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Category: Prophets – Warnings for 21st century ‘christians’

Jeremiah by Michelangelo

Old Testament Prophets WARNED Israel, Judah, and neighboring nations about what GOD has planned IF they did NOT REPENT (and they usually didn’t).

How does this speak to 21 c. ‘christians’ in these last days? Are you bold enough to WARN your SOCIAL ‘Friends’ of what Jesus Christ warns? Does the message of a Prophet apply even more to them and US, now? SHARE your scriptural warnings from the Prophets and WITNESS for our LORD, WHO IS and returning… soon.

In God We Trusted – 5

The political ‘spin’ has been spun.

The gradual fall is begun.

How? lament the People…

Why? In God we trusted.

“Lamentations” was derived from a translation of the title as found in the Latin Vulgate (Vg.) translation of the Greek OT, the Septuagint (LXX), and conveys the idea of “loud cries.” The Hebrew exclamation ekah (“How,”which expresses “dismay”), used in 1:1; 2:1, and 4:1, gives the book its Hebrew title. However, the rabbis began early to call the book “loud cries” or “lamentations” (cf. Jer. 7:29).

Lamentations 5

English Standard Version (ESV)

Restore Us to Yourself, O Lord

5 Remember, O Lord, what has befallen us;
look, and see our disgrace!
2 Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers,
our homes to foreigners.
3 We have become orphans, fatherless;
our mothers are like widows.

Before their cry of How? …while they were yet falling…

Hosea 14: Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God,
for you have stumbled because of your iniquity.
2 Take with you words
and return to the Lord…

Micah 6:12 Your rich men are full of violence;
your inhabitants speak lies,
and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth.
13 Therefore I strike you with a grievous blow,
making you desolate because of your sins.

Isaiah 58: “Cry aloud; do not hold back;
lift up your voice like a trumpet;
declare to my people their transgression,
to the house of Jacob their sins.
2 Yet they seek me daily
and delight to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that did righteousness
and did not forsake the judgment of their God

Zephaniah 3:

Woe to her who is rebellious and defiled,
the oppressing city!
2 She listens to no voice;
she accepts no correction.
She does not trust in the Lord;
she does not draw near to her God.

3 Her officials within her
are roaring lions;
her judges are evening wolves
that leave nothing till the morning.

Habakkuk 2: “Woe to him who heaps up what is not his own—
for how long?—
and loads himself with pledges!”
7 Will not your debtors suddenly arise,
and those awake who will make you tremble?
Then you will be spoil for them.

Obadiah

The Day of the Lord Is Near

15 For the day of the Lord is near upon all the nations.
As you have done, it shall be done to you;
your deeds shall return on your own head.

Lamentations 5:15 The joy of our hearts has ceased;
our dancing has been turned to mourning.
16 The crown has fallen from our head;
woe to us, for we have sinned!

19 But you, O Lord, reign forever;
your throne endures to all generations.
20 Why do you forget us forever,
why do you forsake us for so many days?
21 Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored!
Renew our days as of old—
22 unless you have utterly rejected us,
and you remain exceedingly angry with us.

Remember Israel? Remember Judah? Remember the Nations? Remember Rome?

Remember Great Britain? Remember America?

Do the Nations and Empires and Peoples remember God?

Are we not a falling people in the hands of an angry God (as Jonathan Edwards once warned)?

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758)

Enfield, Connecticut
July 8, 1741

Their foot shall slide in due time. Deuteronomy 32:35

In this verse is threatened the vengeance of God on the wicked unbelieving Israelites, who were God’s visible people, and who lived under the means of grace; but who, notwithstanding all God’s wonderful works towards them, remained (as vers 28.) void of counsel, having no understanding in them. Under all the cultivations of heaven, they brought forth bitter and poisonous fruit; as in the two verses next preceding the text. — The expression I have chosen for my text, their foot shall slide in due time, seems to imply the following things, relating to the punishment and destruction to which these wicked Israelites were exposed.

[READ Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God]

Will it be blessing? Or will we reap curse?

For once, in God we Trusted.

October 18, 2013
In God We Trusted – 4
Lamentations 4

How the gold has grown dim,
how the pure gold is changed!

11 The Lord gave full vent to his wrath;

he poured out his hot anger,
and he kindled a fire in Zion
that consumed its foundations.
12 The kings of the earth did not believe,
nor any of the inhabitants of the world,
that foe or enemy could enter
the gates of Jerusalem.

Yet we have forgotten…

So typically, history is re-told by those who need to tell a story different from that which is witnessed.

False prophets and false advisers appear to tell leaders and the people what cannot happen and also what did not happen.

