BibleTrekToday.com

Year: 2010

  • Prophet of Personal Responsibility!

    Scripture reading for August 23rd: Ezekiel 16-19

    There was a proverb in Israel that went something like this, “The fathers eat the sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” (Ezekiel 18:2b)  Through Ezekiel, God brought this popular myth into question.  To God, each person belonged to Him and answered to Him personally.  He judged each person on their own conduct and either rewarded or punished them accordingly.

    We have a teaching in Pentecostal circles today that speaks of “generational” curses.  It goes something like this: if your father or mother was involved in alcoholism, for example, you might have this “curse” passed on down to you.  This curse must be broken off for you to be free.  Now we know that there might be some truth in this; if there is a genetic disposition in your family for alcoholism, you may have that, too.  But what God was teaching here is different.  Each person is responsible before Him for their actions and choices.  We are not victims of our family tree or some generational curse.  We choose either to obey and follow God, or to disobey and rebel against God.  We are free moral agents with the ability to choose.

    God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but would rather that they repent and live.  (Ezekiel 18:23)  Repentance requires taking personal responsibility for our sins, not blaming someone else.  Repentance requires turning from the sin and then doing what God commands.  It is very simple and yet so profound.  God is merciful and desires to show mercy rather than judge.  When we fail to repent, He must judge us!  (Ezekiel 18:26-28)

    “Therefore, O house of Israel, I will judge you, each one according to his ways, declares the Sovereign Lord.  Repent! Turn away from all your offenses; then sin will not be your downfall.  Rid yourselves of all the offenses you have committed, and get a new heart and a new spirit.  Why will you die, O house of Israel?  For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone.” (Ezekiel 18:30-32)

    Sin is man’s major downfall.  We have all sinned and need God’s mercy.  (Romans 3:23)  God has sent Jesus Christ to take away our sins in the sacrifice of His body on the Cross of Calvary.  Why not take a moment and confess your faith in Jesus Christ and the cross?  God loves to show mercy!

  • Sunday Rest and Reflection:Glory Restored!

    Dear Friends of Jesus,

    Greetings in the Glorious Name of Jesus Christ!  In Him is the fullness of the Godhead in bodily form.  He is the final word from God for man.  His life and teachings are revelation of the heart of God and bring life and immortality to light through the Gospel.  He is the reason we gather this first day of a new week to study and worship with others of like-precious faith.  He is the express image of God’s Glory, upholding all things by His powerful Word!  (Hebrews 1:3)

    As I reflect on the past week’s readings from Ezekiel, I am again remembering this Sunday morning the vision of God’s glory that Ezekiel was given after a “hair-raising” journey of over 600 miles!  He saw the temple being defiled by the leaders of Jerusalem and those over the temple.  He saw God’s glory being escorted out of the Temple and the holy city of Jerusalem. The Glory paused at the temple entrance. (Ezekiel 10:3-4)  It stopped briefly over the East Gate of the Lord’s house. (Ezekiel 10:18-20)  The final place where this appearance of glory was seen was on the mountain east of the city, the Mount of Olives.  (Ezekiel 10:22-23)

    As I meditate on this departure of God’s glory, I think of Jesus Christ coming again to the city and temple to reveal God’s glory to His own people.  Jesus taught in the temple and worshiped there.  Jesus drove the money changers from the temple, cleansing it with a whip.  Jesus prayed in agony in the Garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives as He prepared to offer His body as the final sacrifice for our sins.  He died outside the city, hanging on a cross for us!  The ultimate sacrifice representing the glorious mercy of God for all mankind!

    Jesus rose again in glory and appeared to His own.  He ascended in Glory from the Mount of Olives and promised to come back in the same manner He left, on clouds of power and great glory!  (Matthew 24:30-31)  (Acts 1:11-12)  In Solomon’s porch of the temple, on the Day of Pentecost, fiery tongues rested on the 120 disciples gathered there and they were filled with a deposit of God’s glory to empower them to reach the world with the message of Jesus Christ!  What a glorious God and Savior we have!  May you enjoy His glory as you worship today!

    In His Love,

    Pastor John

  • God’s Message by Charade

    Scripture reading for August 21th: Ezekiel 12-15

    God often used illustrated messages with His prophets.  Ezekiel was given ten different illustrated messages for the people to help them understand what was going to happen.  This time, Ezekiel was to pack up his belongings as if he were going into exile.  He was to take everything he owned and put it on his shoulders and go to the wall of the city.  There he was to dig through the wall and leave the city at dusk, with his face covered in shame.  (Ezekiel 12:1-7)  He was to do this in front of all the people of the rebellious house of Israel.

