Then the Rabshakeh said to them, “Say now to Hezekiah, ‘Thus says the great king, the king of Assyria: “What confidence is this in which you trust? You speak of having plans and power for war; but they are mere words. And in whom do you trust, that you rebel against me? Now look! You are trusting in the staff of this broken reed, Egypt, on which if a man leans, it will go into his hand and pierce it. So is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him. But if you say to me, ‘We trust in the Lord our God,’ is it not He whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and said to Judah and Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem’?”’” 2 Kings 18:19‒22
Like the Assyrians who tried to conquer Jerusalem, the world puts its confidence in all the wrong places. It puts its confidence in physical things, such as silver and gold, even though such things are easily lost or destroyed. It puts its confidence in numbers, despite the fact that the majority is very often in the wrong. The world puts its confidence in flesh and blood, even though every human being will eventually let you down. It also puts a great deal of confidence in feelings, even when God says that our feelings are not reliable guides. Where then should we place our confidence?
We should put our confidence in heavenly things, not physical. Heaven is the only true “safe deposit box” that there is anywhere. Instead of storing up treasure here on earth, Jesus said, “Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal” (Matthew 6:20). Paul wrote, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth” (Colossians 3:2). Paul may have lived as a pauper (1 Corinthians 4:9–13), but he expected to inherit an incorruptible crown (2 Timohthy 4:8).
We should put our confidence in the One, instead of the many. Gideon defeated a great army with only 300 men and one God at his side (and one gets the idea that Gideon and the 300 were not critical to the success of that campaign). Goliath swore by a Pantheon of gods; David needed only one––the same God who later saved Judah from the undefeated Assyrian army. Paul writes, “Let God be true but every man a liar” (Romans 3:4), and again, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (8:31). We don’t need to please the world, because the world can’t save us; only God can do that.
We need to put our confidence in the cross, not the flesh. Paul put his confidence in something better than this life (Philippians 1:21), having “no confidence in the flesh” (3:3ff). Paul tells that, after his conversion, he “did not immediately confer not with flesh and blood” (Galatians 1:16). He did not need anyone’s seal of approval––not even the apostles’––for his confidence and boasting were now in the cross (6:14). The psalmist was right when he said, “It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man” (Psalms 118:8).
We need to put our confidence in God’s Word, not our feelings. This is because, unlike our ever-changing feelings about things, God’s word never changes or fails. The psalmist summed up the power of God’s word: “He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast” (Psalms 33:9). Isaiah wrote, “All flesh is grass, and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, because the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever” (Isaiah 40:6–8).
Like Israel of old, God’s people still make the mistake sometimes of putting their confidence where the world does, but if we will trust in God, we can be the most confident people in all the world!