NO OUTSIDE HELL
For I was ashamed to require of the king a band of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy in the way: because we had spoken unto the king, saying, The hand of our God is upon all them for good to them that seek him; but his power and his wrath is against all them that forsake him. So we fasted and besought our God for this: and he was intreated of us.
Ezra 8:22, 23
Ezra had made great claims for his God and now he was ashamed to ask assistance from the king. And well we may be, but some of us are not. We recite: “Some trust in chariots and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the Lord our God”; we boast that our God is able to deliver us; but in an emergency we go to Egypt for help or borrow the militia of Artaxerxes. King Asa, after God’s mighty deliverance from the Ethiopians, made a league with Syria when Baasha threatened him. Hanani, the seer, said, “Herein hast thou done foolishly.” And we always do foolishly when we sing and preach about a God who supplies all our need and then beg help from the ungodly.
It ought to embarrass us to ask help from this world. We do not need its assistance. Let us beseech our God, and He will be entreated of us.