The 10 Things You Didn’t Know About the War of 1812

(More on this forgotten history in a moment)

Jeremiah had warned Judah what would happen. Judah’s leaders had listened to false tale of the fate of Israel and what they wanted to hear about the truth of their own inevitable fate. God had given Jeremiah the truth. Judah would not hear.

13 This was for the sins of her prophets
and the iniquities of her priests,
who shed in the midst of her
the blood of the righteous.
14 They wandered, blind, through the streets;
they were so defiled with blood
that no one was able to touch
their garments.

17 Our eyes failed, ever watching
vainly for help;
in our watching we watched
for a nation which could not save.

1. The War Needs Re-Branding

In reality, it lasted 32 months following the U.S. declaration of war on Britain in June 1812. That’s longer than the Mexican-American War, Spanish-American War, and U.S. involvement in World War I.

IF you even recall anything about a war with the BIG STAR SPANGLED BANNER (flag), first remember historically that the attacks on Washington DC and Baltimore were in 1814.

An issue that could place the young nation as the aggrieved party could help; of the 19 senators who passed the declaration of war, only three were from New England and none of them were Federalists.

8. There Was Almost a United States of New England

The political tension persisted as the war progressed, culminating with the Hartford Convention, a meeting of New England dissidents who seriously flirted with the idea of seceding from the United States. They rarely used the terms “secession” or “disunion,” however, as they viewed it as merely a separation of two sovereign states.

For much of the preceding 15 years, Federalist plans for disunion ebbed and flowed with their party’s political fortunes. After their rival Thomas Jefferson won the presidency in 1800, they grumbled sporadically about seceding, but mostly when Jefferson took actions they didn’t appreciate (and, worse, when the electorate agreed with him). The Louisiana Purchase, they protested, was unconstitutional; the Embargo Act of 1807, they said, devastated the New England shipping industry. Electoral victories in 1808 silenced chatter of disunion, but the War of 1812 reignited those passions.

(Returning to Jeremiah’s lament for Judah…)

19 Our pursuers were swifter
than the eagles in the heavens;
they chased us on the mountains;
they lay in wait for us in the wilderness.

20 The breath of our nostrils, the Lord’s anointed,
was captured in their pits,
of whom we said, “Under his shadow
we shall live among the nations.”

The Napoleonic Wars in Europe 200 years ago between England and a France under the control of the Emperor who had overthrown the young leadership of the French Revolution spilled into far-reaching places like Haiti, Canada and Louisiana. In a sense, the 13 colonies of the US were surrounded by Europe. Spain still owned Florida. France owned Louisiana and England ruled Canada. British, French, Spanish and Dutch all ruled parts of the Caribbean.

An honest look at a history 200 years ago should not overlook the warnings of those who represent God, rather than the powers of the present which will fade into the past.

Judah, at the time of Lamentations or even prior to the fall of Jerusalem could have looked back with honesty to the warnings of the Prophets of Almighty God.

605-586 BC – LOOKING BACK two centuries

627 BC – 580 BC Jeremiah as Prophet

586 BC – Jerusalem fell to Babylon, but it was falling for 19 years.

605 BC – First defeat of Jerusalem

609 BC – Jehoiakim, King of Judah

King Jehoiakim, 18th sovereign of the separate kingdom of Judah, enjoys the dubious distinction of being the first sovereign of Israelites placed on the throne by a foreign power. When Judah was conquered and King Josiah killed in battle by Egypt, Josiah’s son, Jehoiakim’s younger brother Jehoahaz, took Josiah’s office as king. However, the Egyptian king found Jehoahaz rebellious, refusing to pay the tribute he imposed. So he dethroned him, placing Jehoiakim in power, and giving him that name in place of his original name, Eliakim, as a symbol of Egypt’s power over the king of Judah. Jehoiakim paid the tribute, initiating a new tax to fund it. 2 Chronicles 36:4

Jeremiah 19:3 You shall say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I am bringing such disaster upon this place that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle. 4 Because the people have forsaken me and have profaned this place by making offerings in it to other gods whom neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have known; and because they have filled this place with the blood of innocents, 5 and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or decree, nor did it come into my mind— 6 therefore, behold, days are coming, declares the Lord, when this place shall no more be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.7 And in this place I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will cause their people to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life.

642 BC – Amon, King of Judah

2 Chronicles 33: 21 Amon was twenty-two years old when he began to reign, and he reigned two years in Jerusalem.22 And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, as Manasseh his father had done.

697 BC – Manasseh, King of Judah

2 Chronicles 33 Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem.

2 And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel.

6 And he burned his sons as an offering in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, and used fortune-telling and omens and sorcery, and dealt with mediums and with necromancers. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.

