The Jews rejected their Messiah, and God transferred his interest from the nation of Israel to the church. God has taken away the privileged position of the Jews and given it to “others.” We are now living in the church age. We are now the tenant farmers serving in God’s vineyard. He’s given the vineyard to us. It’s now our responsibility to be fruitful and have something to show for our labor. God wants us to be productive and bear fruit. Are we producing anything? Are we being fruitful? I hope/trust that God will not say of us what he said to the Jews. Read More ...
People fail to see the truth because they don’t want to see the truth. If Jesus really is sent from God, then I must follow him. People don’t want to deal with the implications of Jesus’ authority, so they just deny it. They don’t deny it because it’s not true; they deny it because they don’t like the consequences of that truth. Read More ...
That one phrase, “The Lord hath need of him” (vs. 34) is very powerful. What genuine disciple of Christ would hold anything back if we knew “the Lord needs it”? Yet sometimes we are reluctant to give what the Lord needs—our time, talent, treasures, ourselves. Parents may have to give up their children for the Lord’s service. There may be any number of things we may be called upon to sacrifice for the Lord’s work. Read More ...
Even the worst human, even the oddest or most eccentric, even the most different, the most diseased and the most deformed still bear the image of God. The oldest and the youngest, the best and the worst all share the image of God. Read More ...
Many people today dismiss the idea of God’s vengeance. They like to think about God as loving, kind, tolerant, and benevolent, not judgmental. God to them is like a heavenly grandfather who ignores the bad behavior of his grandkids. But because God is holy, he must also judge righteously. The judge of all the earth will do right, and that requires him to mete out righteous judgment. Read More ...
It’s unfortunate that Ben Hadad didn’t ask Elisha how he could be right with God. He died as a pagan idolater. The Bible assures us that it is appointed to everyone to die. People don’t want to think about it, but death is inescapable. All of us will die, either through natural or unnatural means. The time to prepare for that reality is now, while we still have the opportunity. Ben Hadad’s opportunity is gone; his destiny is unchangeable. As long as you are alive, you still have the opportunity to choose your eternal destiny. Repent and trust in Christ before it’s too late. Read More ...
We live in a perilous time. Many threats against our God-given, unalienable rights exist today. If some people have their way, our property rights will continue to erode. If things keep going the way that they are, we may eventually lose our property rights, or at least see them greatly reduced.
If that happens, it’s just another sign of God withdrawing his hand of blessing on our nation. For those of us who care about these things, we should do all we can to prevent our system of government from being radically altered. We need to vote people into office who will uphold and defend our constitution and our rights. Read More ...
When we turn away from God and disobey his word, we can count on God’s judgment or chastisement. That’s true personally and nationally. When we believe God’s word and obey it, we can expect God’s deliverance and blessing. God will fulfill his promises and make good on his threats. Let’s pray that God will withhold his judgment and show mercy to our nation. Read More ...
God is at work behind the scenes, often in invisible ways, to provide for his people. As God’s people, we should be aware that God is with us and will provide for us and defend us. He’ll provide solutions to our problems. We may not experience miraculous solutions like we see in this text, but God can still help us solve our problems in other ways. Therefore, we can follow Elisha’s command—“fear not.” With the resources God provides, we can deal with the problems we encounter in life. Read More ...