Sometimes the Explanation is GO

​I’ve encountered a mess or two in my life. More than a few, if I’m being honest—and plenty of them were messes of my own making. Either way, in the middle of some of the messiest messes, I’ve found myself asking, God, where the heck are You?

Have you ever asked someone a question, only to realize they aren’t going to answer it? Either they stay silent, or they say something that doesn’t remotely sound like a response to what you asked.

Gideon had this experience with God once.

He was in a mess. And right in the middle of it, God showed up and called Gideon a mighty warrior. Because that’s exactly what you want to hear when you’re losing a battle with your mess, right? Someone calling you a warrior?

Especially when that someone is God.

Gideon responded out loud with a question I’ve often kept to myself: If I’m such a mighty warrior, then why am I in this mess? And while we’re at it, God, why did You wait until my life fell apart before deciding to show up?

God’s answer? Almost dismissive. “Go in the strength you have and save Israel.”

I’ve come to realize something: there are times in life when God doesn’t feel the need to explain His whereabouts in my messes. Not because He’s indifferent, but because He understands better than I do that the answers I long for aren’t found outside the mess. They’re found going through it.

God showed up to remind Gideon that he wasn’t in a mess because he wasn’t a warrior—he was in a mess because he was a warrior who wasn’t acting like one.

How many of our messes come not because we aren’t strong enough to face them, but because we refuse to be strong enough?

How many messes feel overwhelming because we assume God isn’t with us—when, in reality, the mess is the very place He’s calling us to find Him?

We will all face personal messes. We will all face cultural messes. And there is a spiritual enemy that wants us to believe the mess is too big to tackle. Too big for us. Too big for God.

This enemy wants to leave us in a state of shouting, “Where are You, God?”

But in the mess, God wants us to hear: “Go in the strength you have.”

Not as a scolding, but as a reminder.

Because the strength you have? It’s more than enough for the mess when that strength is God.

There are times when our children are begging us to explain ourselves. And there are times when we simply tell them - Go.

We are children who more than ever need to hear - go in the strength you have.

Pastor Robby Hilton says, "sometimes the why isn't understood in a conversation, it's understood in the going."

Go.