722 BC – Fall of the Northern Kingdom of Israel to Assyria

728 BC – Hezekiah, King of Judah

732 BC – Hoshea, Last King of Israel (Northern Kingdom)

740 BC- 685 BC – Isaiah as Prophet

740 BC – Pekah, King of Israel

742 BC – Pekahiah, King of Israel

743 BC – Ahaz, King of Judah

750 BC – Jotham, King of Judah

752 BC – Menahem, King of Israel

752 BC – Shallum, King of Israel

753 BC – Zechariah, King of Israel

760 BC – 750 BC – Amos as Prophet

792 BC – 740 BC Uzziah (Azariah), King of Judah

793 BC – 753 BC – Jeroboam II, King of Israel

Why all this history?

What do you know of U.S. History 200 years ago? (1813) Who was president? Who was Speaker of the House? What did our leaders do to get us to today? Has US history been “re-branded?”

Perhaps you can name an occasional President who “did what was good in the sight of the Lord.”

READ your Bible and you will see that MOST the long list of forgotten leaders had done “what was evil in the sight of the Lord.” God remembers evil. God remembers good. God IS before all history and God IS after all history. God IS.

The Prophets do warn: In God we once trusted.
October 17, 2013
In God We Trusted – 3

Disclaimer & claim:

WE the PEOPLE of the LORD trust God.
Nations rise and nations will fall. The Prophet Jeremiah had warned Judah of their impending fall.

By now you must see the present application of Lamentations 3.

The warnings of the Prophets also speak to our nations.

We the people of the US have forgotten:

In God we trusted. Our heritage of faith is buried deeply in disbelief and rebellion.

Lamentations is indictment of rulers who do not hear the cries of their people or acknowledge the leadership of God.

Lamentations 3

English Standard Version (ESV)

Great Is Your Faithfulness

3 I am the man who has seen affliction
under the rod of his wrath;
2 he has driven and brought me
into darkness without any light;
3 surely against me he turns his hand
again and again the whole day long.

4 He has made my flesh and my skin waste away;
he has broken my bones;
5 he has besieged and enveloped me
with bitterness and tribulation;
6 he has made me dwell in darkness
like the dead of long ago.

7 He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;
he has made my chains heavy;
8 though I call and cry for help,
he shuts out my prayer;
9 he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones;
he has made my paths crooked.

Noah Webster, author of the first American Speller and the first Dictionary said,

“The Christian religion, in its purity, is the basis, or rather the source of all genuine freedom in government. . . . and I am persuaded that no civil government of a republican form can exist and be durable in which the principles of that religion have not a controlling influence.”

Think about this from a man whose mission was to educate our forefathers.

Civil government, to exist and be durable MUST have the principles of religion as a controlling influence: the MORALITY OF GOD – Good, and not evil.

19 Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
20 My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me.
21 But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:

22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“therefore I will hope in him.”

25 The Lord is good to those who wait for him,
to the soul who seeks him.

Even responsible leaders of men will look to our future.

Thomas Jefferson, A Nation of Sheep will have a Government of Wolves

If once they become inattentive to the public affairs, you & I, & Congress & Assemblies, judges & governors shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions; and experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the governments of Europe, and to the general prey of the rich on the poor. – Thomas Jefferson, To Edward Carrington Paris, Jan. 16, 1787

Yet the Prophet both warns and comforts the people who ask, ‘How?’

31 For the Lord will not
cast off forever,
32 but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
33 for he does not afflict from his heart
or grieve the children of men.

34 To crush underfoot
all the prisoners of the earth,
35 to deny a man justice
in the presence of the Most High,
36 to subvert a man in his lawsuit,
the Lord does not approve.

40 Let us test and examine our ways,
and return to the Lord!
41 Let us lift up our hearts and hands
to God in heaven:
42 “We have transgressed and rebelled,
and you have not forgiven.

Has our history revealed the truth of the complete plea to God of Patrick Henry…

or just a simple, secular sound-byte?

Jeremiah had warned those who once spoke of ‘life so dear or peace so sweet.’ Patrick Henry plead: Forbid it, Almighty God!

58 “You have taken up my cause, O Lord;
you have redeemed my life.
59 You have seen the wrong done to me, O Lord;
judge my cause.
60 You have seen all their vengeance,
all their plots against me.

64 “You will repay them, O Lord,
according to the work of their hands.
65 You will give them dullness of heart;
your curse will be on them.
66 You will pursue them in anger and destroy them
from under your heavens, O Lord.”

October 16, 2013