How can you say, ‘We are wise,
And the law of the Lord is with us’?
But behold, the lying pen of the scribes
Has made it into a lie.
“The wise men are put to shame,
They are dismayed and caught;
Behold, they have rejected the word of the Lord,
And what kind of wisdom do they have?
Jeremiah 8:8-9
As I study through Jeremiah chapters 7 – 9 this week in my precept class I could not help but see the familiarity in these chapter with our present day. Here in my home state of Alabama debates wage across social media concerning the same sex marriage and the about to be released Fifty Shades of Grey. If you follow my Facebook page you know that I am part of Dr Juli Slattery and Dannah Gresh’s book team for their new release Pulling Back the Shades.
Here’s the thing… I am against same sex marriage and I am against the erotica/porn of Fifty Shades of Grey. However, I am not ready to go and storm the capital over them. I am more concerned about praying that God would prepare me to be able to love and minister to those who will be hurt through these things.
Those reading Fifty Shades for entertainment, obviously have never heard the true stories of the brutality that this entertainment breeds. They have never wrapped their arms around a 15 year old girl who had to have a hysterectomy because the stepfather who chose to rape her over and over was into BDSM and then when someone tried to rescue her the courts sent her back into that home and within months she was dead from abuse. That’s the reality of the “world” of BDSM… Fifty Shades just dips your toe in for a quick visit. It’s just the frog in the pot.
Deceived… so very deceived are we. So very blinded by the desires of our flesh and the whispers of the serpent of old. I have learned that the line between between being deceived and willingly embracing evil can be a very fine line. Evil I shall hate, but deception I shall pray for truth to be revealed. Yet, to both I will equally speak because sometimes I simply cannot tell which is which.
I won’t storm the Capital because it doesn’t matter what the law of the land states. Abortion is legal in our land, however as a Christian I will not choose to have one. Pornography is legal in our land, however as a Christian I will not choose to participate in it. Marijuana is legal in our land, however I will not choose to smoke it. Therefore, just because same-sex unions become legal in our land does not mean I, as a Christian, join myself in one.
What the current downhill moral decline of our nation does do is cause one to have to truly choose to obey the Lord because it is a Spirit given conviction and not just an outside conformity to culture. As for me and my house we will obey the Lord.
Sadly, the changes occurring to marriage in our nation is our own fault. We, the one man for the one woman for one life, opened the door to this because we ourselves chose to not treat marriage as a holy covenant before God. We chose to live with each other without a promise. We chose “sexual freedom”. We chose this… with our lives as the roadside billboard display for a divorce under $200 no questions asked. We stuck our toe in. Once again it’s just the frog in the pot.
Sometimes it’s easier to stand up and yell louder than to go to our knees and be humbled before our God and seek His forgiveness for our own part in the decisions of our nation. Judgment always begins with the house of God (1 Peter 4:17). The first thing that always has to be cleaned out is the temple (John 2:14-16). When the church in America is no longer a profitable business… who all will remain?
We have chosen this.
‘Now hear this, O foolish and senseless people,
Who have eyes but do not see;
Who have ears but do not hear.
‘Do you not fear Me?’ declares the Lord.
‘Do you not tremble in My presence?
For I have placed the sand as a boundary for the sea,
An eternal decree, so it cannot cross over it.
Though the waves toss, yet they cannot prevail;
Though they roar, yet they cannot cross over it.
‘But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart;
They have turned aside and departed.
‘They do not say in their heart,
“Let us now fear the Lord our God,
Who gives rain in its season,
Both the autumn rain and the spring rain,
Who keeps for us
The appointed weeks of the harvest.”
‘Your iniquities have turned these away,
And your sins have withheld good from you.
‘For wicked men are found among My people,
They watch like fowlers lying in wait;
They set a trap,
They catch men.
‘Like a cage full of birds,
So their houses are full of deceit;
Therefore they have become great and rich.
‘They are fat, they are sleek,
They also excel in deeds of wickedness;
They do not plead the cause,
The cause of the orphan, that they may prosper;
And they do not defend the rights of the poor.
‘Shall I not punish these people?’ declares the Lord,
‘On a nation such as this
Shall I not avenge Myself?’
“An appalling and horrible thing
Has happened in the land:
The prophets prophesy falsely,
And the priests rule on their own authority;
And My people love it so!
But what will you do at the end of it?
Jeremiah 5:21-31