The Invisible Army

Once upon a time, in a land far far away, there was a mighty king who ruled over a vast kingdom. Now the king had a good friend, a wise man, that knew God. He spent many hours every day, talking to God, getting to know Him better, and listening to what God had to say. Often, God would tell this man messages to pass on to the king. At one point, enemies of the king plotted to come capture the man who loved God and conquer the king's kingdom. So they mounted a large army and went to the town where the man of God was staying.
Early in the morning, the servant of the man of God awoke and saw this large army approaching in the distance. He was terrified! He immediately ran to the man of God and asked him, "Oh, my lord, what shall we do?!" But the man of God was not at all worried. "Don't be afraid!" he told his servant. "We have way more people on our side and can easily defeat this army." But the servant was not convinced. He did not know what large army the man of God was talking about. They did not have soldiers at their beck and call. He was convinced the man of God was going crazy! But then, the man of God prayed, "O Lord, open his eyes so he may see." Then the Lord opened the servant's eyes. In the hills around the house he saw hundreds of thousands of horses and chariots... all made of fire! Then the servant knew, the Lord would protect them from the evil that was approaching. He did not have to be afraid.
(My paraphrase based on 2 Kings 6: 8-17)

Someone brought this passage to my attention today in our morning Bible study, and I had to share it! I hope you don't mind that I took a little liberty to add my own flair to the story. You really ought to go read it straight out of the Bible. So often, I think we overlook the Old Testament as not having enough lessons we can pull away for every day life. We prefer the New Testament where we do really quick devotions. We can read 5 verses and have enough wisdom for days. That way we can check our devos off in less than 5 minutes. But the thing I love about the Old Testament is the stories. It is people's every day life. The things they did right and the things they did wrong in their lives... and even better, the things that God did in their lives. Stories like this one remind me how much we need to trust God, even when we can't see him working.