Context No. 3266 of 4322 · 1 Maccabees

1 Maccabees 4:26-33: in context

26The foreigners who had escaped came and told Lysias all the things that had happened. 27When he heard of it, he was confounded and discouraged, because the things he desired had not been done to Israel, nor had such things happened as the king commanded him. 28In the next year, he gathered together sixty thousand chosen infantry and five thousand cavalry, that he might subdue them. 29They came into Idumaea and encamped at Bethsura. Judas met them with ten thousand men. 30He saw that the army was strong, and he prayed and said, “Blessed are you, O Savior of Israel, who defeated the attack of the mighty warrior by the hand of your servant David, and delivered the army of the Philistines into the hands of Jonathan the son of Saul, and of his armor bearer. 31Hem in this army in the hand of your people Israel, and let them be ashamed for their army and their cavalry. 32Give them faintness of heart. Cause the boldness of their strength to melt away, and let them quake at their destruction. 33Strike them down with the sword of those who love you, and let all who know your name praise you with thanksgiving.”

Lysias gathers a large army to crush the Jews, and Judas Maccabeus meets him with a far smaller force. Facing the odds, Judas does not boast of his men's strength; he prays. He remembers how God once defeated the giant by the hand of David and delivered an army by Jonathan and his armor-bearer, and asks God to hem in this army and strike them down by the hand of those who love him.

His prayer is all memory and dependence. Judas grounds his courage not in his own numbers but in what God has done before, victories won by God's hand rather than by human might. He asks God himself to fight, to act again as he had acted for David and Jonathan. When outnumbered and afraid, faith remembers God's past deliverances and pleads with him to move once more, rather than trusting in its own resources. Courage that lasts is rooted in the memory of what God has already done.

When I face something far larger than my own strength, do I ground my courage in remembering God's past faithfulness and ask him to act, rather than relying on my own resources?

Sources

1 Maccabees 4:30: "Blessed are you, O Savior of Israel, who defeated the attack of the mighty warrior by the hand of your servant David."
1 Maccabees 4:33: "Strike them down with the sword of those who love you, and let all who know your name praise you with thanksgiving."
1 Samuel 17:47: "The battle is the LORD's, and he will give you into our hand."