Life Around "The Fire"
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Life Around "The Fire"
Guest Speaker Trevor McMahan: The 10 Spiritual "Tribes" Every Believer Must Overcome
Trevor McMahan returns for part two of his illuminating exploration of 1 Samuel 8, where Israel's fateful decision to demand a king reveals profound spiritual lessons for today's believers.
McMahan masterfully decodes the spiritual significance behind Israel's request to "be like the nations around us," unveiling how this seemingly simple desire represents a failure to overcome the spirit of covetousness. Drawing from Genesis 15, he identifies ten spiritual "tribes" every believer must conquer – from fabricated accusations and religious traditions to fear of failure and victim mentality. These aren't merely ancient challenges; they're the very battles we face in our modern spiritual journeys.
What makes this teaching particularly powerful is McMahan's revelation about God's timing. Israel wasn't wrong to want a king – God had actually promised them one through David's lineage, which was already being established. Their failure was in rushing ahead of divine timing, settling for Saul instead of waiting for God's perfect kairos moment to raise up David. "When God orchestrates things and sets things into His place, into His timing, He has set the provision for the vision," McMahan explains, offering hope to listeners navigating their own seasons of waiting.
The message culminates in a liberating truth: believers don't need earthly authorities to rule over them because they already have access to the greatest King – Jesus Christ. By keeping our eyes fixed on Him rather than coveting what others have, we position ourselves to overcome every spiritual battle with divine assistance.
Have you been rushing ahead of God's timing or comparing yourself to others? This episode might be exactly what you need to realign with divine purpose. Reach out to us at lifearoundthefire@gmail.com with your thoughts and questions as you apply these timeless principles to your spiritual walk.
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Shalom to you and your home.
All right folks, I want to welcome you back to part two of Trevor McMahan. Thank you, Trevor McMahan, who's our guest today, bringing to us part two from the book of 1 Samuel, chapter eight. Once again, trevor, it's a pleasure. Have at it, brother, amen. Thank you again, trevor, it's a pleasure.
Speaker 2:Have at it, brother. Amen. Thank you again, brother. So we left off and we had read through 1 Samuel, chapter 3, and we were discussing about Eli's sons and how that Samuel had learned from Eli the negative side of that and raised his sons in apathy, essentially, and allowed them to go about doing things that were atrocities in the Lord's sight. Well, israel had actually witnessed all of this going on and were actually bringing this before Samuel and honestly believed that this is one of the main reasons that they were petitioning Samuel to go before the Lord to ask them for a king, or one of the reasons. So let's pick up.
Speaker 2:In 1 Samuel, chapter 8, verse 20, and I want to discuss this a little bit so it says we want to be like the nations around us. Our king will judge us and lead us into battle. This is extremely important. I'm going to try to break this down in a way that really opens our eyes to what it's like and the harm of looking around us and envying what they have going on. I want to take us all the way back to Abraham whenever he made that covenant, because, like I said before, I like to examine the origins of things to be able to get a deeper grasp of what's going on here, and in Genesis 15, 18 through 20, or 18 through 21,. Whenever God makes the original covenant with Abraham, he lists 10 tribes that he's going to have to overcome in the land, and those 10 tribes, incidentally, have names and those names have meanings. And what opened my eyes was whenever I was going through this, god had actually shown me that every church is going to have to defeat all of these tribes also, and so, individually or maybe corporately, you may be going through this exact same battle. And so as I list these names, you can probably check mark different battles that you've gone through in your own life or that you're going through today.
Speaker 2:So I'll start off with the first one. It's called Kenites, and the Kenites name means fabricator, or lies or accusations. So there's going to be people that come against you Fabricating false lies and accusations to tear you down. Then there's the Kenites Kenizzites it means possessor or spirit thrower, essentially covetous then. So the spirit is going to come on you and try to get you to long to have what other peoples have. Then there's the kabbanites it means ancient way. So essentially it's it's the religious spirit or tradition spirit that causes you to come in to be like, well, they've always done it this way, so the lights in the building, they're a hundred years old, so they still work, so we can't change them because they've been here always like this. That's a religious spirit that comes over you, the Hittites. The name means terror or fear of failure, so I mean that's a huge one in ministry. Well, you know we don't want to reach out and break new ground because you know it might be more expensive or the economy is looking kind of dressed, so we're not going to go and break new ground. Or you know we're not going to go downtown in that area. Or you know we're not going to go downtown in that area because you know it's a little scary, that spirit of terror or fear of failure.
Speaker 2:Then there's number five, the parasites, which means squatter or apathy. They will take over because your apathy didn't drive them out. This is a pretty interesting one, because in Texas they have a law that if you actually live on someone's property for seven years, you can actually claim that property as yours. And it's the same thing with sin. Jesus said a little leaven leavens the whole lump, and so essentially, to allow sin to just sit in your presence and not address it. Or, like Eli and Samuel, they just did not address the atrocities of their sons and apathy took in this spirit of parasites.
Speaker 2:Number six is the raphaim, which essentially means giants, and they cause you to flee and run away. There's the amorites, which means sayer. It means always speaking about you in a negative sense. So essentially you would walk up into a crowd and they would just stop talking as soon as you walk up and that spirit would tell you they're talking about your clothes. You're dressed funny, you smell bad or they don't like you. That's that spirit of Amorites. Then there's the Canaanite spirit. It means zealous, it means to move quickly before God's timing. That's a big one.
