God does not mess around -
His blessing is given in full measure,
and His judgements also.
Judgement is not only the portion of the world, but also of the disobedient church.
In the process of God's working with Israel there was a full measure of both blessing and judgement.
Isaiah prophesied to Jerusalem -
(not just Israel but Jerusalem, the very center of Israel's glory,)
"Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the LORD
the cup of his fury;
thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of
trembling, and wrung them out."
(Isa 51.17)
"The dregs" - it is a picture of the bitter, inescapable, end.
It was not just the cup but even to the dregs had to be drunk.
Today, I wonder what will bring us to awareness.
We seem to be still proclaiming peace and safety, in the face of a calamity which we can neither measure nor arrest.
If God desires to bring us to an awareness of the limits of our pride,
and our abilities, the question is how much more will it take?
Everything which God has appointed must be fulfilled.
The full measure of chastisement must be taken.
There is an option to judgement:
Isaiah says (1.19) "If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land."
This is truth unalterable. This is our proffered inheritance.
One translation of Job 42.16 says, "he died at last as old men die,
that have taken their full toll of the years."
How different from our common expression that "the years take their toll."
Job was in control here - it was he who collected toll of the years!
Does it sometimes seem that in our lives we are 'drinking the dregs' of the years?
It doesn't have to be that way, we can take toll of our years.
Instead of the years taking from us,
and leaving us the bitterness, and frustration, of loss.
There is an invitation to know the fullness of a realized Life.
Time can add yet more and more to our possessions in Christ.
The "good of the land" is still there for those who follow hard after their God.
Amen and Glory to the Lord on high!
ReplyDeleteDuring a time of lamentation in 2015 after a young white supremacist stormed into a prayer meeting at a black church in South Carolina and shot nine people to death, the Holy Spirit spoke two words to me very clearly: "National Repentance." I believe it is the Lord's intention to bring America, a country of excesses and arrogance, to that place, but this will not happen until and unless it happens first in the Church, and it won't happen in the Church until God reveals her spiritual needs to her by His Holy Spirit. I agree when you said in your last segment that the American church does not believe she has any needs, but in reality, she fits the description of the Laodicean church in the Book of Revelation who doesn't know that she is actually naked, poor and blind. God invites His people to "repent" and "hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches." Now is as good a time as any!
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