Exodus 17:8-13

Introduction

  • People’s awareness or memory about what the Bible actually says is not headed in the right direction.
  • One of the most popular sayings attributed to the Bible:

God helps those who help themselves.

  • Origin: It is one of Aesop’s fables.
  • For the most part, God will not do for you what He enables you to do yourself.
  • From a human perspective, the whole story of God’s people and their faith journey begins with a single word: help

The Need for Help

  • We often experience a resistance to asking for help.
  • If we don’t get help, things can become much worse.

The Cry for Help. (Exodus 2:23-25)

  • God helps people who ask for help.
  • One of the Bible’s favorite words to describe God is our help. (Psalm 46:1, Psalm 121:1,2)
  • Instead of self-help, the Bible calls us to a life of prayer.
  • Self-sufficiency is a prayer-killer.

We believe in prayer.  Then why don’t we pray?  The real reason is, we have nothing to pray for.  We have everything we want without praying.
Charles Allen, All Things are Possible through Prayer

God teaches about the power of PRAYER. (Exodus 17:8ff)

“Choose some of our men and go out to fight the Amalekites.Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hands.”

  • What we pray matters much less than who we pray to.
  • When we pray, a power is released that is beyond what is seen.
  • You and I were not made to live on our own power. We were made to live in dependence on God.
  • We were not meant to do battle alone.

When we admit: “I need help”

  God is Able God is Willing
Ephesians 3:20

  • To do what we ask
  •  All that we ask
  • More than
  • Immeasurably more
 

– To become one of us

-God learned firsthand
​what it is like to need help.

Where do you need help from God?
God helps those who cannot help themselves.

Help from Others

Who is your Aaron and Hur?

The Real Battle

  • Is not on the field but on the mountain
  • Is holding up hands toward God, letting go of self-suffiency and pride, stubbornness and resistance.