Speaker 2:There's the Girgashites. It means stranger. You will feel out of place. This one happens in churches. So like you'll have people in your church for like 10 or 15 years and then all of a sudden, just they'll be like man, I just don't feel the spirit here, no more, I just don't feel right here and they'll get up and they'll leave. Normally they're the ones that will not ever participate or help out with student ministry or children's ministry or with the trash, or picking up or cleaning the building. They don't want to carry the water, and so that's that Girgashite spirit that they're a stranger.
Speaker 2:Then there's number 10, the Jebusites. It means downtrodden, it produces anxiety and depression, not doing enough mentality or victim mentality. So these are the 10 tribes that God had told Abraham, the father of Israel. God had told Abraham, the father of Israel, or that Israel comes down through his line, that Israel would have to overcome. And so now we come all the way back to our story where Samuel is sitting there in front of Israel and Israel's petitioning him to go before God. So the tribe that Israel is facing right now is the Kenizzites, the possessor, the covetousness, and they had came into this place where they did not defeat that tribe, the spiritual part of the tribe, and they were looking to their neighbors and they're longing to have a king to rule over them. And then also they were looking into the Canaanite spirit, that zealous spirit to move before God's timing. Now, this is extremely important to the Canaanite spirit because a king was actually promised to Israel and whenever I was doing the research for this, god really opened my eyes to it that if you read in Ruth, chapter 4, and it talks about that Ruth gave birth to a son. That son was Obed. He was the father of Jesse and Jesse was the father of David. And these lineages were in or alive at the time that Samuel was petitioning God for a king. So God had already had it in place in order set up to have David reign as king. But the Israelite people were going before God, before its time, petitioning for a king. So God gave them Saul, which he pronounced would rule over them, take their children, send them to war, take their crops. And so they still, even with all of that negative information, still were like, yes, give us a king to rule over us.
Speaker 2:God's timing is so important in our lives. The Greeks actually realized this, and so they gave two different words for time. One is chronos and one is kairos. Chronos is like the circular pattern of time, like on a watch. You have one o'clock, two o'clock, three o'clock, four o'clock. It goes in a pattern. Kairos is like the opportune time, like today is the day of salvation, or just at the perfect time Jesus Christ entered the world, and so God has a perfect timing for everything.
Speaker 2:Now I don't know about you, but I've been in that zealous place before in my life. I'm actually a victim of doing that quite often, that I would get out before God's timing just being a doer. But God has me working on this place of sitting back and relaxing in His rest and waiting for His opportune time for things to happen. Because whenever David took the throne, god had established everything in order to work out for his plan and his purposes. Saul was a struggle the whole time, cursed the whole time, and so whenever God orchestrates things and sets things into his place, into his timing, he has set the provision for the vision. Every single time, if we walk in that divine order of God, things work on our behalf.
Speaker 2:So I really want us to learn from Israel and these 10 tribes that God has set before them and I know that every person that is listening right now is struggling with at least one of these battles and so God had promised for seven of these that he would overcome them. In Deuteronomy it's in Deuteronomy 7.1, if you want to look it up there's seven tribes that God had promised Israel that he would overcome with them. And so if we rely on God in his perfect timing, he will handle these situations for us. He will handle these situations for us. He will show us the exact measure, the exact way, the exact timing to overcome them. Man, that's good for me.
Speaker 2:I've been going through battles left and right. I feel like the world was caving in on me, but when God has shown me that I'm not anybody special, that he is not a respecter of persons, that every person that is created in this universe has gone through these same struggles, and that he is faithful to bring us through them, that he will turn all these things for his good, because we are called by him and we love him. And so I just want to encourage you today.
Speaker 2:I want you to look at this story of Israel at a time of desperation, a time when they had came into the subjection of the flesh and they had started to look around at the pagan kings around them and had longed to have somebody rule over them, to have somebody rule over them. You don't have to have somebody rule over you. Today you can have God, almighty King, jesus, be your Lord and Savior. He has so much greater things to you, and this podcast is what my brother David he constantly talks about is the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of heaven has a king and his name is Jesus, and we get to be a part of that kingdom now. So don't be subjected, don't like get caught up in looking to your left and looking to your right and longing for what your brother or sister or this country has. Keep your eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and finisher of your faith. He is a good king and he loves you deeply.
Speaker 1:Sir, thank you. I would say a very loud amen to everything that's been spoken and, once again, terry, would you please just say a word of prayer with us concerning the things that you just shared. Absolutely, brother.
Speaker 2:Father, we love you, we love you, we love you, father. Father, right now, as I speak, I ask that your Holy Spirit would just come and embolden each person under the sound of my voice, that the Holy Spirit would just rise up inside of them to take their rightful place in the kingdom of heaven, to walk in boldness, authority and, most importantly, love, and to trample over the enemy's head everywhere they go. And, father, I ask that you would keep their eyes fixed upon you. Father, I speak peace, I speak love over every person under the sound of my voice, and I thank you in Jesus' mighty name.
Speaker 1:Amen, Folks, we love you. If you have any thoughts, questions, concerns, please feel free to just fire us an email at lifearoundthefire at gmailcom, or you can just type in Life Around the Fire and look us up on the web. We would love to hear from you. In the meantime, God bless you. Adios amigos.