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In Christ, Mark
In Christ, Mark
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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
“You are always righteous, Lord, when
I bring a case before You. Yet I would speak with You about Your justice: Why
does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease? You
have planted them, and they have taken root; they grow and bear fruit. You are
always on their lips but far from their hearts.”
“Drag them off like sheep to be
butchered! Set them apart for the day of slaughter! How long will the land lie
parched and the grass in every field be withered? Because those who live in it
are wicked, the animals and birds have perished. Moreover, the people are
saying, ‘He will not see what happens to us.’”
“If you have raced with men on foot
and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in
safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan? Your
relatives, members of your own family—even they have betrayed you; they have raised
a loud cry against you. Do not trust them, though they speak well of you.”
“I will forsake My house, abandon My
inheritance; I will give the one I love into the hands of her enemies. My
inheritance has become to Me like a lion in the forest. She roars at Me; therefore
I hate her. Has not My inheritance become to me like a speckled bird of prey that
other birds of prey surround and attack? Go and gather all the wild beasts; bring
them to devour. Many shepherds will ruin my vineyard and trample down my field;
they will turn my pleasant field into a desolate wasteland. It will be made a
wasteland, parched and desolate before Me; the whole land will be laid waste because
there is no one who cares.”
“Over all the barren heights in the desert destroyers will swarm, for the sword of the Lord will devour from one end of the land to the other; no one will be safe. They will sow wheat but reap thorns; they will wear themselves out but gain nothing. They will bear the shame of their harvest because of the Lord’s fierce anger.”
This is what the Lord says: “As for
all My wicked neighbors who seize the inheritance I gave My people Israel, I
will uproot them from their lands and I will uproot the people of Judah from
among them. But after I uproot them, I will again have compassion and will
bring each of them back to their own inheritance and their own country. And if
they learn well the ways of my people and swear by My name, saying, ‘As surely
as the Lord lives’—even as they once taught my people to swear by Baal—then
they will be established among my people. But if any nation does not listen, I
will completely uproot and destroy it,” declares the Lord.
Jeremiah 12:1-2, 3b-17
This ends today’s reading from God's holy
word. Thanks be to God.
We see it every day it seems.
Someone does wrong and seemingly either gets away with it all
together or receives a light punishment for their actions, leaving someone
crying about injustice and unfairness. This can be particularly true when we
see people with money who are able to afford exceptional legal representation
getting acquitted for acts that a person of lesser means would be convicted of.
It can make a person ponder whether crime really does pay?
Or maybe another way to phrase the question would be: Does
the way of the wicked prosper?
As we see in our scripture passage from the Jeremiah 12,
the prophet had these same feelings when he addressed God about all that was
going on in Judah. Look again at these words here:
“You are always righteous, Lord, when I bring a case before You. Yet
I would speak with You about Your justice: Why does the way of the wicked
prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease? You have planted them, and they
have taken root; they grow and bear fruit. You are always on their lips but far
from their hearts.”
“Drag them off like sheep to be butchered! Set them apart for the day
of slaughter! How long will the land lie parched and the grass in every field
be withered? Because those who live in it are wicked, the animals and birds
have perished. Moreover, the people are saying, ‘He will not see what happens
to us.’”
“If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can
you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in
the thickets by the Jordan? Your relatives, members of your own family—even
they have betrayed you; they have raised a loud cry against you. Do not trust
them, though they speak well of you.”
“I will forsake My house, abandon My inheritance; I will give the one I
love into the hands of her enemies. My inheritance has become to Me like a lion
in the forest. She roars at Me; therefore I hate her. Has not My inheritance
become to me like a speckled bird of prey that other birds of prey surround and
attack? Go and gather all the wild beasts; bring them to devour. Many shepherds
will ruin my vineyard and trample down my field; they will turn my pleasant
field into a desolate wasteland. It will be made a wasteland, parched and
desolate before Me; the whole land will be laid waste because there is no one
who cares.”
“Over all the barren heights in the desert destroyers will swarm, for the sword of the Lord will devour from one end of the land to the other; no one will be safe. They will sow wheat but reap thorns; they will wear themselves out but gain nothing. They will bear the shame of their harvest because of the Lord’s fierce anger.”
This is what the Lord says: “As for all My wicked neighbors who seize
the inheritance I gave My people Israel, I will uproot them from their lands
and I will uproot the people of Judah from among them. But after I uproot them,
I will again have compassion and will bring each of them back to their own
inheritance and their own country. And if they learn well the ways of my people
and swear by My name, saying, ‘As surely as the Lord lives’—even as they once
taught my people to swear by Baal—then they will be established among my
people. But if any nation does not listen, I will completely uproot and destroy
it,” declares the Lord. Jeremiah
12:1-2, 3b-17
The people of Israel had turned away from God and made the
pagan god Baal their focus of worship, an act that could not have been more
disrespectful toward the God who had been so faithful to them and all their
ancestors who had lived before them. God had promised to be the God of the
Israelites and they in turn would be His people. All they had to do was remain
fully obedient to His commandments and receive the righteousness He expected
them to live by but we know they didn’t do that. They instead chose to follow
their own will, ways, and desires, disregarding and dishonoring God along the
way.
These actions angered Jeremiah, God’s selected messenger,
and not yet seeing God’s judgment come upon his fellow people of Judah and
Jerusalem, he wondered whether or not God was going to hold them accountable.
He yearned for God’s justice to be revealed and wondered the following
questions:
Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why
do all the faithless live at ease?
Jeremiah knew that God had promised consequences for anyone
who chose to live in iniquity over holiness but he had not seen God act as yet
and that’s what led him to ponder what he did.
Perhaps we’re like the prophet and rather than trust that
the Lord will work at His appointed time and in His appointed way, we tend to
be impatient and almost demand He work in accordance with our expectations.
Unfortunately, that’s just not how it works.
God always moves in His time and in His way. All we need to
do is trust that He will move, whether it is to judge or whether it is to
bless. His timing is always perfect.
One thing is certain: no one gets away with sin. The wicked
never prosper, rather, they will suffer when God deems it’s time and pay for
their transgressions.
You can bank on that.
In the case of the Israelites of Judah and Jerusalem, their
punishment came in the form of first being attacked by the Babylonians, the
destroyers the scriptures speak of in our passage today, who would invade God’s
holy land given to His people, lay it to waste, and then haul off the
Israelites to Babylon for seventy years of exile. The people of God chose to
abandon and forsake Him and so they would get a taste of what it felt like to
be abandoned and forsaken. Although they would cry out to God, their cries would
go unheard. The same would apply to their cries to all the false gods they had
worshipped, the false gods that had gotten them in trouble in the first place.
God wanted that to happen to show His people that He was indeed the one true
God and had no rival.
Today, we need to rest assured that no sin will go
unpunished. Yes, it’s true that there is no condemnation for those who are in
Christ Jesus. The scriptures assure us of that but there is a difference between
condemnation and correction. Those in Christ will not be condemned but they
will be corrected if they turn to sin and away from the Lord and His
righteousness. God will send penalty on anyone today who chooses wickedness
over righteousness just as He did in Old Testament times more than 2,000 years
ago.
Back to our question for the day.
Does the way of the wicked prosper?
Don’t let anyone ever tell you it does, no matter how
things may appear.
God is always on the scene and in control, acting when He
sees fit.
That’s all we need to remember.
Amen.
In
Christ,
Mark
PS: Please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.
Send any prayer requests to OurChristianWalk@aol.com
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