God's Hedge of Protection

“And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.”  Genesis 21:6

The miracles of God sometimes are so self-evident that we cannot help but express our gratitude and thanksgiving - like Sarah when Isaac was born - for God’s personal intervention into our lives. Many, if not most of the miracles of God, are never seen by His people.

Just like children are unaware of unwavering oversight exercised by their parents both by day and night, followers of Jesus are overshadowed by the Holy Spirit’s protection. God did not rescue you from sin and death and leave you to the will and ways of the evil in this world. God has chosen you to be His child and will guard over as you as you walk with Him.

The people of God are blessed with divine intervention in their lives. Oftentimes we are not aware that God has imposed Himself in our daily walk with Him. The intervention and protection of God often is not seen in the human understanding and takes place in the spiritual dimension.

We are warned in God’s word that we have a spiritual enemy who seeks to do us harm:

“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” (1 Pe 5:8) We are told in the same passage that we have a responsibility to, “…resist stedfast in the faith…” (1 Pe 5:9)

Satan and his minions are indeed seeking to overthrow you! They employ tactics both in the physical and spiritual dimensions to cause you harm. God works in the shadows of the human dimensions that separates the spiritual from the natural world to hold back the hounds from hell from gaining access to you.

God is in the hedge-building business. The Bible talks about how God goes about building hedges around His chosen people, keeping Satan’s “…fiery darts…”(Eph 6:16) from reaching you.

Circumventing the devil by building hedges to keep you from going out where harm would be done to you is a different approach in how God protects you from damage as well.

When Job was under attack by Satan himself, he complained to God saying, “Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side?” (Job 1:10) The implication is clear; Satan and his hounds are on a leash that God holds and God is protecting you from harm by not allowing Satan and his minions access to you.  

God also builds hedges to keep His people from harming themselves. Hosea was chosen to show God’s love and willingness to preserve God’s relationship with His people. Hosea was instructed to marry a woman who would be continually unfaithful to him in their marriage vows. The purpose of this was to provide an illustration of God’s relationship with the people of Israel, who had been unfaithful to Him by practicing idolatry.

Over and over again, his wife Gomer would slip away and join herself to other men and over and over Hosea would go and retrieve his wife. God, using Hosea’s marriage to Gomer as an example of God’s grace and mercy to the unfaithful nation of Israel, said  “Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.” (Hos 2:6)

God is at work in our lives with His Spirit blocking access to evil so our lusts will not turn into sin. James, the brother of Jesus, said, “But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.” (Jas 1:14)

Gomer would be “drawn away” by her lust and “enticed” into sin. God’s response was to hedge her in so her sinful lusts could not be accessed. Jesus explores these two types of hedges when He was speaking to His disciples about prayer. In His example of prayer Jesus said, “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil…” (Mat 6:13)

When Jesus said “and lead us not into temptation” He was not declaring that God would lead you but that we would be preserved from the temptation that would lead us into sin. This is the “Gomer’s hedge wall” that keeps us from harming ourselves with our own lusts. This is God’s divine protection given by the Spirit of God that keeps us well-looked after in this sin-filled world.

The words spoken by Jesus “deliver us from evil” speak to the hedge built by God that keeps evil from having access to us. Just as Job had been protected from Satan, so are you. God stands guard over you limiting evil power from having access to your life.

Rest well, my friend. God is superintending your life and watches over you both day and night. You can lay your burdens on Him and find peace and comfort knowing that Jesus is building you a home in Heaven and His Father has built a hedge of protection around you.