Becoming Like The World

Becoming Like The World

5/3/18

The topic of this message is occurring around us at breakneck speed and is a process that some reach faster than others.  We must be thankful that the Creator of this wonderful nation and our lives is slow to judge such wickedness even though we continue to snub our noses at Him through our self-righteous attitudes.  God is gracious enough to wait for us to turn our hearts towards Him even when the fingers are being pointed at us for various reasons.  If we turn our hearts back towards God and fulfill the designed mission that He commissioned us to do then we shall see the perfect healing that He promises to those who serve Him with all their heart.  But if we do not and continue to reject His Ways, His hand shall appear in ways that we have never witnessed before, just as our egos have grown so too shall God’s hands be mighty.

God has shared with over these past articles that He is delighted to give us the blessings and gifts of life and that it is He who designed and authorized the leadership status of this nation.  But as time has moved along we have become a self-supporting and self-centered nation that believes that it was through our humanly works alone that has allowed for this rise in status.  We have steadily crossed and marked God out of our lives and ignored the beautiful talent that He has graced our hearts with to guide other nations with His wisdom.  We have stood before mankind and boasted about how much we have accomplished even though being isolated from the majority of the world and its existence, a young nation in time that has achieved so much without the long entity of lineage to back our claims.  Yet through this discourse of public self-preservation acknowledgment, we have left out, purposefully, the One source and origin of our presence and while we boast of our status and who we completely forget that our hearts are sounding with emptiness due to the rhetoric of lies that we have adopted.

How common it is to stand upon our past reputation as a nation and leadership skills yet want to degrade our status both involuntarily and voluntarily on the highest stage all in the name of equality.  Our hearts are empty because we have drained the source of our heartbeat from its openings and our defenses are suffering as a result.  Our existence has become anemic due to our own flagellation process for being leaders to a dying world and being embarrassed for such standing and not defeating the process.  It is always amazing to me to see the systemic annihilation of God in our lives and at the same time fulfill God’s Word while laughing at His face.  A sad and eternal mistake that at some point God shall have to remind His people and this nation of what we were supposed to do for the world, a supernatural condition being taken from a nation is NEVER a good thing and one that if repaired will take thousands of years to restore; ask Israel about this state of repair.

In the last article that God shared with us, it was supposed to cover Jonah 1:5-8 but we never touched on verse 8 at all and there was a reason for this.  I have always found it astounding that after God shares with me what to write there is a short period of time where He stays quiet about what He has just shared with me and then after a while begins to expound on what He has given.  It is this type of example that He did when He gave me the previous article but after it was completed He had other plans for verse 8 but still did not tell me to change the title of the previous article nor did He want to exclude verse 8 from the passage either.  I am not in control of these articles nor am I in control of what is spoken and shared, God is and I am just obeying what He has given me to share with you.  So, here we go with Jonah 1:8 and it states as follows: “Then they said unto him, Tell us, we pray thee, for whose cause this evil is upon us; What is thine occupation? and whence comest thou? what is thy country? and of what people art thou?”

There is nothing wrong with finding out where everyone is from while being placed in one spot or location.  This is so common when settings and situations are tense, people begin to ask questions about others in the predicament in order to ease their own worries and tensions but when the cast is drawn and death looks eminent it is also a human trait to begin wanting and even demanding answers so that blame can be placed on the one(s) responsible for such tragedies to occur.  Very, very rarely will anyone readily admit to being the one who is responsible for the causes of such animosities yet justifications of such actions flow freely and are subject to penetrate every heart around the setting.  We see this type of scene being played out on this boat with the other people all pointing their fingers at Jonah demanding to know exactly why this type of devastation is upon them and it is a perfect view of what many people in today’s societies are doing as well.

Now, we are going to be focusing on a single word here in this verse and it comes from the middle portion of the verse and the word is “evil”.  It is used in the question that the mariners asked Jonah as to why the current conditions were around them and the question was directed solely to Jonah alone for he was the one chosen as the lot winner.  The Hebrew word that is used here for evil is “haraah” and it is not the only time in the Bible that it is used, but it does, however, feature a unique set of its own when this specific word is used and it fits perfectly with this story and all other content stories that it is associated with.  There are several Scripture passages that support the usage of this word “haraah” and they all have specific references to people doing things that affect others around them.  This is only a partial list for there are many more that give such example but this list is as follows: Genesis 19:9, Genesis 39:9, Genesis 50:15, Exodus 32:12, Exodus 32:14, Numbers 14:27, Numbers 14:35, Deuteronomy 31:18, Judges 20:41, 1 Samuel 6:9, 1 Samuel 16:23, 2 Kings 22:20, 2 Chronicles 7:22.  The participants in these verses were in desperate conditions and tense times, only because of others’ reactions to what they were supposed to do and what they ended up doing, a classic human response that we cannot get away from today either.  Remember, God is a consistent God and He cannot change His ways on any level to accommodate ANY sin from humans.

