God hates sin, including prideful arrogance
God is a jealous God
When God talks, listen like your life depends on it, because it often does
God’s message is clear if we listen to His messenger and not just whoever sounds good
So many thematic messages running through these 5 chapters . . . which one to settle on.
Listen. You’ll know which one you need to hear most, but you need to listen. He spoke clearly to me as the themes pounded again and again. The same Spirit, but different authors, different eras, different intended audiences, different outcomes, different foci.
Listening takes practice. It’s easy to talk, but so hard to listen. And, you can’t listen just to the loudest voice, because our humanity often drowns out the clear truth.
Look at Ahaziah. A prophet ready to speak the truth was close at hand, but he sent off to another country to get someone to say what he wanted to hear. How often do I just hear what I want to hear? I thought only my kids were professionals at that, but I think they learned from me.
Not til God burns up 51 soldiers in response to Elijah, TWICE, does someone finally wake up and realize they were barking up the wrong tree. How many lives are lost when I choose not to hear?
If only the writing was as clear as the writing on the wall, right? Jumping to Daniel 5 . . . It would be so easy if God spoke that way. On the other hand, in both these stories God spoke loudly in judgement because they had not listened before and repented.
If we learn to listen when He whispers, we won’t have to hear Him “yell.” Just like with my kids. The learn to obey when I whisper calmly because then the blessing follows. Then fellowship remains intact. If they wait for the rumblings, they hear the reminder that delayed obedience is disobedience, and the longer they delay, the greater need for restoration, teaching, and consequences. Ahazia and Belshazzar didn’t learn that lesson.
Psalm 110 says, “The Lord is at your right hand;
he will shatter kings on the day of his wrath.
6 He will execute judgment among the nations,
filling them with corpses;”
Definitely no mincing words when it gets to that point.
All the more reason to pray for each other as in II Thessalonians 1:
To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power, 12 so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Thank you, Lord, for your grace. Help me to continue to hear while you lead quietly, and to draw others along with me that they will not have to face Your wrath. Help me to remember how much you hate sin, and that it would urge me on to share you all the more. ~Amen
Sixty-six books in a year 