A short article by Adrian Warnock – original found not least because it is also clear that the Lord sometimes departs from someone. This was a major prompt for Saul’s jealousy of David.

As usual when considering something like this it is useful to look at other passages where this phrase is used. What are the marks of The Lord being with you?

God grants you success. Here, David’s success is attributed to The Lord being with him. We see the same thing in a number of other places, including Joseph in Genesis 39:1-3, and also 2 Kings 18:7. We see in Judges 1:19 that this success is sometimes only partial.

You receive favour from others. Here we see this described as the people loving David. For Joseph the favour leads to promotion.

Some will fear you. Saul here is not just jealous but actually terrified of him. Some leaders today inspire a similar sense almost of awe. Those who do shouldn’t abuse that.

God demonstrates steadfast love to you. (Genesis 39:21)

You inspire trust from others with minimal oversight. (Genesis 39:23)

Fame may be granted to you (Joshua 6:27). When we are evaluating successful ministries today, we do well to recognise that, at least in some cases, fame will have been granted someone because God is with them. We should not reflexly reject popular ministries.

Blessing is shared with those who are associated with the one God is with. (Judges 2:18). Note that when a Judge died Gods stopped overlooking his people’s sin.

God establishes your word. ( 1 Samuel 3:19-20). A major part of leadership is making decisions and having others want to follow them. Often ineffective leader’s words “fall to the ground” and simply be ignored?

The hand of The Lord is also associated with the miraculous (Luke 1:63-66).

In the New Testament a clear mark of God being with you is a great number of people being saved. (Acts 11:21). Spurgeon urged his students to expect salvations every time the word is preached.

Why is God with some people more than others? Mostly the answer to that seems to be simply grace. God is more favorable to some than others, though he does this in order that all may be blessed through his anointed.

But we do see hints that there are some things that we can do to increase the extent God is with us. So, for example, it is said of Jehoshaphat in 2 Chronicles 17:3-4 that God was with him because he walked obediently and purely before God rather than turning after idols.

No wonder then that we are wise to pray “God, be with me!” And when selecting a leader today we do well to choose someone who God is clearly with in a particular way.

Quote from Tim Keller’s Chapter in “The Scriptures Testify About Me”:

If there is one Old Testament passage that the New Testament invites us to read in a Christ-centered way as a paradigm of Christ’s salvation, it’s the exodus.

I’ll never forget nearly forty years ago sitting in R. C. Sproul’s living room in Stahlstown, Pennsylvania. Alec Motyer, a British Old Testament scholar I had never heard of, was visiting. I was on the floor with a bunch of other college and seminary students, and Sproul said to Motyer, “Tell us about the connection between the Old and New Testaments.” Motyer replied something like this:

Think about it. Think of what an Israelite would say on the way to Canaan after passing through the Red Sea. If you asked an Israelite, “Who are you?” he might reply, “I was in a foreign land under the sentence of death and in bondage, but I took shelter under the blood of the lamb. And our mediator led us out, and we crossed over. Now we’re on our way to the Promised Land, though we’re not there yet. But he has given us his law to make us a community, and he has given us a tabernacle because we must live by grace and forgiveness. And he is present in our midst, and he will stay with us until we arrive home.

Then Motyer added, “That’s exactly what a Christian says—almost word for word.” And my twenty-three-year-old self thought, “Huh.”

What can we learn from the Red Sea crossing about Jesus and our salvation? Three lessons: salvation is about getting out, but it’s about

what we’re getting out of: bondage with layers;
how we’re getting out of it: crossing over by grace;
why we can get out of it: the Mediator.

That’s how the story of the exodus connects with the rest of the Bible. We would not make these connections without the rest of the Bible, but the connections are clear when we look at the Bible’s sweeping story line.

Dr. J. I. Packer:

“Most people in churches nowadays have never read through the Bible even once; the older Christian habit of reading it from start to finish as a devotional discipline has virtually vanished. So in describing the Bible we start from scratch, assuming no prior knowledge.

The Bible consists of 66 separate pieces of writing, composed over something like a millennium and a half. The last 27 of them were written in a single generation: they comprise four narratives about Jesus called Gospels, an account of Christianity’s earliest days called the Acts of the Apostles, 21 pastoral letters from teachers with authority, and a final admonition to churches from the Lord Jesus himself, given partly by dictation and partly by vision. All these books speak of human life being supernaturally renovated through, in, with, under, from and for the once crucified, now glorified Son of God, who fills each writer’s horizon, receives his worship, and determines his mind-set at every point.

Through the books runs the claim that this Jesus fulfills promises, patterns and premonitions of blessings to come that are embodied in the 29 pre-Christian books. These are of three main types: history books, telling how God called and sought to educate the Jewish people, Abraham’s family, to worship, serve and enjoy him, and to be ready to welcome Jesus Christ when he appeared; prophetic books, recording oracular sermons from God conveyed by human messengers expressing threats, hopes and calls to faithfulness; and wisdom books which in response to God’s revelation show how to praise, pray, live, love, and cope with whatever may happen.

Christians name these two collections the Old and New Testament respectively. Testament means covenant commitment, and the Christian idea, learned from Paul, from the writer to the Hebrews, and from Jesus himself, is that God’s covenant commitment to his own people has had two editions. The first edition extended from Abraham to Christ; it was marked throughout by temporary features and many limitations, like a non-permanent shanty built of wood on massive concrete foundations. The second edition extends from Christ’s first coming to his return, and is the grand full-scale edifice for which the foundations were originally laid.

The writer to the Hebrews, following Jeremiah’s prophecy, calls this second superstructure the new covenant, and explains that through Christ, who is truly its heart, it provides a better priesthood, sacrifice, place of worship, range of promises and hope for the future than were known under its predecessor. Christians see Christ as the true center of reference in both Testaments, the Old always looking and pointing forward to him and the New proclaiming his past coming, his present life and ministry in and from heaven, and his future destiny at his return, and they hold that this is the key to true biblical interpretation.

Christians have maintained this since Christianity began.”

– Taking God Seriously: Vital Things We Need to Know (Crossway, 2013), 21-22