Once the physical process of disobedience begins and is not put into check, then eventually the spiritual aspects of disobedience will appear soon afterward. Satan understands this process for he is the one that established the breeched contact with the physical so that the spiritual could be reached. When God calls us to perform a specific duty that duty represents our command from Him in order to keep and dress our dominion which means we are serving God in an obedient manner and thus advancing His Kingdom. God’s definition comes from His Word and it is His Word that defines us thus it must be carried out or we as a Creation shall cease as it did when Adam and Eve fell through disobedience. The same occurs here in Jonah when it is obvious that Jonah ran hard enough from God that this passage gives us a picture of what Jonah’s heart inhabited and it is easily recognized that the rise of wickedness had been reached that was equivalent to Nineveh.

I understand that being human and having a limited capability of understanding is a common and present state, but God has also given us the heart to seek Him with as well which is used in a pure manner will bring forth the truth on a level that we can grasp.  Jonah did not do this here and up until this point in Scripture, he had n intentions of changing his plans either.  Jonah had made up his mind and began fulfilling the direction that he chose it is a human action to do such a thing after one’s mind has been made.  When humans choose the world over God it is an automatic course and plot that is laid out and many times we do not even conceive just how bad off we will be and for those around us.  It may seem a tad harsh that others have to suffer because we are disobeying what God commanded us to do, but it is relative and eternal truth that God has to follow in order to keep His Word intact and pure because once a plan goes array on the human aspect it is God’s job to correct our path back to Him by any means necessary before it becomes too late.

We have a tendency to forget that when two or more are together and say they are gathered in God’s name that they should do so and be represented as such as one in God.  If two people are divided between themselves then it can be guaranteed that they are divided between God and themselves also and such division goes against God and His Ways completely.  It is this simple divisionary tactic by the enemy which brings the message of separation into our lives and when we grab a hold onto this tactic then we will always have doubts about the will of God for our lives.  This action of ours shall also cause us to delay or completely disobey what God has told us to do as well and if this disobedient spirit is allowed to continue we will soon find ourselves in a boat with a violent storm around us with God’s next step in hand.  Do we understand that the action that Jonah took that day is exactly what Aaron did back in Exodus and what the Church is doing today?  What does God mean by the Aaron example?  This topic of Aaron shall be addressed soon and it is a major component of how the Church operates today and how much of an abomination she serves as well.

Our nation has been called to complete a specific work for God and through this eternal commission to be a light unto a dark world.  Yet, we have picked up the sword of selfishness and have begun to cut off the heads (spiritual) of those who go against this worldly behavior.  Instead of teaching God’s love to those who are dying we swing the idea of mortal strength and personal fitness to those we believe are inferior.  Look at what this nation now accepts as the truth for every level of our existence, this belief has become a Babylonian foundation and definition by which we measure our physical and spiritual existence.  We are so engrossed in our superficial appearances that we fail to recognize that we are unprepared for a real battle, a spiritual battle with our enemy that will have us fighting against ourselves with him standing on the sidelines laughing at our struggles with destruction.  We have reached the point of self-service that we do not even recognize that it is the spiritual plane that we have lost that is directly affecting our physical capabilities and decisions.

What is disturbing about the setting with Jonah is that he understood what was transpiring in Nineveh because God directly showed him what was going on in that city and quantified such disobedience to Jonah at the same time.  God did not sugar coat the situation at all nor did He say it was okay for Jonah to take his time in telling the people what God had said.  Jonah had no intention of going to Nineveh at all and while he disobeyed what God told him to complete, was in the completed state just as Nineveh was thus deserved whatever judgment that was appropriate from God.  What we need to identify here is that the attitude that Jonah portrayed to God is of an uninhibited decision of disobedience without any hesitation of conscience of truth at all, and it is this attitude that rose up in the face of God concerning Nineveh and it is also the exact same condition that now is present before God’s face concerning our nation today.  It was obvious that Nineveh had reached a point where she believed that she could do anything without having to face consequences for her actions, an identical and preferred state and condition that we represent today as well.

The warnings are all around us but we do not know how to appropriately respond and then adequately repent of our sins so that the storms subside.  The Church is in the exact same position as Jonah was when the storm approached and then consumed the boat in Jonah Chapter 1, asleep below deck where she believes it is safe and dry.  The world is crying out for help and for a savior and we are knitting our little Bible markers inside the church buildings believing that the storm will pass and everything will be reached with no worries.  The Church has the duty, the eternal duty to walk out in that storm and to pull in those that are drowning in the waves of death, it is this message of salvation that we need to be teaching by example and voice not such being seen sitting in a safe and warm place.  This nation has been protected from so many enemies and because of this blessing we have learned that sitting around and give orders for our comfort is a high profile life, just as the Church has learned to do.

