Sunday, March 1, 2020

Who REALLY Knows How Bad It Is?

Hear the Word of the Lord given through the prophet Jeremiah, who issued a warning to God’s people (leaders and followers), and then offered hope:
Jeremiah’s Warning

This is what the Lord says: “Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans, who rely on human strength and turn their hearts away from the Lord.  They are like stunted shrubs in the desert, with no hope for the future.  They will live in the barren wilderness, in an uninhabited salty land.  Jeremiah 17:5-6(NLT)

Jeremiah presents a contrast between those who cave-in to the culture, as opposed to those who live Godly lives no matter which way the wind blows.  The cursed are eventually going to be stunted shrubs in the barren desert; there will be no hope.  But the Godly ones who resist the cultural shift towards evil…they will draw from deep waters; their fruit will stand the test of time.  In short, they have God’s blessing, which is the hope of all who trust in Christ, not the culture.
I do not have to tell you that the early Methodist movement under John and Charles Wesley bore the Godly fruit of holiness, which blessed this nation and the world for generations.  Among that fruit the world saw an end to slavery, the beginning of sweeping spiritual revival, and social reform.  In the mid-part of the last century Methodists were also at the forefront of combatting racism.
But the shift of lukewarm waters into our baptismal fonts of recent generations has made Methodism more like a social club than a holy movement.  Where once Methodists were considered people of the Book of Books, now we’re a wide tent of anything goes!  God’s book lies collecting dust on coffee tables and tucked-away in grandma’s cabinet, and even absent in many church worship services. 
United Methodists do have a huge book of rules, most of which means nothing, because nobody wants to offend anybody.  We elect people to lead, but the only place they lead whoever’s following is into temptation. 
·      Where is the deliverance of leaders and followers in hot pursuit of God? 
·      Where is God’s remnant? 
·      Where are the Methodists who have God as their hope? 
·      Where are the people of God who have a backbone and not simply a wishbone, hoping problems will go away?
I’ll tell you where they are – they’re in Africa. 
While North American Methodism grows more tepid and lukewarm with every passing liberalization of faith and practice, our black brothers and sisters on the dark continent are standing in light; they’re standing strong for Biblical faith, Biblical marriage, and sexuality without perversion.  And they are not slaves to money and buildings, because they know they’ve got a King who owns the cattle on a thousand hills, and a building not made with hands.   
In 2007 I went to the South African nation of Zimbabwe to help build a seminary building and teach African pastors the doctrine of End Times recorded in Daniel, Matthew and Revelation.  Many of these young pastors were so hungry for the Word of God they walked 10 or more miles each day to the seminary. 
After a full day of study and work on the building they walked back home to tend their meager little farm plots and meet with their congregations under a tree somewhere.  They had little of this world’s stuff, but they were covered in the anointing of God’s Holy Spirit.  I taught them what I learned studying Scripture, but they taught me what it means to be a real disciple, one who has tapped into the power follow Jesus Christ, make more disciples, and transform the world.
While we were in Harare, Zimbabwe we held a 4-day outdoor Vacation Bible School for the children.  I shared the simple Gospel through an interpreter and more than 100 little girls and boys received Christ as savior.  I’m not an evangelist, but when the Spirit of God is working you do the best you can, and then get back out of the way, because wonderful things happen!  I was no missionary to them; they were teaching me what the real work is all about. 
The children I met that week were not looking for cell phones, or more sophisticated toys to collect dust; their parents had taught them well to respect others and to turn to the Word of God.  This was evident because, when the invitation to accept Christ was offered, the children were also offered a choice between staying behind to make their decision to accept Jesus or go outside with their teachers to play and have some candy.  Most of the children stayed behind.  These children rarely had treats and free time to play, so candy is always a big draw.  But, for those 8, 9, and 10-year-old children, following Christ meant putting aside a momentary treat in favor of eternal salvation.
There are those who think of Africa and parts of South America as backward and third world because of financial poverty and backward educational levels.  But in those impoverished places the Spirit of God is moving, and they are rich in the things of God – something of which all the riches of Solomon or Fort Knox will never buy or even understand.  The only backwardness of these people is they’ve gone back to God’s Word, while the rest of the so-called civilized and progressive world has gone forward to the shame of apostasy, Godless and proud of it!
Beloved, if you think Africa is full of savages, I invite you to look at the savagery the so-called first-world countries display.  We kill each other over stock portfolios, parade our sexual perversity as if it’s a badge of sophistication, and snuff out the lives of the unborn like squashing a mosquito.  Meanwhile, the so-called savages of the African bush are sharing burdens, enduring hardship, and even persecution; our African brothers and sisters protect life, gender purity, and preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ, pure, unadulterated and doctrinally-sound.  I ask you, who’s the REAL savage? 
We Americans like to call ourselves a “Christian” nation.  Friends, if ever we were a so-called Christian nation, we have graduated to become the evil, apostate, and lost nation we read about in Scripture:

What sorrow for those who say that evil is good and good is evil...Isaiah 5:20a(NLT)

And the irony of it all is that we don’t even know it; we reject it when we hear it, we squabble over nitpicking things like whether the black people will be black in heaven…and we are still murdering the prophets, the unborn, and persecuting the bride of Jesus Christ. 
And some of us will never find out those things because heaven will never be seen, except from the side of the throne where the goats gather!  There is coming a day when God is going to set things right; He is continually searching the hearts of human beings, and Jeremiah’s warning includes an assurance that, where he finds unbelief, there will be judgment:

“The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked.  Who really knows how bad it is?  But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives.  I give all people their due rewards, according to what their actions deserve.”  Jeremiah 17:9-10(NLT)

The warning couldn’t be clearer; if a person will not serve Jesus, the Cornerstone, then, to you He becomes the Rock of Offense, a stumbling stone that will crush whatever life you may think you possess. 
Warnings without consequences may be what parents do these days, but our Eternal Heavenly Father knows no such thing; what He promises, He delivers!
Jeremiah also has a word of hope.
Jeremiah’s Hope

But blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence.  They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water.  Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought.  Their leaves stay green, and they never stop producing fruit.  Jeremiah 17:7-8(NLT)

This hope is simple; those who place their trust in the LORD, receive the LORD as their hope.  Jesus’ love and friendship to us is the kind of eternal life and strength of deep roots in the heavens.  There may be storms down here, but we stand like the great cedars of Lebanon; we may stand here physically battered, but we’re growing stronger with every wind of adversity. 
How strong is that strength?

And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.  Romans 8:38(NLT)

And, by the way, that promise is sure, and includes whatever happens this week, next month, or in the next thousand years. 
The edicts of human kings and queens tend to fall apart like grass withering and fading to oblivion, but the Word of God stands forever.
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…Let it be so! 

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Title Image:  Pixabay.com   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©

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