Not by Might, a devotional thought

In Hosea 1:7, we come across one of the central themes of the Old Testament Scriptures, but also one of the most difficult to hang on to. God’s talking about an Assyrian invasion which is just around the corner for his people. He's just finished saying that, although the Northern Kingdom of Israel will not escape destruction, he will have mercy on Judah (the Southern Kingdom). Then in verse 1:7 comes the stop-you-dead-in-your-tracks qualifier: Judah's deliverance will not come about "by the bow, nor by the sword, nor by battle, nor by horses, nor by horsemen" (i.e. not by any of the worldly ways you'd expect deliverance to come); rather it will come from the Lord their God, and him alone.

I call it a stop you dead in your tracks verse, because it sort of forces me to think about what I'm trusting in for "deliverance," however I happen to define deliverance in the given moment. Am I looking to the very same things everyone around me is looking to? (scientific know-how, maybe? performance excellence, perhaps? financial security? the latest ministry product guaranteed to revolutionize your church? You name it.) Or am I trusting in, and waiting on, especially, and before anything else, the Lord my God?

I think this question needs regular revisiting, because the tendency to start looking for a better bow, a sharper sword, a faster horse, or what have you, is very real; it's like a gravitational pull in the Christian life. Hosea 1:7 is God's urgent call to defy gravity, to resist the allure of better-bow-building, and to depend wholly on him. Like it says in another place, "Not by might, not by power, but by the Spirit of God."