We have also found out that through this type of national attitude the Church attitude has followed likewise which is a GROSS insubordination of God’s Holy Order and thus an abomination to His eyes and nostrils.  Our divisions are so deep and wide that while we stand and boast about our standards and tell others to come, come we fail to recognize or admit that our foundation for survival is gone.  It is the Church that is supposed to be the light of the world which is a presence that is separated from the world’s setting not an acceptance letter for the world’s conduct.  It is evident that the majority of the members of the Church body are not fulfilling their responsibility in keeping the will of God and the plan that He has for each one of us.  The heart of the Church has risen to the same level of wickedness as it was in Jonah’s heart and we have no problems with accepting this counteracting truth with a steady climb into a deeper sinful state.  We are continually witnessing warnings that God has provided us yet blaming environmental and conditions along with obscure reasoning against those who do not follow these reckonings as the source of the warnings instead of looking at the inner spirit of our nation to see what really the root for these events is.  You want to place blame, then blame the origin of such atrocities that we are seeing and that are our hearts, yes, Church, it is our hearts for we have allowed sin to infiltrate our lives enough to have a greater influence within than God and when this state occurs only destruction and death can be incorporated into others.

I wish I could say that the Church (myself included) would realize the entire structure of what is going on here in our nation today.  As each day passes we blindly take a step closer to the end of days and if we do not turn around and seek after God again, this nation shall cease to exist as what we know of it today.  That also means that the Church and all of the little divisions that we have created in order to pacify our selfish wants shall be destroyed as well and our presence will be shattered and thrown back into the ancient of times.  Yes, God is stating that since He has given us the directive to be the light of the world and the ones to call upon the world to be saved, that we are not doing what we are supposed to be doing and therefore, we are totally responsible for the condition that this nation and our hearts are in today.  This did not occur overnight but over a long period of time where we have placed our selfish intentions above God’s and we are rapidly witnessing the entire collapse of the world due to this fatal and eternal error of ours.  The warnings signs that God delivers are serious enough and can do enough damage to grab any living being’s attention, but we should recognize them as such and then tell ourselves that something is wrong and most importantly turn our hearts back to God so that He can examine them and rid ourselves of the roots that are subjecting us to these warnings.  God is not providing these warnings out of anger but through His Love for His people so that He will not have to take the next step as any good parent would do.

Jonah’s heart quickly became equal to the world’s heart by blatantly disobeying what God had told him to do and we as a nation and the one nation chosen by God to be such a similar light as Jonah have chosen to run in the same direction as Jonah did.  That can mean only one thing, the warning signs have already appeared and judgment is just around the corner.  We can avoid this tragic mistake and proven text from God if we turn our hearts around and accept God as our source and then place God first in our hearts again.  The call is for repentance and then if we honestly repent God is faithful to restore our land and our hearts back to a living presence once again.  Let us stop writing the path that we are on today and change the pattern of our lives towards God and when we do I can guarantee that our ending shall be far greater than our beginning.  God is not like the world and if we truly turn towards Him neither will we be.

An important detail to remember here about evil is just how it infiltrates and then progresses to fill every part of the space given.  We see this process and how quickly it developed into a single person (Jonah), then what this process led Jonah to do fully knowing what was at stake for countless people.  It is this same path that a city took and we can attribute God’s command to Jonah for such a path.  So, why would it be surprising if a nation took this same path?  It is not and while we glory in our so-called progress through world standards we cannot ignore the fact that while we have established such worldly communication with others it is the eternal and spiritual communication that we have cut and now do not harbor.  See the pattern here?  We have a person, a city, and then a nation all being affected by such dramatic worldly input.

The nation that is used here does not have to be given specifically for we have an ample amount of examples that we can learn about concerning this pattern.  For instance, Israel can be used for the biblical times, Greece and Rome for the ancient times of history, Europe for the medieval period, and this nation for modern times.  A nation just does not become corrupt overnight it takes an infiltration process in order for some entity to develop.  Yes, this process may start overnight and grow but the overall pattern takes time to accept, it takes a person, then a small group, then a larger group, etc. for this process to work.  Do you see the pattern?  We should, for it is a worldly pattern that we should notice which means that God’s Pattern and Ways cannot be followed, a word of wisdom that we all need to keep in mind.  It is obvious to God that we have risen to a level of sinful recognition before Him and He is doing His best to provide such warnings so that we can figure things out before He must go further, or if one wants to put it popular terms of today before God must move forward.  Church, it is time that we stop playing Aaron and play the leadership role that God gave us back when He separated us from the world and its standards and lifestyle.  Repent, Church and allow God to move in our presence once again so that we can effectively fulfill His Word to the lost and dying instead of the world fulfilling Satan’s plan (becoming like the world) for our lives.

DLB