Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Go against the flow!

As the story of God's people continues, selfish agendas and lies roll on.  The tarnished look of chosen people reminds me of the world today.  Broken lives, precious people not seeing their value or others.  It is a sad picture.  The nation of Israel does what most of us do in crisis--they turn to God with their words (but not their hearts).  They 'dissemble in their hearts' as Jeremiah says--the short and ugly translation:  they lie to themselves and others.  They say, 'Tell us what God wants us to do and we'll do it."  What they meant was 'Tell us what we want to hear and we'll do it.'  So, in essence, they lied.  Lies are of the devil and God hates dishonesty.

Jeremiah said, 'God wants you to stay here and trust Him.'  They chose to go to Egypt to escape the rule of Babylon and Nebuchannezer.  God simply gave Egypt to Babylon, and Israel ended up back where they back centuries before:  in slavery in Egypt.  In a human heart, exasperation would rule the day.  In the heart of God, love and mercy reigned and reigns. 

God continued calling out to the stubborn, rebellious hearts one at a time.  He does that now.  There are times we are part of story we do not like--but we are individuals to God.  While 'God so loved the world, He sent His son to whosoever would believe'!  He so loves us as individuals, we can always seek Him even in the midst of a rebellious world.  Jeremiah ended up with the folks in slavery but his heart stayed obedient to the Lord.  That is our call too.  It does not matter what the world around us does--we are to seek and serve the One True God!  He is there, He sees and He rejoices in each individual.

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