Cooperating With God's Omnipotence

Photo by Pietro Rancan on Unsplash

Then came Am′alek and fought with Israel at Reph′idim.

And Moses said to Joshua, “Choose for us men, and go out, fight with Am′alek;

tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand.”

-Exodus 17:8-9

Rightly, we think of God as all-powerful, but then we draw a false conclusion: God, therefore, should eradicate all evil or, at least, the evil we see in our own lives. Sacred Scripture, though, has a different understanding of the way in which God exercises His omnipotence.

The battle of Amalek against Israel recorded in Exodus 17:8-13 provides a good understanding of how God wants us to fight evil. Amalek marches on Israel with the intention of killing every last one of them. The Israelites prayed for deliverance, but God did not snap His fingers and make Amalek and his army disappear. No. God fully expected the Israelite army to march out of their camp and fight Amalek's army to the best of their abilities. Trusting in and obeying God, the Israelite army did just that. Also, obeying and trusting in God, Moses, Aaron, and Hur went to the top of a hill overlooking the battlefield, where Moses lifted up the rod of God in his hands. "Whenever Moses held up his hand, Israel prevailed; and whenever he lowered his hand, Am′alek prevailed" (Exodus 17:11). After a time, Moses grew so weary, that Aaron and Hur pulled up a rock on which Moses sat, then they held up Moses' arms until Israel won the battle. In this way God and the army of Israel cooperated with each other in eliminating the evil threat of annihilation by Amalek's army.

This short passage provides us with incredible insights into how we are to conduct our battles against evil. First, we are to pray to God and ask for His help. We, then, are to march out of our own camps and confront the evil ourselves trusting that God will help us. We do not have Moses holding up his arms, but we do have the priest holding up the Sacred Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. The Blessed Sacrament, greater than any rod, strengthens and encourages us to overcome the evils we combat in our lives. As long as we receive Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we prevail over the evils. When we do not receive Our Lord, the evils prevail over us. Just as the Israelites could not prevail over Amalek, when Moses dropped his hands, we cannot prevail over evil, when we drop the Eucharist out of our lives.

Likewise, the Israelites did not prevail by only having Moses raise his hands with the rod of God nor did they prevail by only executing great strategic and tactical plans. While receiving the Blessed Sacrament is integral to prevailing over the evils in our lives, our actively fighting against these evils is equally integral. We cannot remain in our homes or in our churches praying and going to Mass and expect the evils we face to simply disappear. Again, the reception of the Blessed Sacrament is integral to prevailing over evil, but nothing will get done until we exit our homes and our churches and take on these evils head on. Yes, God is omnipotent, but He wishes to exercise that omnipotence through our actions.

In Christ, we have everything we need to prevail over the evils we see and despise in our own communities. We have only to trust God, receive Christ in the Eucharist, and engage head on those evils. By cooperating with God, we will prevail over the evils we see all around us.