    The people had a proverb that was popular in the land during this time of Ezekiel’s and Jeremiah’s prophesy.  “The days go by and every vision comes to nothing.” (Ezekiel 12:21)   God told Ezekiel to tell the people that that proverb would be eradicated from the land.  Every vision and word of true prophetic warning was about to be fulfilled.  The vision would not be for the distant future, but would come to pass in their day and time.  (Ezekiel 12:26-28)

    God sent Ezekiel with these true words  from His mouth.  He spoke them to the people faithfully, but most just scoffed.  They were more interested in the words of the false prophets.  (Ezekiel 13:1-12)  These false prophets spoke from their own imaginations and yet declared “Hear the word of the Lord.” God called them “foolish” prophets and likened them to “jackals” among the ruins, looking for some dead meat to feed on!  They had false visions and lying divinations for the people that soothed them into thinking that God would not judge them.  God promised to remove them from Israel and from the record of God’s people!

    These false prophets were like a person who whitewashed a flimsy wall to help strengthen it.  Another coat of paint made the wall look good, but because it was not on a solid foundation it would surely fall.  God sent Ezekiel with a message for these who whitewashed the walls with false prophecy.  The wall would fall and destroy the people who listened to them and these false prophets themselves.  (Ezekiel 13:13-16)

    Have you noticed how God tried so hard to reach His people?  Hard words of repentance were and are not popular!  Check out your own heart today.  Which prophets are you listening to?

  • The End Has Come!

    Scripture reading for August 20th: Ezekiel 7-11

    Ezekiel had a hard message to preach to the people of Judah who were in captivity.  In today’s reading he announced that the end had come!  God was finally forced to act and judge the land because the people of Judah failed to listen and  repent.  Judgment must always begin at the house of God.  Why?  Because those with the most light are most accountable for their response!

    What were the terrible things done in Judah by it’s leaders?  Ezekiel cites violence and the idolatry brought on by wealth as trigger points.  (Ezekiel 7:10-13)  People went through the motions of religion but were really trusting in their own strength and wealth.  Materialism has a way of creeping in and taking God’s people captive.  In this tragic end, the people’s silver and gold would not be able to help or save them.  (Ezekiel 7:19-22)  During the extreme famine, no amount of wealth would be able to buy food.

    Another sin was violence and the shedding of innocent blood.  (Ezekiel 7:23-27)   The land must be purged of these sins and what men sow, they will reap!  These sins, when persisted in, bring about a blindness and confusion concerning God and His holy word.  People will look for God’s counsel and mercy but not be able to find it.  God must judge them so that they know that He is the Lord who is in charge!

    As this judgment of the end was prepared and executed, Ezekiel was taken by the hair and transported to Jerusalem.  There he was given a vision of what was really going on in the city and temple among it’s religious and political leaders.  (Ezekiel 8:2-6)  All kinds of idolatry and pagan practices were being done by the so-called leaders of the nation.  With judgment on the doorstep and the end at hand, they were seeking help from worthless idols!  They were worshiping nature and the sun instead of the Creator of heaven and earth!  (Ezekiel 8:16-18)

    Ezekiel then got to see the Glory of the Lord being escorted out of the temple and city by some awesome creatures with wheels and wings.  (Ezekiel 10:1-5)  The worst form of judgment on God’s people, is the withdrawal of God’s presence and glory from their lives.  Without God’s presence, all that exists is sin and darkness!  That is truly the “end” we all want to avoid!

  • Warn the Wayward!

    Scripture reading for August 19th: Ezekiel 1-6

    “Above the expanse over their heads was what looked like a throne of sapphire, and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man.  I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him.  Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him.  This was the appearance of the glory of the Lord.  When I saw it I fell face- down.” (Ezekiel 1:26-28b)

    Ezekiel was one of the exiles taken to Babylon some years before the fall of Jerusalem. The thirty-year-old son of a priest of Israel, he was picked by God to be a prophetic voice to those who were taken captive. A vision of  God’s presence and glory humbled this young man and enabled him to hear the voice of God speaking to him.

    “He said, “Son of man, I am sending you to the Israelites, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me; they and their fathers have been in revolt against me to this very day.  The people I am sending you to are obstinate and stubborn.  Say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says.’ “ (Ezekiel 2:3-5)

    God’s instructions to Ezekiel were very clear.  He was to speak to God’s rebellious people.  These people may or may not listen because of their inborn habits of stubbornness  and rebellion.  Ezekiel was to be bold and speak plainly to them all the words that God gave him.  These were given to him as a scroll to eat, written on both sides with words of woe, sorrow and mourning.  Ezekiel was to be a watchman for the house of Israel and to warn them of the consequences of their evil ways.  (Ezekiel 3:17-19)  If he was faithful and did what God told him, it would go well with him.

    Hearing God’s word is each person’s individual responsibility.  To the humble, God’s word is sweet as honey and good for the soul.  Take a moment today and ask God to open your ears to His truth.  Pick a verse from Ezekiel and chew on it today, then share it with someone in need!

