Weapons of Mass Destruction or Extremly Heavy Paper Weights?

It was a typically warm 2008 July afternoon near the Baltic sea village of Swibno, Poland. A light and airy breeze whispered through the needles of the tall pines that towered just 230 feet from the public beach that was already beginning to fill with the normal traffic of a summer day.

The man who had stopped to survey this scene smiled within himself as he bent down to pluck another  mushroom for his near filled sack when he spied something that captivated his attention. It looked like a bullet sticking out of the pine needles that had packed over the years into a hardened mass. He reached for the bullet and discovered to his surprise that it was in fact an entire belt of rusted ammunition that was fed into what turned out to be an intact German machine gun from World War Two.

What the mushroom picker would later discover is that directly under his feet was at that moment over one hundred and fifty thousand pounds of explosives that had been buried years before by the occupying German armies of the Third Reich. Just a stones throw from a public beach was buried over twenty thousand pieces of explosive that were potent enough in themselves to "Rip an arm off". They were manufactured and designed to destroy but ended up unused and long since forgotten about. Still dangerous, but no longer a threat to the targets that they were intended to hit.

I had been studying the first accounts of creation in the book of Genesis and had posted three posts that broke down Genesis 1:1.  "What's next", "I was here from the start", and "Created by God" . 

In the process of reading that passage and the ones that followed it i came across a word that i absolutely LOVE!

“And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul”~ Genesis 2:7

The word is "FORMED".

The word "Formed" here means; "Created or fashioned to accomplish a desired goal, outcome, or result."

.I have always heard it said that God made man to give God pleasure, glory and fellowship. I see it this way, God personally formed man for the express purpose of being in His presence.

Every other act of creation was a thought followed by the words, "Let there be!" With us, it was a thought followed by the personal act of "Forming" with the desired goal, outcome, and result of man to be in His presence.

You were handmade to specifically be in the presence of the creator!

The word "formed" with this same meaning is also found in the book of Jeremiah.

"Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations."
                                                                                                                  ~Jeremiah 1:5

Jeremiah was helped by God to understand his very life's message to the world and God drops this bomb on him to emphasize the point. "I not only "Formed" you to be in my presence, i "formed" your life to breathe a specific message to the world around you!"

Wow! So if God personally created me to be in His presence, and He personally handmade me to have a specific message or purpose to the world around me...what does that have to do with a pile of hand grenades found in Poland?

I am glad you asked!

There is another place where this word, "Formed" is used and it has the same meaning.

"No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper..." ~Isaiah 54:17

 

God used Isaiah to tell a nation of His people that "Even though the weapons that were Formed (with the desired outcome, result, and purpose of destroying them) were in fact Formed and ready to be used, they would NOT prosper".
The weapons would still be manufactured, ready, and lethal but they would not be able to be used against the targets they were intended to be used against.

“Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil,” ~Ephesians 6:11

This passage tells us that our adversary has prepared an arsenal of inventory designed to destroy the believer. Ironically the thing that causes his weapons to be unable to complete the task for which they were "Formed" is the same thing that enables the believer to complete the task for which they were "Formed".

"This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh." ~Galatians 5:16

This passage tells me that when i walk in the Spirit, which indwells me as a believer, then I can render the weapons of mass destruction of the enemy for my life to be useless.

Weapons of mass destruction or just extremely heavy paper weights?

The choice is mine and the choice is yours!

When I do not walk in the Spirit Not only am I not following the purpose for which i was "Formed",  but i allow the weapons of the adversary to fulfill the purpose for which they were "Formed".

The rusted weapons found in Poland were a stark reminder that it is possible for weapons to not be used against the ones they were intended to be used on. I would like to encourage you today to take a minute and ask the Lord to renew your understanding of his "Forming" of you. Renew to your mind the "Message" that He placed within your very core that He "Formed" you to deliver to the world around you.

In the post, "You Had It All The Time"  I revealed a message that i know as sure as i know my name that God created me to speak with my life to those that He places in it. God gave you a message and He can bring that to your mind today!

What is it you will be able to see today?

Weapons of Mass Destruction or Extremely Heavy Paperweights?

Climbing with you,

~Dan