Mon.’s Devo - Blessings of Obedience

Read Ex. 23:20-33 God sent them an Angel (capital “A”) to not only lead them but make sure they stayed “in the way” and made it to the desired end. An angel has been assigned to each of us to do that very thing: keep us walking with God and make sure we make it to our destiny. Isn’t that comforting? This Angel is to bring them right to the enemy and cut them off so they can’t hurt them. While they are in the land of their enemies they are not to let them influence them in their idol worship, but they are to overthrow them and bring their gods down. If you serve the Lord then he will bless your bread and your water and take sickness away from you. Your women will not miscarry their babies or be infertile. You will live all your days. Your enemies will fear you and they will be destroyed before you. God will send hornets to drive the Hivites, Canaanites, and the Hittites out of the land little by little so they will be able to occupy the land as they leave. Don’t make any compacts or covenants with them or their gods. If you let them stay in the land they will cause you to sin and be a snare to you. All this is promised to us if we walk in God’s ways and choose to be holy. We have unseen enemies in our land like anger, jealousy, envy, unforgiveness, hatred, unbelief, and deceit. If we trust in the Lord, he will drive it out little by little so we can occupy our land (our minds). We want instant change, and sometimes God does that, but usually it is little by little. Now I know why. If he does it all at once then we have too much unoccupied land that the “beast of the field multiply against thee”. This means that if you are instantly delivered of a sin that occupies your thoughts most of the time then you have a huge gap in your thinking and you have to replace it with something. If you aren’t prepared for that you might be tempted to fill it with another vice just as bad, where if you are delivered little by little then you learn to replace the thoughts with scripture or good things till you are completely thinking godly thoughts. Lord, help us to walk in these blessings as we train our bodies to submit to your ways.