panicked, if he saw the 800 as a really big problem, or did he reframe it and see this as an opportunity.
In the same way, I don’t believe Benaiah was looking to hunt lions in the snow, and in a pit. It wasn’t on his honey do list. But, when it happened, he didn’t run away, he jumped into a pit with the lion and walked away.
I guess what I’m driving at is this . . . what are we doing that will make a difference, not just today, but in 10, 20 or 50 years?
I don’t want to have regrets at the end of my days. I also really don’t want to be wrestling 500 pound lions in the snow or fighting off 800 dudes who want me dead. But maybe God is calling me and you to chase after something way, way bigger than me and you. What opportunities is God placing before you?
Let me end with this thought . . .
In 1761, James Otis resigned his position as advocate general for the royal colony in Massachusetts because he was conscientiously opposed to the writs of assistance that had been levied by Great Britain on the colonies.
James Otis wrote . . . “Taxation without representation is tyranny.” James Otis argued against taxation without representation with such fervor and such candor that John Adams said Otis is the one who started the Revolution.
After hearing John Otis’ courtroom speech in February of 1761, John Adams wrote, “Then and there the child Independence was born.”
James Otis didn’t set out to start a revolution. It wasn’t a bumper sticker campaign. He just acted according to his convictions.
Here’s what I’m getting at: what you do makes a difference. But it’s the little things — the small acts of kindness, the sacrifices you make that no one sees, the prayers you pray that no one hears, the little steps of faith that scare you to death.
That’s how the kingdom advances. It’s when one person has the courage to raise his spear against 800 because he knows he isn’t outnumbered, not if God is on his or her side. If God is on your side, the odds are in your favor.
Your mission from God may not be a spear.
It may be a speech.
It may be on the job
It may be the way you love someone
It may be the way you teach a student
It may be the way you are generous
It may be radical kindness
It may be sacrificial love, grace and mercy
It may come through God’s power and strength.
I don’t know what it will be, but this I do know. We have a God who is bigger and greater than we can imagine and as Paul is writing to the Ephesian church, telling them not to lose heart because of his suffering in Ephesians 3, he wrote - - -
14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,
15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named,
16 that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being,
17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith — that you, being rooted and grounded in love,
18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,
19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
20 Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us,
21 to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. - Ephesians 3:14-21
It’s a prayer for you and I to be filled with God’s fullness, His strength would reside within us; we would know we are rooted and grounded in Christ’s love; that we would have the strength to comprehend just how much God loves you; that God’s love surpasses our ability to comprehend; and to believe and trust that God is able to do more than we could ever imagine or ask or think.
That’s the God who will never run from us, yet, it’s the same God who calls us to come to Him, so He can strengthen, encourage, comfort and lead us into the world so that we could make a difference in His name!
Let Him fill you and move you . . . follow the Lord . . .
A 3 part series based on the book In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day and sermons from Mark Batterson
