Tag: jonathan edwards

  • In God We Trust – Hope

    In God We Trust – Hope

    The Lamentations asking “HOW?” are really questions of hope for a fallen nation. Christians hold onto hope.  In God we trust (at least, some of us.)  No Biblical consideration of our present and passing crisis would be complete without hope.

    Recalling from our parallel to Lamentations some of the earlier history of this young nation:

    • October 19, 1781 – Cornwallis surrendered to General George Washington and the French at Yorktown Virginia, ending the war. Peace is not declared until two years later in Paris, September 3, 1783.
    • February 18, 1815, (just three decades later) renewed conflict ends after the British attempt to re-conquer the colonies (and defeat the French in Europe & the New World), burning the White House and sacking Washington DC.

    lincoln-memorial-and

    In a temple in Washington D.C., United States of America, sits a statue of a man and leader who often quoted scripture.

    Abraham Lincoln, the new Republican President was about as popular with the Democrats as President Obama, our nation’s first black president is with the Republican party of 2013.

    • November 6, 1860, the election of Lincoln assured that America would be divided by the politics of slavery.
    • Just fifty years after the sacking of Washington D.C. by the British, defeat of the Confederates, the surrender of Lee on April 9, 1865 and the compassionate grace of Lincoln’s policies to reconstruction prevented that collapse and held on to hope.
    • Less than a century later on December 7, 1941, the United States of America entered a war to save Asia and Europe from tyrants of Japan and Germany worse than Napoleon.

    After final defeat of the Axis powers in 1945, the US had a decided edge as empire of strength in a 20th century world which provided a stability of growth and hope until the evolution of decline of morality diminished the once considerable influence of the US empire.

    NOW (just sixty-eight years later), as in Jeremiah’s lament the people are asking HOW?

    A man is no longer a man of his word. A vote of one man has no influence; only money.

    • 1/21/2009 – WASHINGTON – Barack Obama, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Harry S. Truman, and Richard Nixon (also a Quaker) swore the oath on two Bibles. According to Wikipedia, the word “faithfully” was misplaced. The second oath was administered in a simple, private ceremony.
    • 9/11/2010 – WASHINGTON — House Democrats were preparing late last year for the first floor vote on the financial regulatory overhaul when Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio and other Republican leaders summoned more than 100 industry lobbyists and conservative political activists to Capitol Hill for a private strategy session.  He maintains especially tight ties with a circle of lobbyists and former aides representing some of the nation’s biggest businesses, including Goldman Sachs, Google, Citigroup, R. J. Reynolds, MillerCoors and UPS. They have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to his campaigns… — he has raised $36 million for Republican causes during this election cycle… source: New York Times
    • 12/7/2011 – SWITZERLAND – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Clinton also announced that the U.S. will use both diplomacy and $3 million in foreign aid to help the global fight for gay rights. –Source: Business Insider
    • 12/26/2011 -The complete timeline of the Gingrich divorces shows he’s not been honest with voters source: The Raw Story

    A man is no longer head of his family.  A marriage of a man and a women is no longer honored in the land.

    Corporations have sovereignty over the US Congress, President, and Justices, as well as most ‘consumer’ Nations. Pornographic ads for pharmaceutical companies (with disclaimers which once would have brought congressional restrictions on broadcasters) bombard healthcare ‘consumers’ who are told to ‘tell your doctor’ about their government-subsidized products.

    A genocide of over 45 million children worldwide once unthinkable after the 1945 revelations of the concentration camps is policy guaranteed by government, insured and paid for by taxes from the budget.

    Greed and immorality are rampant: as the Prophets had warned Judah and Jonathan Edwards had warned America.

    We are sinners in the hands of an angry God!

    The lessons and hope of Lamentations are no less applicable in 2013.

    I have presented the warnings of the Prophets to Judah and the disobedience of the kings and people going back 200 years (1813, in context of present-day America).  Jeremiah closes Lamentations with hope, which proved true.

    Lamentations 5:

    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.

    As you may recall:

    •  607 BC – Jerusalem fell. Yet just 70 years later:
    • 537 BC – the exiles return to Jerusalem, after which the Temple is rebuilt
    • 455 BC – Ezra and Nehemiah re-establish the Law and rebuild the walls of Jerusalem
    • 440 BC – Warnings of the Prophet Malachi

     “I have loved you,” says the Lord. But you say, “How have you loved us?” – Malachi 1:2

    Does this lament of God through a later Prophet sound familiar as Lamentations of just two centuries earlier?

    Alexander ruled Judah (no longer an empire) from about 332 BC, thus the Greek influence of culture represented in the New Testament and lasting beyond the influence of the rise and fall of the later Roman Empire.

    A great period of silence from God ensues until the time preceding Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, promised Messiah and King.

    The warnings of Malachi to WE the people are little different from what Jesus would preach in Jerusalem.

    Willem A. VanGemeren, in the Baker Bible commentary states:

    God raised up Malachi to address the problems of cynicism, formalism, and unfaithfulness, and questions about the benefits of godliness.  Malachi defends the love, honor, and justice of God…

    Malachi calls for responsibility in marriage, sacrifice, religion, social concerns, tithes, and observance of God’s laws. He redefined the “godly” as those who persevere in godliness.

    Do you persevere in godliness? Do you hold near your trust in God and faith in Christ Jesus?

    MANY in America and the world lament over a pervasive evolution of evil into the morality of mankind and governments who do NOT put their trust in God. As you can see, this is nothing new under the sun… even in America.

     

    • November 19, 1863, just 150 years ago, Lincoln’s words at Gettysburg echo a faith and hope immortalized in the memory of all faithful people of the United States of America (even now divided in the halls of Congress and the streets of Washington D.C.)

    … that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom… and that government of the people… by the people… for the people… shall not perish from the earth.” 

    This government and all governments not obedient to the Laws and will of Almighty God will indeed fall; as have all governments of rebellious man and tyrannical ambition.

    A King, who we crucified on a cross and show disobedience in our daily lives, will rule all people of hope and restore His own Kingdom to come.

    Thy Kingdom come.

    Thy will be done.

    On earth as it is in Heaven.

    This nation is a nation of its people. As in every nation, even a fallen Judah, a remnant of the faithful and obedient remain.

    Leaders and citizens obedient to the King of Heaven, Christ Jesus, will indeed not perish from this fallen earth or the eternal hope of this Kingdom to come.

    Even so, come Lord Jesus.    +

     

     

  • In God We Trusted – 5

    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.

    Minor-Prophets-Timeline

     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…

    solomons jerusalem

     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 3CapLightningNight_sm

    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.

    margaret-bourke-white-sculpted-frieze-reads-justice-the-guardian-of-liberty-at-entrance-of-the-supreme-court-building

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

    iou

    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.

    seige of jerusalem

    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.

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