2002-11-11
Good Morning Faithful Ones,
We continue looking at citations that reveal God’s intervention and interaction with us, while we wage spiritual warfare. His presence in our lives and continual help is a blessing of our salvation. All we had to do was to repent of our sins and come to faith in Christ. I was asked to read a long e-mail message recently that, upon first inspection, looked very scientific and legitimate. It contained a message that might have been a life saver had it been true. The problem is that a few truths in it were misinterpreted and surrounded by a pack of lies. It took a bit of digging on Peter’s part to find out what was behind it; one couldn’t tell easily from that first inspection. My red flag had been raised enough to ask for his help with this. I’m always pretty skeptical about things that come over the Internet warning us to stop using something that is widely accepted in our society. In this case, it was a warning to stop using microwave ovens. Christ gave us this warning in MT 7: 15, “Be on your guard against false prophets: they come to you looking like sheep on the outside, but on the inside they are really like wild wolves.” This article quoted reliable sources like Lancet, the English version of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Along with that were lots of unknown sources, including a doctor from Switzerland. Further investigation revealed that this doctor is the head of a church in Switzerland that is very New Age, far out, and anti-Semitic. It blames the Jews for all of society’s ills. Another so-called doctor quoted in the same article believes that the Zionists are responsible for encouraging the use of cell phones, even through they “know” these devices cause brain tumors. These Zionists are more interested in seeing the cell phone business flourish than in preserving human lives, according to this doctor. These are the kinds of vicious lies that spread quickly, causing panic. They are evil. Any e-mailed response to the article might have given the sender’s information and set off the sending of unwanted mailings expressing their point of view. 2 COR 10: 4-5 shows us how God helps us in a situation like this. “The weapons we use in our fight are not the world’s weapons but God’s powerful weapons which we use to destroy strongholds. We destroy false arguments; we pull down every proud obstacle that is raised against the knowledge of God; we take every thought captive and make it obey Christ.”
Jeremiah dealt with the enormous challenge of having to express a very poorly received and unpopular message in his time. Judah was being very disobedient to God, and God had fueled Jeremiah’s faithful and obedient heart to tell the truth. He was in dire physical danger as a result. Note how God helps him in JER 20: 8-11. “Whenever is speak, I have to cry out and shout, ‘Violence! Destruction! Lord, I am ridiculed and scorned all the time because I proclaim Your message. But when I say, ‘I will forget the Lord and no longer speak in His name,’ Your message is like a fire burning deep within me. I try my best to hold it in, but can no longer keep it back. I hear everybody whispering, ‘Terror is everywhere! Let’s report him to the authorities!’ Even my close friends wait for my downfall. ‘Perhaps he can be tricked,’ they say; ‘then we can catch him and get revenge.’ But You, Lord, are on my side, strong and mighty, and those who persecute me will fail. They will be disgraced forever, because they cannot succeed. Their disgrace will never be forgotten.” Jeremiah goes on to tell us how God tests men justly and knows what is in their hearts and minds. He acknowledges how God rescues the oppressed from the power of evil men (12-13).
James brings up a very basic problem and reveals God’s response to it in JAS 4: 5-6. “Do not think that there is no truth in the Scripture that says, ‘The spirit that God placed in us is filled with fierce desires.’ But the grace that God gives is even stronger. As the Scripture [PR 3: 34] says, ‘God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.’” This passage is illuminated by looking at RO 7: 5-6 first. “For when we lived according to our human nature, the sinful desires stirred up by the Law were at work in our bodies, and we were useful in the service of death. Now, however, we are free from the Law, because we died to that which once held us prisoners. No longer do we serve in the old way of a written law, but in the new way of the Spirit.” From where did those fierce desires of our human spirits come? They were a direct result of Satan’s deception of Adam and Eve [GN 3: 6], fleshly desires we inherited. God knows this and provided us a way out of our slavery to sin by the death of His beloved Son on the cross and imparting to us the ability to repent and come to faith in Him.
We must understand that God is omnipresent, loving, and compassionate. Our ability to perceive His constant presence, to acknowledge He knows what is in our hearts without regard to what we say, and to feel the warmth of His love is a function of the depth of our faith in Him. We are called upon every day to examine our own lives to assess the state of our faith and willingness to trust and obey Him. In addition, we are wise to spend time looking for how He interacts with us and with others to bring about blessings for His children. We have a lot to learn about this. The more we do learn, the more joy it will bring us.
PRAYER: O Lord, You are wanting us to look at all of Your word, OT and NT alike, so we can see the consistency of Your messages and the immeasurable compassion that You show toward Your creation. No human being has ever been able to match it. The same can be said for Your wisdom. Paul expressed what is in our hearts in RO 11: 33-36. “How great are God’s riches! How deep are His wisdom and knowledge! Who can explain His decisions? Who can understand His ways? As the Scripture [IS 40: 13] says, ‘Who knows the mind of the Lord? Who is able to give Him advice? Who has ever given Him anything, so that he had to pay it back?’ For all things were created by Him and all things exist through Him and for Him. To God be the glory forever! Amen.” If You had been a careless, irresponsible god, You would not have acted as You have. You would not have sacrificed Your Son on the cross, given us the Holy Spirit to dwell within us, been acting as a constant Help in times of trouble [PS 46: 1], encouraged us, corrected us, made promises that have been kept to us, or done any of the loving things You do. Instead, You would have left us dangling in the wind when Satan shoots off his fiery arrows. IS 40: 31 describes how Your presence comes thorough to all who believe. “But those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed. They will rise up on wings like eagles; they will run and not get weary; they will walk and not grow weak.” You offer us the assurance of eternal life with You, one of joy and close fellowship, if we will endure through our battles and not lose our faith. You have given us the big picture of Your plan for us, so that our pain, suffering, and losses won’t have the power to separate us from You. In fact, You have told us in RO 8: 38-39 just how protected the faithful really are. “For I am certain that nothing can separate us from His love: neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers or powers, neither the present, nor the future, neither the world above nor the world below-there is nothing in all creation that will ever be able to separate us from the love of God which is ours through Christ Jesus our Lord.” We humbly confess our sins and offer You our adoration, worship, loyalty, diligence, trust, obedience, glory, honor, thanks, and praise. In Christ’s name, we pray. Amen.
Tomorrow, there is even more to share about God’s interaction and intervention when we are amidst spiritual warfare. All of this is causing great comfort and peace to arise in me, and I hope it is doing the same for you. Each day that I write about the love the Lord has for us, it is a privilege. He is so eager to bless us, if we will only turn to Him. There is no greater Source of help anywhere than our Father in heaven and His Son. He loves each and every one of us, no matter how important or unimportant we may think we are. Peter and I send our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn