The Lord fights our most strategic spiritual battles in ways human effort can’t accomplish. It is simply a work of God.

Elisha was living under the threat of death from the king of Israel. A famine in the land had become so great that a mother ate her son and the dung of a dove sold for half an ounce of silver. Not only was the famine severe, but the nation’s finances were also in jeopardy with desperate people spending precious metals like silver to pay for a substitute of a healthy diet.

Elisha then prophesied that a great change of events would occur to make the people of Israel aware that God was in charge even in their time of suffering. The assistant to Elisha didn’t have the faith to believe what God could do and said, “That couldn’t happen even if the Lord opened the windows of heaven” (vs. 2). There was even a famine of faith in the nation.

Four lepers sitting at the city gate concluded they were going to die anyway from the famine so why not just surrender to the Aramean army and take their chances? When they arrived at the enemy camp they made a startling discovery, “When they came to the edge of the camp, no one was there for the Lord had caused the Aramean army to hear the clatter of speeding chariots, and the galloping of horses and the sounds of a great army approaching. They said, ‘The king of Israel has hired the Hittites and Egyptians to attack us!’ So, they panicked and ran into the night, abandoning their tents, horses, donkeys, and everything else, as they fled for their lives” (vs.5-7). The lepers ate the abundant food left behind and plundered the gold and silver. Then they returned to the city to let the people know what happened.

A team of scouts riding two chariots was sent out to investigate if the report from the lepers was true. They followed the trail of the escape of the fleeing Aramean army “following a trail of clothing and equipment that the Arameans had thrown away in their mad rush to escape” (vs.15). They returned to the king and told him what took place. They had discovered an empty enemy camp.

This is how God fights our enemies when we are living in what appears to be a hopeless place. The result of His intervention in a conflict will cause unexpected victories to happen that we could not imagine in the weakened state of our faith.

God will cause the enemy to hear the equivalent of “the clatter of speeding chariots and the galloping of horses and the sounds of a great army approaching” (vs. 6). He will disarm the present-day tactics and equipment used by the enemy to assault God’s people.

What is facing us at this time in history with a plan to come against us will be dismantled by the Lord to such a degree that the assembled enemy forces will flee in fear and panic as God begins to move on their encampment. Left in the trail of their defeat will be the debris of compromised theologies within the Church, the failing mouthpiece of the media used to transmit a false narrative, and the elements of a message of fear declaring a hopeless future. We serve a miraculous God who always has a plan of intervention and redemption when the future appears hopeless.