The perils of turning away from God

In a conversation about the mess in our world, particularly in North America, I said that when a nation turns its back on God, it always falls apart. The person I was talking to looked at me as if I had two heads.

History confirms this idea, and the Bible verifies it. Proverbs 14:34 says, “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.” This is from the ESV. The New Living Translation is even clearer: “Godliness makes a nation great, but sin is a disgrace to any people.”

How has God been abandoned? Some examples: Prayer is forbidden in schools and many public gatherings. Where allowed, it is watered down so that praying “in the name of Jesus” is not allowed. Bible reading is frowned upon in many places and Scripture cannot be quoted. When guidance is needed, many people turn to all sorts of ‘experts’ and some consult their daily horoscope, but not God.

This is not new. In the OT, God’s people even did it. The prophet wrote:

And when they say to you, “Inquire of the mediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter,” should not a people inquire of their God? Should they inquire of the dead on behalf of the living? To the teaching and to the testimony! If they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn. They will pass through the land, greatly distressed and hungry. And when they are hungry, they will be enraged and will speak contemptuously against their king and their God, and turn their faces upward. And they will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish. And they will be thrust into thick darkness. (Isaiah 8:19–22)

When trouble came, they spoke against God as if He were their enemy. They looked to the earth, to other resources, but their troubles increased.

The Bible has many examples, but rather than point to more of them, I am thinking about the one resource God has given me and how much it has blessed and changed my life. His Word is my ‘how to’ or Manufacturer’s manual, given to me by my Creator so I know how to live enjoying His blessings. Yes, there are trials, but in those trials, I know His love and care. Walking as He wants me to walk produces great joy rather than distress, darkness, and the gloom of anguish.

“But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:14–17)

I began reading the Bible each day when I was about thirteen. My mother did it, and I thought that was the right thing to do. While it took years before Jesus came into my life and I better understood what I was reading, I’m aware of His hand on my life all those years, and certainly ever since.

I’m also blessed and amazed at the way God blesses those who suffer because their trust is in Him. Consider the people in Texas who are saying that the Lord has taken care of them. They have lost all their possessions, but not their ability and desire to praise God. Compare them to those who have turned their backs on God, those who raise their fists in anger, those who even loot the homes of people who have already lost everything. They mock the mercy of God to their peril.

Magnify these contrasting attitudes in an entire nation. Think of the countries who say NO to God and yes to the so-called freedom of being without religion. How far they fall! Even as they wallow in lawlessness and poverty, they refuse to honor Him. On the other hand, those who seek His face are persecuted by the state and even by their own family members as if they are the scum of the earth. People who oppose the Lord seldom realize that God is not the cause of their misery; rejecting God is destroying them.

Following Jesus means being taught God’s ways, and corrected when in error. He trains His people in righteousness, and makes us complete and enabled to do good. Abandoning the Lord means going the way of sin, refusing correction, welcoming unrighteousness, yet feeling incomplete and unhappy, and without the ability to know the difference between good and evil. Apply that to a whole nation and no wonder God says, “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.”

^^^^^^^^

Jesus, I am praying for many parts of the world that have lost any vision of You that they once had, and for those in darkness. Give them light from You, and from those who know and trust You. I don’t need to be an historian to realize that You exalt those who exalt You. Those who insist on going their own way are reaping the results as they wallow in sin and the consequences of sin. What can I say? How can I pray? Much of our world is in trouble. Help me understand and pray in Your will for individuals and for entire nations. 

Face God now? Or Eventually?

Ezekiel 23:1–49, Revelation 11:1–14, Job 35:9–16

A friend once said to me, “I don’t know why people think it is difficult to believe that Jesus died for the sin of the world. I don’t have a problem with that.”

I replied, “But what about your sin?”

There was a long pause, and he said, “Oh, I see what you mean.”

Human nature has not changed. Sin-filled people do not what to hear about it, even try to hide from hearing the truth. When Adam and Eve sinned, they hid in the garden trying to escape God. We all do it, one way or another.

Today’s reading in the OT describes the sin of God’s people in graphic terms. The metaphors make me blush. Near the end of these descriptions, God says to Ezekiel, “Son of man, will you judge Oholah and Oholibah? Declare to them their abominations. For they have committed adultery, and blood is on their hands. With their idols they have committed adultery, and they have even offered up to them for food the children whom they had borne to me. Moreover, this they have done to me: they have defiled my sanctuary on the same day and profaned my Sabbaths. For when they had slaughtered their children in sacrifice to their idols, on the same day they came into my sanctuary to profane it. And behold, this is what they did in my house.” (Ezekiel 23:36–39)

A few verses later, God repeats how He will use their enemies to punish them. He says, “And they shall return your lewdness upon you, and you shall bear the penalty for your sinful idolatry, and you shall know that I am the Lord God.” (Ezekiel 23:49)

We don’t want to see our sin, and we don’t want to go face to face with the Living God. However, as this chapter describe, all who we resist God in this life, we will meet Him eventually.

Sometimes sinners will mask their resistance to God. They seem okay on the outside, even have a pious exterior. Job’s young ‘friend’ Elihu knew about those people. He said, “There they cry out, but he does not answer, because of the pride of evil men. Surely God does not hear an empty cry, nor does the Almighty regard it.” (Job 35:12–13)

He spoke the truth about the way pride keeps us from a two-way relationship with God and how prideful prayers bounce off the ceiling. Yet Elihu erred by accusing Job of being one of those people: “Job opens his mouth in empty talk; he multiplies words without knowledge.” (Job 35:16)

Job may have been without understanding concerning God’s reason behind his suffering, yet God eventually said that Job spoke “what is right” so his words were not empty talk. He trusted God and spoke directly to Him. He was not afraid to let God examine his life or hear his innermost thoughts and fears. Job had not rejected God, even when he felt that God had turned away from him.

Sinners might think that God isn’t looking and He does not care about what they do, but the Bible is filled with descriptions of how God deals with those who reject Him. Even at the end, He speaks of those who mock the people who serve Him. He tells John (who wrote Revelation), “Rise and measure the temple of God and the altar and those who worship there, but do not measure the court outside the temple; leave that out, for it is given over to the nations, and they will trample the holy city for forty-two months. And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” (Revelation 11:1–3)

In those final and terrible days, it seems sensible that everyone would turn to God and His people for help. Instead, God continues to describe the attitude of godless people. In this case, it is their attitude toward His two witnesses: “And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that rises from the bottomless pit will make war on them and conquer them and kill them, and their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city that symbolically is called Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified. For three and a half days some from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations will gaze at their dead bodies and refuse to let them be placed in a tomb, and those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry and exchange presents, because these two prophets had been a torment to those who dwell on the earth.” (Revelation 11:7–10)

Three and a half days later, God put life into those two. “They stood up on their feet, and great fear fell on those who saw them. Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, ‘Come up here!’ And they went up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies watched them. And at that hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth of the city fell. Seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven.” (Revelation 11:11–13)

A witness is someone who describes what they have seen. These witnesses told people about God, and to do that, they had to know Him, not run away from Him. Turning from sin and facing the Lord means admitting sin and being honest with God. This is unpleasant at best, but the result is far better than the alternative, for the mockers die and the faithful witnesses live with God forever.