What do we learn about God’s judgment by reading the Old Testament? Even then, God sought to give grace and forgiveness. God did not seek to condemn. He sought that all would repent and live.
But when men refused to repent and instead set their faces against God, there came a moment, a line in the sand, where God moved against them in judgment.
In a word, His longsuffering came to an end. Men had set their way, and no repentance was found in them. God would not let them continue in their rebellion and evil in perpetuity.
I don’t know when the Lord will return to judge this world. He first came to save and offered His grace to all His image bearers, including you and me.
And He is patiently waiting for whosoever will to claim His grace and live. He has not come to judge the world yet because He is waiting for you and me to repent.
But once we no longer repent, once we decide to go our own way, then the longsuffering of God will no longer benefit us.
Ezekiel speaks of this truth throughout his book. God wanted to extend grace to all who would accept it, but His judgment reluctantly came for those who did not accept His salvation. I say reluctantly because He prefers to extend grace to judgment.
He is the same God today. He wants a relationship with us. He has given us a way to Him through His Son. He offers His grace that will build our faith, leading to obedience because of our faith.
He promises to create in us a new heart, to make us a new creature, to renew and strengthen us as we give ourselves wholly to Him.
But if we have one foot on the cross and the other foot in the world, we become whores who break our Lord’s heart. Like a faithful husband, He wants us to be fully devoted to Him and no other.
If we continue to conform to this world rather than being transformed, we walk away from the royal inheritance we are promised. We give up the grace that He offers. We lay down our saving faith.
If we cast our lots with the damned, we will be damned. If we choose those who have rejected His grace, we will reject His grace.
When judgment comes, we will have nothing. We will have traded our birthright for a mess of pottage, and God will give us what we truly want- an existence without Him.
Let us be wholly devoted to our Lord and King. Let His grace be the foundation of our faith, and let our faith cause us to live lives as His disciples, not out of compulsion, but out of love for Him because He first loved us.
He offered Judah and Israel the same thing, but they refused His offer. Let us embrace Him while His longsuffering is extended. Let us be fully His when our King comes again in judgment against those who refuse Him. Let us be in His grace and claim our royal promise from Him.
Read Lamentations. It is a book of weeping, sadness, and despair. The nation that was the apple of God’s eyes is now despised in the eyes of the nations.
Once rich in wealth and food, its people now grope about for a morsel of food and drink. Rich and poor, old and young alike suffer because of the judgment of God against them.
I can only imagine what it will be like for many of us on the Day of Judgment when we realize that we have given up a prince’s inheritance for a meager existence without God for eternity, that we have traded our birthright for a mess of pottage.
Perhaps for those of us who turn away from the Lord, we will understand the heart-wrenching lamentations of Jeremiah. The big difference is that Jeremiah speaks of repentance and restoration. On the Day of Judgment, there will be no more repentance or salvation.
May we never experience that lamentation.
“For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.” (Hebrews 10:26-27 ESV).
I am in the book of 1 Kings in my daily Bible reading. This is the book where God blesses Solomon with tremendous wealth and wisdom. Yet, Solomon took these blessings, and instead of using them to bring glory to God, the king forsook God and used His blessings for his own glory and sinful purposes.
King Solomon broke the commands that God gave to the kings through Samuel. Among these commands was not to marry foreign wives because they would turn away the king’s heart. This is precisely what happened to Solomon.
“Now King Solomon loved many foreign women, along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women,
from the nations concerning which the LORD had said to the people of Israel, “You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you, for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods.” Solomon clung to these in love.” (1 Kings 11:1-2 ESV).
But Solomon followed his heart and walked away from the Lord Who had shown tremendous kindness to him, and just as the Lord had warned, his wives turned his heart away from God.
“He had 700 wives, who were princesses, and 300 concubines. And his wives turned away his heart.” (1 Kings 11:3 ESV).
God, Who had given Solomon wisdom, wealth, peace, and a long life, was angry and heartbroken. King Solomon chose to walk his own way and not with his Lord.
“And the LORD was angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned away from the LORD, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice” (1 Kings 11:9 ESV).
What a lesson for us. God will not give us nearly what He blessed King Solomon with, but will we choose to walk away from the Lord for far less than Solomon had? Will we turn our hearts away from God over our small mess of pottage?
Let us be careful where we put our hearts. Let us be careful to have the discernment to see the true treasure we have.
“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal,
but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-21 ESV).
This is one of my favorite verses in the Bible:
“This is a light thing in the sight of the LORD. He will also give the Moabites into your hand,” (2 Kings 3:18 ESV).
“This is a light thing in the sight of the LORD.” Isn’t that amazing? In this context, the armies of Israel, Judah, and Edom were going after the rebellious army of Moab, but the soldiers did not have water and would die unless water was found.
In this context, God told the kings that giving them water would be a light thing for Him to do. In fact, God would deliver the Moab army into their hands.
Sometimes, we see the impossible and forget that the impossible to us is a light thing to God. Sometimes, we put God in a box and determine what He can or cannot do before we even ask Him.
Sometimes, we don’t ask because we have already determined what God will or won’t do.
When we do this, we do not act in faith but in doubt. We forget that everything is a light thing in the eyes of our Almighty Creator.
James teaches us the same principle when we pray to God for wisdom:
“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.
But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind.
For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord;” (James 1:5-7 ESV).
May we remember that anything we ask of the Lord our God is always a light thing in His sight. Always.
2 Kings 6 talks about the angels of God and chariots of fire. Elisha could see them, but his servant could not until Elisha prayed that his servant’s eyes be opened.
I believe that there is an unseen realm all around us. Angels, sent to minister to God’s children who have accepted Jesus as our Savior and King, are here, doing their divinely appointed duty (Hebrews 1:14).
We do not know much about God’s unseen realm, but ignorance does not mean that it is any less real. It is amazing that God has brought together the seen and unseen realms for the benefit of His children.
Just like the servant of Elisha was amazed to see God’s protection in the form of mighty angels waiting in chariots of fire, I believe we would be overwhelmed to see what God has provided for us in the unseen realm.
Let us praise God for using all at His disposal to benefit His adopted children, those of us who have a divinely appointed inheritance made possible through our King Jesus.
I sometimes wonder if we spend too much time on the less weighty spiritual matters and not enough time on the weightier matters.