"Shall the throne of iniquity, which devises evil by law, have fellowship with you?" Psalm 94:20 "which DEVISES EVIL BY LAW..." It's something we never would have believed could come to pass in America, the nation which was founded on righteousness and established upon the Word of God. How far we have fallen - evil is actually made the law of the land! How far we have fallen when the citizens of the land rejoice when evil is devised as law! Who ever would have believed there would come a day when more than 60 million little boys and little girls are murdered in their mother's womb? ...And the people rejoice??? For a believer, it's hard - no, it's impossible - to understand how human beings can actually rejoice in it. "...having their own conscience seared with a hot iron..." Ist Timothy 4:2 "They gather together against the life of the righteous, AND CONDEMN INNOCENT BLOOD." Psalm 94:21 How truly they have gathered together against the righteous. And how truly have they condemned innocent blood! Few speak up and declare it is gross SIN to murder these little children; those who speak up are held in contempt and called haters, deemed fools. Deliberately do they scorn the Word of Almighty God. vs 16: "Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? Who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?" Who will stand up for them? It's come to the time when anyone who stands up against evil may be fined and imprisoned. How have we come to this? God has raised up men to plead with the nation to repent - with the solemn warning of what is to come should they refuse, yet they are ignored and the blood of the children continues to flow. "So you shall not pollute the land where you are, FOR BLOOD DEFILES THE LAND, and no atonement can be made for the land for the blood that is shed on it, except by the blood of him who shed it." Numbers 35:33 Has it come to this? That no atonement can be made for the land? The land has been defiled with the blood of the innocents. The land that has proclaimed as law the slaughter of the little ones can only look forward to the judgment of God which will surely come. There will be a great slaughter in America. People, there is coming a great slaughter in America - for the blood of the innocents that has been shed. When it comes, few will connect the dots. Have 60 million died? It's safe to expect that 60 million or more will die in the judgments that will come upon the nation. We have entered the period that the Bible calls "the time of sorrows," which is the time immediately preceding the great Tribulation which Jesus foretold. Judgments fall as wars, rumors of war, earthquakes, famines and diseases, and that's only the beginning. During the time of sorrows there is still time for people to come to repentance, and that is the hope as judgments fall - that is the mercy of God who will pardon anyone who turns to him in repentance. But once the great Tribulation begins, it's not the time of sorrows anymore, it's the time of the great and unrestrained wrath of Almighty God, when all breaks loose and tribulation falls as never has been upon the earth since the beginning of the world. "For then there will be great Tribulation, SUCH AS NOT HAS BEEN SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THE WORLD until this time, no, nor ever shall be." Matthew 24:21 "He will trample down the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored." Folks, as we see the wars of the Middle East and so many other places, and we watch in horror as great earthquakes take place, as we see famine in dusty lands, and diseases running rampant, it is time to get right with God while you still can, because all the signs are here before our eyes, showing that the great Tribulation is near to taking place. “When it is evening you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red,’ and in the morning, ‘It will be foul weather today for the sky is red and threatening.’ Hypocrites! You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times!" Matthew 16:2-3 Don't be a fool. Those signs are here. Repent now while you can, and receive the mercy of God while it is still being offered.
In grief and sorrow we lose sight of the fact that every trial of the believer has purpose. The context: The Book of Ruth, chapter 1 There was a famine in the land of Israel, so a man and his wife Naomi, along with their two sons, went to a neighboring country to wait out the famine. But during the ten years there, Naomi's husband died, and if that weren't enough, her two sons died too. Bereft and heartbroken, Naomi took her daughter-in-law Ruth and they returned to Naomi's land, the land of Bethlehem in Judea. When they arrived, the people were delighted to see her again! They gathered around her and rejoiced. But she stopped them: "But she said to them, 'Do not call me Naomi, call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full, and the Lord has brought me home again empty.'" Ruth 1:20-21 Naomi means "pleasant," and Mara means "bitter." Tragedy had struck the life of this faithful Jewish woman. She went out with a husband and two sons, and she returns a widow heartbroken over the loss of her husband and her children. She was inconsolable and she blamed God. Have you been grievously hurt? Has there been tragedy in your life? Have you lost someone you dearly loved? Are you blaming God for your pain? What Naomi did not know was that this story was going to change the course of history, because her daughter-in-law Ruth was going to marry a relative of Naomi's and have a son, and this son was going to be the great grandfather of King David, the one through whom the Messiah would come, he who was promised since the earliest passages in the Bible. Just imagine her joy if she could have known that, if she could have known that her story had purpose, that she had to bring back with her a gentile daughter-in-law who would be the foreshadow of the gentile church, and that it was going to be one of the greatest stories in all of the Bible. In this story God is showing that he uses the bad things in life to bring about good. "For whatever things were written before
were written for our learning,
that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures
might have hope."
Romans 15:4
Surrender to God when you're going through a bitter time. All the stories that make up our lives have purpose, and we are promised in Romans chapter 8 that God is working it all together for a desired end:
"And we know that ALL THINGS work together for good
to those who love God, to those who are the called
according to his purpose."
Romans 8:28
ALL things.
