11/28/05
The organization of this blog may be off, hehehe...
It is now 9:47 am, and I think it's alittle early to be typing this now, but with thoughts from this morning I just couldn't wait. I woke up early this morning and had a quiet time, and had some interesting thoughts about Godless men and Prayer! (By the way, the two subjects aren't linked in anyway.)
I started off reading Daniel Chapter 9 this morning and Daniel's prayer really popped out at me! I was intrigued by the way he prayed to God. Daniel completely humbled himself before God with fasting, sackcloth attire, and ashes. Daniel began to praise God for what He had done in the past, and also admitted his faults and the faults of his Countrymen! In addition to his humility, Daniel came boldly before God with requests on behalf of Israel! But what really got me was the fact that Daniel wasn't just plainly asking God for forgiveness of his countrymen...no... he was demanding it! He came before the creator of the universe demanding blessings!!! How cool is that? He was extremely humble in the process of it too, and God granted his request! When I think about this there seems to be a wave of irony associated with this! How can a mere man come before God with total confidence and demand blessings?! Lol. This is found specifically in Daniel 9:15-19. Prayer in this Fashion is also done by the believers in Acts 4:28-30, by the Lord Jesus Himself in John 17. There are more examples all over scripture, but those were some of the ones that came to mind immediately. Approach God's throne with boldness believing that he will answer! If God doesn't give us what we request, he may be telling us no, or wait, but I trust that it will make sense to the saint why God will not answer a prayer.
Afterwards I read some of the book of Jude, and again something caught my attention....Godless men!!! Jude 8-16 Talks about Unrighteous/Godless men and the judgement that will eventually come to them! I will make this short. Everyday we are surrounded by unrighteous Godless people, alot of us are close friends with them. Now the point I want to make is that we should warn these people of God's judgement... Yes! We should warn them, and this reminds me of Ezekiel 33:7-9. Following this warning, we should follow up with the truth of the gospel. Many people have been told that they are a sinner and that they are going to hell, and they have been greatly offended by this. I've run into individuals who were bitter towards Christians because someone has told them that. This is because the truth was not fully spoken and was not spoken in love! In reality the unbeliever may have been told that he or she is going to hell out of malice and cruelty or just plain coldness. We must speak the truth in love! While it is true that if someone is not trusting Christ they are headed for hell, but WE MUST TELL PEOPLE WHY!!! We must give them the whole truth, and the truth is that we are all transgressors of God's law. God does not overlook sin but instead, he must provide punishment for those sins. For the wages of sin is death. By no means will God let those who are not forgiven of their sins into heaven, and there are two places where one can only go after judgement! We must warn people of this and speak the truth in love followed by the gospel! Now by typing this, I am reminded of what I talked about with an acquaintance during my ride back down to Gainesville. Here is the Gist of the story......
I was in the car with a friend and his friend. I'll call him D. I opened up a spiritual conversation with D and he told me that he was an agnostic/athiest, then he told me that someone told him that he needed to repent or he was going to hell......ok....But then he proceeded to proclaim his goodness. He told me that he was no Hitler, he only stole once, he was honest MOST of the time, and that he stayed away from extreme stuff. Now what's wrong with this picture? Someone warned him of God's wrath, but he did not indicate that he knew why God would send someone to hell!!!!! D is like a blind man headed toward a cliff!!!!! He thinks he will be ok if there is a God when he is judged, but in reality he is not forgiven for his sin, and only through Jesus can he be forgiven!!! We must warn these people of God's wrath, but we must also tell them WHY they are headed for God's wrath following this with the gospel. We must speak the truth with love!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We must not abstain from telling our friends and family this vital truth followed with the gospel!
Now I want to mention one more thing.
When speaking the truth of the gospel to people there will be persecution. Jesus said so himself...... No servant is greater than his master, and if they persecuted Him they will persecute you too. You can look back at history and in scripture, and you will see all kinds of persecution. People have been ridiculed, boiled, beheaded, hit, kicked, spat on, crucified, and stoned. But these are the marks of Christ, and we will not be exempt from the cup that our Lord Himself drank from. Besides if you are rejected for the name of Christ, you are blessed. (1 Peter 3:14 ; 1 Peter 4:14, 16).
I know this was alittle extreme, but this is what was on my mind today and for the past few days.
More to come......soon
No comments:
Post a Comment