And the Spirit of the Lord Came upon Him

"And the Spirit of the LORD Came Upon Him"

Reading through the Old Testament, one will realize that God may sometimes "bend the rules" so that his people can survive or progress. One will see that there are situations in which, under normal circumstances, God's people should have been annihilated. Somewhere in these stories one will most likely see the phrase "and the Spirit of the Lord came upon him/them," followed by a swift and dramatic victory for God's chosen one/ones. These events may give rise to many questions concerning exactly what effect the "Spirit of the Lord" had on His people. Did those filled with His Spirit become invincible? Did our Almighty Creator possess them and then take over the battle? Did they physically win the battle, or did God destroy the enemy and name His chosen one/ones the victors?

An important thing that one must remember when trying to distinguish how these events actually happened is that the Lord is omnipotent and can do anything He wants in any way He wants. God could have acted in any of the ways mentioned above. Several times throughout the Bible God is referred to as having a "mighty hand." God uses His "mighty hand" to repeatedly deliver His people from bondage. Ezekiel mentions that God will rule over us "with a mighty hand." From the Scriptures, one can determine that God is (along with many other traits) mighty.

In the third chapter of Judges, the Bible says, "And the Spirit of the LORD came upon him, and he judged Israel, and went out to war: and the LORD delivered Cushan-rishathaim king of Mesopotamia into his hand; and his hand prevailed against Cushan-rishathaim." The Hebrew word for "Spirit" is ru^ach, and the entry in Strong's Concordance for this word is as follows: From H7306; wind; by resemblance breath, that is, a sensible (or even violent) exhalation; figuratively life, anger, unsubstantiality; by extension a region of the sky; by resemblance spirit, but only of a rational being (including its expression and functions): - air, anger, blast, breath, X cool, courage, mind, X quarter, X side, spirit ([-ual]), tempest, X vain, ([whirl-]) wind (-y).

From this definition we see that this spirit was one of wisdom but also of anger and even violence. Perhaps in order for a person to be used to deliver God's wrath upon an enemy, that person must be able to feel the anger that God feels toward that enemy and the discernment to know exactly how to handle the situation. When the Spirit of the Lord comes upon a man, he is able to think and feel (to a certain extent) the way God would think and feel.

The Hebrew word for came in the same verse is ha^ya^h, and the concordance entry for this word is: A primitive root (compare H1933); to exist, that is, be or become, come to pass (always emphatic, and not a mere copula or auxiliary): - beacon, X altogether, be (-come, accomplished, committed, like), break, cause, come (to pass), continue, do, faint, fall, + follow, happen, X have, last, pertain, quit (one-) self, require, X use.

From this definition we have a clearer view of what is meant by the phrase "came upon" in this verse. Evidently the Spirit of the Lord, at least temporarily, becomes one with the chosen man. What does it mean to be one with the Spirit of the Lord? The Lord sent His Spirit upon someone who needed either superior wisdom or superior strength to complete a task that the Lord had assigned to him. This man would then be able to exercise God-like wisdom and/or God-like strength and agility. He would be able to do the things he needed to do which human limitations wouldn't allow him to do on his own.

Now that we've seen how the Lord puts His Spirit upon someone, let's look at who He chose to put His Spirit upon. The main thing that all of these men have in common is that they intended to serve God. Othniel, Gideon, Jephthah, Samson,