  • Hope From the Ashes

    Scripture reading for August 18th: Lamentations 1-5

    “How deserted lies the city, once so full of people!  How like a widow is she, who once was great among the nations! She who was a queen among the provinces has now become a slave.”  . . “Jerusalem has sinned greatly and so has become unclean.  All who honored her despise her, for they have seen her nakedness: she herself groans and turns away.” (Lamentations 1:1,8)

    Jerusalem, the once proud city of the nation of Israel was turned to rubble!  Those who lived there were either killed or taken captive by their enemies and the rest were slaves of a foreign occupying power.  Jeremiah wrote this book of Lamentations as a funeral song over the death of a city and nation.  He knew why this had happened and repeatedly told the people what was coming and why!  Their sins had piled up and God had allowed them to reap the consequences!

    The consequences of sin were horrible and sad!  Jerusalem was destroyed and burned by fire, and its walls broken down.  The children and infants suffered in the siege and had no food to eat.  Many starved to death and some were actually eaten by their parents in order for them to survive!  (Lamentations 2:11-12, 19-20)  Others were murdered or slaughtered by the conquerors.  The ravages of war and siege left a deposit of  hopelessness and bitterness in the hearts of the survivors and even in Jeremiah’s own heart!  (Lamentations 3:5-7, 19-20)

    But Jeremiah found cause to hope in the midst of all the destruction and depression.  “Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail.  They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.  I say to myself, “the Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for Him.” (Lamentations 3:21-24)  God’s great love and mercy brought hope to the prophet.  He knew that God was faithful to His word and the many promises He had made for His people and holy city.

    In his grief, Jeremiah was comforted by God’s mercy.  It is the same in our day.  God’s love through Jesus Christ will sustain us through life’s trials and save us from the consequences of our many sins.  He is our portion and we can trust in the God of all hope!  (Romans 15:13)

  • Babylon’s Promised Retribution

    Scripture reading for August 17th: Jeremiah 46-52

    Vengeance belongs to the Lord alone; only He can repay people and nations for their sins.   His judgments are right and true because He alone knows the truth about motives and actions.  As we read these last chapters of Jeremiah, we see that God has the final say concerning judgment on each nation and people mentioned.  He does nothing by judgment unless He warns people by prophetic word.  Even Gentile nations were warned by Jeremiah of God’s coming judgment.  Egypt, Moab, Ammon, Edom, Syria, and Israel were all spoken to.  The final warning was sent to Babylon, the nation God used to punish Israel and who had destroyed God’s temple and killed many of His people.  Although God used them to accomplish His purposes, they still stood accountable for their attitudes and actions.

    This retribution would come from repentance by God’s people. “In those days, at that time, declares the Lord, “the people of Israel and the people of Judah together will go in tears to seek the Lord their God.  They will ask the way to Zion and turn their faces toward it.  They will bind themselves to the Lord in an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten.” (Jeremiah 50:4-5)  This repentance would be followed by a new covenant that would not be forgotten.  They would petition God for Zion and seek God with all their hearts and He would hear them!

    Babylon would be punished because they opposed the Lord. (Jeremiah 50:24)  He  would punish them because of their arrogance.  (Jeremiah 50:31-32)  He would punish them because of their false prophets and idols.  (Jeremiah 50:36-38)   They would feel His wrath because they destroyed His temple and did wrong in Zion.  (Jeremiah 51:11, 24)  They would fall because of Israel’s slain at the hands of the wicked in Babylon.  God does repay and is a God of retribution!  (Jeremiah 51:56)

    This punishment for Babylon was written down 70 years before it would happen and Jeremiah sent it by messenger to Babylon to be read aloud.  (Jeremiah 51:60-63)  After the reading of the scroll, the messenger was to tie a rock to it and throw it into the Euphrates River.  He was to proclaim, “So will Babylon sink to rise no more because of the disaster I will bring upon her.  And her people will fall.” (Jeremiah 51:64)  God’s word is always right, and 70 years later, Babylon fell as Jeremiah predicted!

  • Back to Egypt!

