Jonathan’s Robust View of God

God is big. He cares for us. He doesn’t need us, but He is willing to use us to accomplish his merciful intentions.

This is the truth that Jonathan, the friend of King David, believed with all his heart.

Jonathan was the son of King Saul – the same king who tried to eliminate David. Yet Jonathan and David were close friends. They didn’t have the whole Bible, like us. There was a lot of information about God that they didn’t understand. What they did have was a deep, intimate relationship with the LORD – the national, yet personal, God of Israel.

Sometimes it doesn’t matter how much we know, but how much we believe. So much of the Christian life is about downloading what’s in our heads into our hearts. Jonathan knew, and believed, these truths.

During one of the perennial wars of the Hebrews against their Philistine oppressors, Jonathan suddenly devised a bold plan. He determined to march right into one of the Philistine fortifications, alone except for his armor-bearer, and start killing Philistines. The pagan invaders were mistreating God’s people, dishonoring God, and someone needed to stop them.

The fortification was almost impregnable, set on a rocky hilltop, and Jonathan and his armor-bearer had to clamber up on their hands and feet just to get inside. Right before they went in, Jonathan revealed his robust view of God to his armor-bearer:

“Come, let us go over to the garrison of these uncircumcised. It may be that the LORD will work for us, for nothing can hinder the LORD from saving by many or by few” (1 Samuel 14:6).

What a robust view of God! Jonathan is about to risk his life, but he is brave and manly. He is filled with faith. The righteous shall live by faith, we are told, and Jonathan is certainly living by faith. Henry Scougal defined faith as the spiritual counterpart to sight, the ability to ‘see’ what is spiritually true, and Jonathan’s actions demonstrate this sort of faith.

But more important than Jonathan’s faith is the God he serves. Here is a God worthy of our admiration, praise, and faith. He is a God who saves – not just one who uses his immense power chaotically, to destroy or build up at random. No, He is intentional in his purposes. He works out rescue, deliverance, for His people.

Nothing can hinder Him. He needs no human strength to accomplish His purposes. By the breath of His mouth the wicked are destroyed, and in an moment He could set all things right. Yet He is content in Himself. He works in more majestic, sweeping ways. His Providence is more like the mighty tide of an unstoppable ocean, than a sudden, instant solution.

Nothing can hinder the LORD from saving by many or by few. That is why He often chooses to use people. Sometimes he uses those who are filled with faith. Sometimes he even uses the godless, to show that he can use any tool and override even the most wicked intentions; but often, those who have the clearest view of Him are His special tools. Jonathan entered the fortress, wreaked havoc among the Philistine oppressors, and began a Hebrew revolution among his countrymen.