We Can Defend Our Own Hill of Beans Like Shammah

The scripture I woke up and heard in my mind today is this one.

Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses. 1 Timothy 6:12

I like the part where it says, "Take hold of the eternal life."  take hold of His grace, take hold of His love, take hold of His abundant (eternal) life.

At times, I get frustrated in this single world. It's new territory since I've not been in a bad relationship for 23 years and I am avoiding bad relationships with a man or with other women. Especially since I've not had many dealings with single men my age in 15 years. I was mostly in contact with married men at church and through work.  It was about a month ago, I told my daughter how I wished I had all the restaurant money or gas money I spent on single events, because I don’t see where it made any difference or a hill of beans in life.

My daughter said, "Yeah mom, but if you would have not sat down with those singles than what else would you have done?" She has a point.  My friends on Facebook said I could be wasting a lot of money on hitting a golf ball around and people spend a lot of money on concerts and Colt’s tickets.  So maybe spending money on a couple single retreats is not so bad even if I wonder what it accomplished in my life.  I like getting a lot of freebies in life and my spouse always got free tickets to the Pacer’s game, Verizon VIP tickets and the 500 Race.  My daughter has gotten me free tickets to the NFL experience and to travel because her former roommate’s husband is an airline pilot.   I recently got two free airline and hotel nights by listening to some vacation resort presentation.  It says in God’s word, “Freely we have received freely give.”  Matthew 10:8

David’s time as a shepherd with all those sheep could have been extremely boring.  Moses spent 40 years in the wilderness to get all that Egyptian thinking out of his head. Paul said he spent 15 years before he went up to preach, which I am glad he did since he was formerly murdering Christians.  Jesus spent up to 30 years preparing for his ministry.  Joseph spent something like 14 years in prison not including living in slavery.  Noah preached to a whole generation and it was like they had deaf ears, he did not save any of them to come into his ark.  My frustration exactly in not finding people to come into my boat at times….LOL

It’s nice to know that God records the conversations when we talk about him.

Then those who feared the Lord talked with each other, and the Lord listened and heard. A scroll of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the Lord and honored his name. Malachi 3:16

I found a commentary about a man after I was thinking about a “hill of beans” in the Bible who defended his own hill of beans so maybe God does not see this as useless/worthless. I do like coffee beans!

“2 Samuel 23:11 Shammah the son of Agee was one of the mighty men that David mentioned as he listed heroes. "And after him was Shammah the son of Agee the Hararite. And the Philistines were gathered together in a troop, where was a piece of ground full of lentils: and the people fled from the Philistines, but he (speaking of Shammah) stood in the midst of the ground, and defended it, and slew the Philistines: and the Lord wrought a great victory.

Shammah stood his ground against a band of foraging Philistines, but what makes this story so meaningful is what he was defending a patch of lentils (beans). This man fought like fury to defend a hill of beans. He laid his life on the line for a hill of beans and he won. The Bible calls that victory a great victory.  Why? What is so important about this hill of beans? The patch of lentils in itself is not important, but what was represented is all important. That was a part of God's promised land. It wasn't very much, but it was something. The enemy wanted it back. The enemy wanted the fruit of their labor.

The people had claimed the land and had possessed God's promises. Then, they had developed it. It was bearing fruit. Then along came the Philistines; they wanted to consume the fruit of the labors of God's people and then get the land. When you give a Philistine an inch, he take an acre. “

Fight the good fight of faith. I have constantly stood my ground concerning God giving us a good Christian marriage, and I've been encouraging other divorced women and widows.

I was at Marsh Supermarket last night and this lady about bumped into me and I saw “Federal Express” on her shirt, and I know my single friend has been working two jobs -one at Federal Express so I knew that was God’s clue that I need to pray for her! Than the next morning she emailed me to pray for her about her two jobs and I told her, “God has your back, he has you covered, he showed me to pray for you.

God cares about us defending our hills like my friend working two jobs, and it says he has the number of the hairs on our head all numbered.

And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Matthew 10:30