The Fruit of Conflict
"Out of the spoil won in battles did they dedicate to repair the house of the Lord" (1 Chron. 26:27). The margin gives a slight variation - "Out of the battles and the spoil did they dedicate to repair the house of the Lord."
The emphasis for this moment is not so much upon the battles as upon the one word here which is translated "repair." The word really means to strengthen, to make sound, to consolidate. There are battles connected with the building - we know something about that - but here they are not particularly related to the original building. When the building is done, it needs preserving, it needs its original splendour maintained, its first glory kept; there needs to be something that can maintain it according to God's first thought in it; and if this word is to be taken as it stands - repair, maintain, preserve, strengthen, consolidate (the Authorised Version does translate it "maintain") - then it is something which has to go on after the work of building. It looks like a reserve that they had against the building falling into disrepair. I think it is just there that the force of the whole verse rests. "Out of the battles and the spoil." or, if you prefer it, "Out of the spoil won in battles did they dedicate to maintain the house of the Lord."
Conflict Allowed by Divine Sovereignty
Well, the message in that is, I think, very apparent. It lies right on the surface. Divine wisdom working sovereignly ALLOWS conflict, as a way to keep things strong, pure and healthy. Battles seem to be necessities for the very purity of that which the Lord is seeking to have. Conflicts, in the Divine judgment are essential to maintenance. We do not always look upon them like that; indeed, it is very often difficult so to regard the terrific conflicts into which the Lord's people individually and collectively are so frequently thrown. We know something about the conflicts. It is not necessary for me to tell you that there are such things. We know that they are increasing in their intensity, and sometimes they get almost, if not altogether, beyond our powers of endurance. It seems there is very little "let-up" in the number of battles that have to be fought. It is in the plural here - "Out of the battles..." You and I know a good deal about the battles, the real spiritual battles, the enemy coming in like a flood, the fury of the oppressor, the constant effort on his part to break and to destroy us. Our question often is as to why the Lord allows it. We are hardly out of one before we are in another; and there is no doubt about it, the Lord allows it. It may be that there are some things which could be cut short and put back, but on the whole, the Lord allows His people to know very much conflict and pressure; and as we enquire why, this little fragment does give us at least a part of the answer. When we examine the history of things, we can see it is quite true that any increase, any preservation, any maintaining, has come along the line of what we have gained from our deep experiences.
What the Church has secured by way of conflict, trial, pressure and adversity! If this were a literal building around which we could walk at the end of our days, we should be able to see quite a lot in it which we could relate to a definite experience of conflict and trial through which we went, and we could say, That came out of so-and-so, that was the result of that particular bad time that I had. Spiritually, it is like that. Even now we can see in our lives something like that, and it will be so at the end. If we use our imagination, the truth holds good (if it is not actually like this) that the Lord will be able to take us round His completed work and say, Do you see this and this? Do you remember what you went through? That is the result from it, the value of it, that is the good that came out of it. It was all built into the fabric, the great eternal edifice of God's own house. It was something secured through battles; it was the spoil that went to the house; it recovered something that was lost of original glory, purity, fullness. It safeguarded some breakdown. The Lord put you through something, and out of that He secured what was necessary to guard against a threatened loss of which He was aware.