    Scripture reading for August 16th: Jeremiah 40-45

    “Then all the army officers, including Johanan son of Kareah and Jezaniah son of Hoshaiah, and all the people from the least to the greatest approached Jeremiah the prophet and said, “Please hear our petition and pray to the Lord your God for this entire remnant.  For as you now see, though we were once many, now only a few are left.  Pray that the Lord your God will tell us where we should go and what we should do.”…“May the Lord be a true and faithful witness against us if we do not act in accordance with everything the Lord your God sends you to tell us.” (Jeremiah 42:1-3,5)

    This is a preacher’s and a prophet’s dream:  people coming to them for God’s direction and vowing to obey whatever God  says!  These people were a small remnant that was left from the captivity and had survived the assassination of their appointed leader.  It seemed like they were ready to hear, so Jeremiah went away to pray.  Ten days later, he brought them God’s directions.  God told them in no uncertain terms what they were to do.  They were to stay in the land and care for it and God would care for them.  If they chose to go to Egypt, they would suffer and die there, never to return to the land.  (Jeremiah 42:7-18)

    It was a simple word and easy to understand.  There was one problem, however.  These people did not believe it because they had already decided what they wanted to do.  The wanted to return to Egypt and felt that there they would have plenty to eat and protection.  They loaded up all their possessions and the people and headed for Egypt in defiance to God’s word and instructions! (Jeremiah 43:1-7)

    Egypt represents a type of the world and the ways of the flesh.  When God’s people live in fear rather than faith, they often run to Egypt.  Egypt represents man’s strength and dependence on the works of his own hands.  Egypt was full of idols and its religion was sensuous and lust-driven.   This group of Israelites that went to Egypt had been worshiping the “Queen of Heaven”, a female fertility goddess, even while in Israel.  They were drawn to Egypt where they could indulge more freely! (Jeremiah 44:15-19)  God in judgment, gave them what they chose, resulting in their destruction!

  • Sunday Rest and Reflection:Recabites!

    Dear Friends of Jesus,

    Greetings in the Wonderful Name of Jesus Christ!  No other name offers salvation and eternal life!  No other person has shown such great love to all of mankind and is now alive praying that we might enjoy this love forever!  It’s time to worship Him and gather to celebrate our life in Him!  It’s time to worship and bow down in honor and thanksgiving to the King of Kings!

    I want to reflect today on a very obscure passage of scripture, Jeremiah 35.  In this passage, God instructed Jeremiah to tempt a family to drink wine.  They refused because of a command of their forefather, Jonadab.  They chose to fully obey their forefather and enjoyed blessing for doing so.  This was a simple command, but one not easy to obey in the culture of the Middle East of that day.  The Recabites went against the culture and customs of the land to obey, and continued to do so even when tempted to do otherwise!

    This is the lesson God was and is still teaching us through these simple people,  “Therefore, this is what the Lord God Almighty, the God of Israel, says: ‘Listen! I am going to bring on Judah and on everyone living in Jerusalem every disaster I pronounced against them.  I spoke to them, but they did not listen; I called to them, but they did not answer.” (Jeremiah 35:17)  We must listen to God and heed His word, just like the Recabites of old listened to their father and obeyed.  They were rewarded for this simple obedience by God.  He longs to reward us as well, as He is no respecter of persons!

    Are you a good example like the Recabites, that God could use to call others to obedience?  Why not make the changes you need today as you attend worship and hear the word of the Lord?  God will reward you too!

    In His Love,

    Pastor John

  • “Is There Any Word From the Lord?”

    Scripture reading for August 14th: Jeremiah 37-39

    Prophets have to know that they have heard from the Lord and stay true to the message, even when the going gets rough!  Jeremiah had been prophesying for nearly 40 years and giving the same basic message:  God was going to send Judah into captivity for her sins!  This was not a popular message and was not the message of the popular prophets of Judah either.  They were telling the king and people that God would deliver them from the Babylonians and break the yoke of the enemy, restoring their land and freedom. (Jeremiah 28:10-11)

    However, as Jerusalem was surrounded and under siege for a time, the Babylonian army withdrew to fight against Pharaoh’s army.  (Jeremiah 37:9-12)  As Jeremiah began to leave the city to claim his property in Benjamin, he was caught by officials and falsely accused of deserting to Babylon.  He was beaten and imprisoned in the house of Jonathan.

    “Jeremiah was put into a vaulted cell in a dungeon, where he remained for a long time.  Then King Zedekiah sent for him and had him brought to the palace where he asked him privately, “Is there any word from the Lord?”  “Yes,” Jeremiah replied, “you will be handed over to the king of Babylon.” (Jeremiah 37:16-17)  The king longed to know what God was thinking and sent for the prophet.  Had he been listening, he would have known that God had already spoken and no one was listening.  Jeremiah repeated the simple message and petitioned the king for mercy.  Zedekiah seemed to soften and allowed him to be moved to a more comfortable location and to receive food.

    Some people seem eager to hear a fresh “word from the Lord” when they haven’t processed or heeded the earlier words.  Some of the instructions from God may not be to our liking or may seem too hard for us, but obedience is the right approach.  God can’t give further instructions until we obey the one’s we have already.  Faithfulness in the little brings an opportunity to be faithful in much!

    Would you take time today to examine your obedience to what God has already spoken to you?  Are you walking in His call for your life?  Are you faithful in the tasks you know you should be doing?  If not, repent and begin to obey!  That’s a “word” for you today!