Hello dear brothers and sisters!!
I would like to share something that came to me as I was
praying and reflecting on my study of the Book
of Isaiah. (Isaiah Chapters 29-31)
In this section of scripture (as in others) God is
telling his children through the prophet Isaiah to stop rebelling against his
way; against him. The religious leaders
of that time (and even today) ignored God’s warnings. So, God left them (and he leaves us) to deal
with the consequences of our rebellious choices. We humans never seem to grow and learn from
being blessed. We need to fall on our
faces (Alcoholics Anonymous calls it “hitting bottom”) before we “get it”. In this case, “get God”. Often times in scripture God tells us we are
“blind” and “deaf”. We don’t want to do
it God’s Way. We don’t want to submit to
his will. We think we know best. We are so arrogant and prideful. Of course Satan’s encourages us to be that
way because his sole purpose in this world is to destroy what God loves…..His
Children…. US!!!!
God never forces himself on humankind. He never forces us to follow him. The Lord never forces us to love him as he
loves us. We are free to accept his invitation of
salvation or reject it which means that we reject God. Here’s where we go wrong every time. Chapter 1 in the Book of Romans is one place
that confirms the results of rebelling against God and following our own
desires. God will step back and let us
have what we want most. If we choose sin
over him he does not stop us or force us to choose him. But when we turn from the only source of
goodness and light in the universe then all we have is sin and darkness. We just never “get it.” We never seem to understand that without God
the world is HELL and all that is left for us throughout eternity is pain and
darkness.
All we have to do is love God. Seems so simple but the catch is that we also
have to obey. But the sin, the rebellion
in us will see that as the bad option. Eventually,
we think so highly of ourselves that we stop seeing God all together. We stop listening to his voice. As our heart hardens, we sink deeper and
deeper into darkness and farther and farther away from God. When this happens HIS WAY makes no sense to
us and we turn our backs on him. Soon we
don’t listen to God. We don’t recognize
God’s voice at all. We don’t see his
light because we are blinded by our sin. Remember, Jesus said those sheep that
truly are his know his voice and follow him.
John 10:24-26 The Jews gathered around him, saying, “How
long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ (the Savior),tell us plainly.”
25 Jesus answered, “I did tell you, but you
do not believe. The miracles I do in my Father’s name speak for me, 26 but you do not believe because
you are not my sheep. 27 My
sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.
When we start mixing different doctrines
and world views into the truth we cannot hear the Lord’s voice of truth over
the clamor of worldly/man-made imitations of it. Oh, we convince ourselves that we are
following Christ but it is an “anti-Christian” version of him. We don’t know the truth or even want to know
the truth. That interferes with what we
really want. We want to feel good about
what makes us feel good whether God likes it or not. We make God fit into how we choose to see him
and not how he teaches us he really is. Then
we humans settle back and worship our imitation of God and delight in the fact we
can feel good about our worldly God supporting what we desire.
2 Timothy 4:3 For the time will come when men will not put
up with sound doctrine (scriptural truth that leads to
salvation). Instead, to suit their own desires,
they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their
itching ears want to hear (tell them what
they want to hear, not the truth).
Isaiah 30:10-11 Give us no more visions of what is
right! Tell us pleasant things, prophesy
illusions. 11 Leave this way, get off
this path and stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel!
Basically this last scriptural reference talks about how we
don’t want to listen to the real messengers of God because they tell us things we
don’t want to hear. We prefer to listen
to the false prophets/teachers because they tell us what we like to hear. They tell us what fits into what we want out
of the world instead of what God calls us to do. These false teachers tell us “wrong is
right and right is wrong” and that’s just the way we like it. That way they help us justify what our heart
really wants.
Take a look at Isaiah 5:20 ..
“Woe to those (or
how horrible it will be for those) who call evil
good and good evil, who turn darkness into light and light into darkness, who
turn what is bitter into something sweet and what is sweet into something
bitter.”
God warns us here that those who pervert and twist the
truth of God’s Word will suffer his wrath and punishment for their rebellion.
The real scary part is that we do “good” by worldly
standards and fool ourselves into believing that our good works will somehow
equal a ticket to salvation. We may go to church and even talk about Jesus
as our savior but our heart is not in it. Our heart becomes cold and self-centered. Is our salvation our real treasure? Is obeying God in our heart more than
anything else? Are we following Christ,
who is our only way to salvation? NO!
NO! NO!
Isaiah 29:13 These people come near to me (say
that they are my children – praise me and celebrate me)
with their mouth and honor me with their lips but their hearts are far from
me (they don’t really love me). Their worship of me is made up only of rules
taught by men (their views/beliefs are not from scripture but from
the man-made doctrines created from the worldly desire of their hearts).
So, we talk about God and even do good in the world but
our “heart” is not in it. The minute we
have to choose between what we want and what God commands we choose US!!
How does God feel about our rebelling against him?
Check out Isaiah 30:1 "Woe
to (or sorrow awaits) the obstinate (rebellious) children,"
declares the LORD, "to those who carry out plans that are not mine (follow their own ways which are contrary to mine), forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit (not
approved my ME!), heaping sin upon sin (not
repenting but continually rebelling);
When we “rebel” against God we are no better than
Satan. Rebelling is rejecting God. Repackaging sin to sound more acceptable and
not so offensive is still turning our back on God just like Satan has
done. Those who do this are no less an “enemy”
of God than Satan is.
But in God there is hope for all of us sinners. For the Bible tells us that God is “longsuffering”. This means he is patient with us. He waits for his rebellious children to turn
to him. God is merciful and loving and
compassionate especially to those of us who are most lost in darkness. Jesus said that he came to seek and save
those who are lost. (Luke 19:10)
So, God waits to help us, love us and forgive us.
Isaiah 30:18 So the Lord must wait for
you to come to him so he can show you his love and compassion. For the Lord is a faithful God. Blessed are those who wait or his help.
The “GOOD NEWS” of the gospel is that
Jesus came and has rescued us from our sin.
Through Christ, God is reaching out to the entire world but are we reaching
back?
Read the bible. Open your eyes and ears and heart to the
TRUTH and listen for your Shepherd’s Voice. Turn from you imperfect ways and return in
obedience to him.
God is waiting for you…….
