Good morning to all on this Monday morning. Waine and I spent the weekend in Thomason, Georgia and had a great time just being together one on one. These away times are good bonding times for us. I saw Eric's wife last week in Lake Charles, Louisiana and she is doing fine. Please continue to keep JKS in your prayers for her healing. I am praying for all those in need of a job but more importantly I am praying that you will seek the face of God and find peace and comfort.
I am continuing my journey in Jeremiah 5, verses 1-19 "Go up and down the streets of Jerusalem, look around and consider, search through her squares. If you can find but one person who deals honestly and seeks the truth, I will forgive this city. Although they say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives,’still they are swearing falsely.” LORD, do not your eyes look for truth? You struck them, but they felt no pain; you crushed them, but they refused correction. They made their faces harder than stone and refused to repent. I thought, “These are only the poor; they are foolish, for they do not know the way of the LORD, the requirements of their God. So I will go to the leaders and speak to them; surely they know the way of the LORD, the requirements of their God.” But with one accord they too had broken off the yoke and torn off the bonds. Therefore a lion from the forest will attack them, a wolf from the desert will ravage them, a leopard will lie in wait near their towns to tear to pieces any who venture out, for their rebellion is great and their backslidings many. “Why should I forgive you? Your children have forsaken me and sworn by gods that are not gods. I supplied all their needs, yet they committed adultery and thronged to the houses of prostitutes. They are well-fed, lusty stallions, each neighing for another man’s wife. Should I not punish them for this?” declares the LORD. “Should I not avenge myself on such a nation as this? “Go through her vineyards and ravage them, but do not destroy them completely. Strip off her branches, or these people do not belong to the LORD. The people of Israel and the people of Judah have been utterly unfaithful to me,” declares the LORD. They have lied about the LORD; they said, “He will do nothing! No harm will come to us; we will never see sword or famine. The prophets are but wind and the word is not in them; so let what they say be done to them.” Therefore this is what the LORD God Almighty says: Because the people have spoken these words, I will make my words in your mouth a fire and these people the wood it consumes. People of Israel,” declares the LORD, “I am bringing a distant nation against you— an ancient and enduring nation, a people whose language you do not know, whose speech you do not understand. Their quivers are like an open grave; all of them are mighty warriors. They will devour your harvests and food, devour your sons and daughters; they will devour your flocks and herds, devour your vines and fig trees. With the sword they will destroy the fortified cities in which you trust. “Yet even in those days,” declares the LORD, “I will not destroy you completely. And when the people ask, ‘Why has the LORD our God done all this to us?’ you will tell them, ‘As you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods in your own land, so now you will serve foreigners in a land not your own." May the Lord add a blessing to the reading and hearing of His Word.
It has been hard for me to get through Jeremiah because this is not the God I know, the God of the Old Testament; the God before the Grace and Mercy of Christ. The God of Jeremiah was still trying to communicate with His children of Israel and Judah. The children of Abraham who were given the Promise. He is actually pleading with them to turn from their practice of worshiping idol gods and turn their face back to Him. He even conjectures that if Jeremiah can find "just one person" whose heart is true to the One and Only Living God then He would not ravage Judah. The importance of Judah versus Israel is that Christ would come from the lineage of David who became the first King of Judah. It was important that Judah submit itself to the will of God to prepare the way for Jesus. Likewise it is with us today, even in the dispensation of Grace and Mercy the Twin Towers of the Love and Commitment of God. God desires that we submit our will and lives to Him so that we can be connected to Him and realize the life of abundance that He has for us. God knows that our sin nature will block our vision of what a life of faithfulness can do you us. A life of faithfulness is a life free of the burdens of this world. We can awaken each morning with a smile on our face because we will be on a treasure hunt from the time we wake until the time we fall asleep. God has prepared a banquet, a feast for us that sin can block us from. Just as in the days of Jeremiah, God sends the Holy Spirit on a minute by minute basis to remind us that our job is to abandon sin and turn our face to the only Living and Wise God.
The lost "tribes" don't know this God of Mercy. Some actually think that they have sinned so much that God will never accept them. Well those of us sinners who have been saved by the Blood of Jesus, know better. We know that there is no sin too great to keep us from the Love of God through Christ Jesus. Just like there was no stopping God from eliminating the false idols of Judah so that His Son Jesus would have a lineage from which there was no shame. Nothing can block us from His love today. Share the Love of God with someone today; share His love with yourself.
Now may the LORD bless you and keep you; may the LORD make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; may the LORD turn His face toward you and give you peace. Amen.
Stephanie
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