A Simple Faith
"Come, and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised: it may be that the Lord will work for us: for there is no restraint to the Lord to save by many or by few." 1 Sam. 14:6. To Jonathan, the Philistines, whatever their numbers and prowess, were simply "these uncircumcised." They were men not in relationship with God. On the other hand, Israel was in relationship with God, hence the twice-repeated covenant name "Jehovah." Faith in Jonathan, therefore, could see no difficulty. If God was not with the Philistines, they had no real power. If God was indeed with Israel, then almighty power was at hand, if only there were faith to use it. How charmingly simple is all this!
Have we learned the lesson? Do we deplore the lack of power visible in the Church today? Is not the Church still the temple of God, and does not the Spirit of God still abide therein? (1 Cor. 3:16.) What do we want more than just the simple faith to go forward in dependence upon Him?
Jonathan felt, and rightly, that if God were moving, numbers mattered nothing. "There is no restraint to the Lord to save by many or by few." Gideon accomplished the deliverance of Israel with only three hundred men, furnished, not with weapons, but with pitchers, lamps, and trumpets (Judg. 7). Paul reminds us that "neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase." 1 Cot 3:7. Two or three humble men, without visible resources, moving about preaching the gospel of Christ, were once described as "these that have turned the world upside down." Acts 17:6.
Moreover, Jonathan had the consciousness in his soul of his link with the people of God—with Israel. Hence his words in verse 12, "The Lord hath delivered them into the hand of Israel." We observe the same feature in David when he went forth to encounter the giant, "that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.... He will give you into our hands." 1 Sam. 17:46, 47. In both cases there was no independent action. The faith was indeed their own, but they acted for and with the nation that God owned as His. Saul was utterly destitute of this feeling, hence his words in 1 Sam. 14:24, "mine enemies.”
In all our labors and conflicts, let us never forget that we are part of a great, divine unity, the body of Christ. The mass of our brethren may possibly be in a spiritually low condition, but they are our brethren nevertheless. The Church, whatever its state, is still owned of God in the earth. We serve, therefore, as representing it, and for its edification and blessing.
Jonathan asked God for a sign, and He was graciously pleased to grant it. The two men proposed to discover themselves to the enemy, and if the enemy said, "Tarry until we come to you," they would remain where they were, and see what God would do. But if the enemy said, "Come up unto us," they would accept the call as assurance from God of a complete victory. Let us not miss the lesson of this sign. "Come up unto us" was the language of complacent security. A single boulder would have easily destroyed two men clambering painfully up rugged rocks, yet no boulder was rolled down upon them, so secure did the Philistines feel, and so deep was their contempt for the two climbers. Nothing is more deadly than a human sense of strength and security. But nothing is more blessed than a spiritual sense of weakness and dependence upon God. Let us cultivate the latter increasingly.
As soon as Jonathan and his armor-bearer reached the top, they began to slay, and simultaneously the Lord caused an earthquake. Panic ensued. The Philistines fled hither and thither, apparently killing one another as they went. Thus did God work for the discomfiture of the insolent foe.
Saul's watchmen reported the commotion, but the king was not in the secret. Neither was the priest, who at the king's bidding brought thither the ark and began to inquire of God, receiving, however, no answer. God was not interested in these religious formalists, but was acting altogether apart from them, as He has frequently done down to our own day.