In the book of Job, we see a faithful man who lost everything, every single thing he had, including his seven sons and three daughters. The passage counts out for us all that he lost, so many sheep, so many camels, so many oxen, so many donkeys and so many children. Like Naomi, Job was faithful and could hardly believe God would do this to him. He wept and reasoned, and despaired, and went down into depression.
Little did Job know that his was going to be another of the greatest stories in the Bible, a story that would teach believers throughout the ages many truths about God, truths which would go down in history to encourage others who suffer. In the end, God restored to Job DOUBLE what he had lost, double the number of sheep, camels, oxen, and donkeys. Only when it came to his children, God did not restore to him double. He had lost seven sons and three daughters, but God only restored to him seven more sons and three more daughters. Why didn't God restore to him double the number of children that he lost, as he did with everything else? The answer is that Job did not permanently lose his original sons and daughters, they were in heaven waiting for him. So in the end he actually did have double the number he started out with. The agenda of Satan to destroy Job actually brought about huge double blessings, both in this life and in the life to come.
Joseph is another person in the Bible who suffered greatly. He endured hatred from his brothers and they sold him to a caravan that was going to Egypt. Joseph ends up in an Egyptian prison for something he did not do, but in the end ...he became the second highest official in all the land of Egypt and head over the storehouses of grain. Eventually his brothers had to go to Egypt for food when there was a famine in Israel. Joseph ends up saying:
"But as for you, you meant evil against me,
but God meant it for good,
in order to bring it about as it is this day,
to save many people alive."
Genesis 50:20
God had placed Joseph there in order to provide sustenance for his brothers when famine came.
In so many of the stories of our lives, we are like Naomi, we are like Job, we are like Joseph and SO many others - tragedy and heartbreak happens to every believer. But if only we knew the end of the story, we would not despair, we would not call ourselves "bitter" and blame God for our grief and sorrow. We would stand in the faith and not only wait for the glorious end of the story, but we would jump up and down in excitement, because the glory of the end of the story far outweighs the grief of the beginning.
"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time
ARE NOT WORTHY TO BE COMPARED
with the glory which shall be revealed in us."
Romans 8:18
That is a promise. Hang in there! The story is not over with yet. There will be a glorious ending if only you will believe it and wait patiently. For how long? For as long as it takes. Just know this: your story has PURPOSE and God is FAITHFUL!
MORE ON SUFFERING
"I hope in your Word." Psalm 119:147 Blessed is the one who puts his hope in the Word of God... This world is fallen, and it stands opposed to the teachings in the Word of God. The world has its principles, but they are contrary to the Word of God, indeed, the Word of God is foolishness to the world, and it is imperative to truly understand that. Before one is born again, the things of God seem foolish to him. "But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, FOR THEY ARE FOOLISHNESS TO HIM, nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." 1st Corinthians 2:14 When faced with a difficulty, most run to the world for help and direction. Is THIS not foolishness then? What am I saying - that one should not go a doctor when needed, or to an expert in the area of whatever the need is? No, I am not saying that. I'm saying that when one has a problem, his FIRST recourse should be to go to the Lord and surrender the difficulty to him, putting it all under his sovereignty and asking his direction. Only AFTER one has brought it all to the Lord, THEN he can go for help unless the Lord directs otherwise, and sometimes he does. It happened to me! I obeyed and in each case the situation turned out to my good. Had I turned instead to what "made sense," it could have turned out in disaster and I cringe when I think of it. So, we must establish the Word of God as the very foundation of our lives. "For the Word of God is LIVING and powerful..." Hebrews 4:12 If God goes to such lengths to teach us about his Word, should we not make his Word the foundation, the very rock of our lives? Is that not his intent? Do we not insult him by first going for help somewhere else? For every situation in our lives, God has an answer. Sometimes it's not the answer we would expect. How can we know, unless we have brought it to the Lord first? Sometimes God heals, and sometimes he doesn't. Why is that? And the answer is: we don't know why. It's different in each case. We simply need to get his direction in a problem, and then proceed according to his leading. Many times the Lord chooses not to heal. I knew a woman deeply loved by multitudes of people she had brought to the Lord. She developed a medical condition and scores of people, hundreds of people were praying for her healing. In spite of all that, she died. I saw her the night before she died and upon leaving I said, "I'll see you again," not knowing she was going to die the next day, and though she couldn't speak, her eyes lit up and she shook her head yes, yes, YES! It was not God's will to heal her at this time, though SO many people were praying for her. And she was fine with that. The most important thing in a believer's life is finding out what God's will is in any situation, and THEN we proceed to use the helps in the world that are available to us. That's what faith is all about. It's putting God first, and allowing God to be the Lord in every situation in life, and giving him time first to speak to us through his Word, the Bible. It's not easy, friends. It necessitates surrender, and that can be very painful. But it is absolutely necessary. Otherwise, we're on our own. A scary place to be. "I hope in your Word..." Let this be the foundation of your life, and your life just might go differently from what you thought. And to you who believe, he has promised to work everything out for the good, and I surely can testify to the truth of that, though the powers of hell have sorely fought against me and I have the wounds to prove it. But through surrender, I learned the faithfulness of God. "And we know that ALL things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose." Romans 8:28 THIS PROMISE IS NOT TO EVERYONE. It's to those who are his.