January 21, 2025

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“So now hear this [declares the Sovereign Lord], O lover of luxury who sits securely, who says to herself, ‘I am, and there is none besides me. I will never be a widow or know the loss of children.’ These two things will overtake you in a moment, in a single day: loss of children, and widowhood. They will come upon you in full measure, in spite of your many sorceries and the potency of your spells.” (Isaiah 47.8-9)

REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD:

Do we really believe we can lie to ourselves? The answer would be “yes.” However, we know that we cannot lie to ourselves forever. Do we believe we can lie to ourselves and believe it? My fear is that even those who lie to themselves know the truth and cannot avoid it regardless of their efforts. What’s more is the lie, as does the truth, comes with consequences. As God speaks to Isaiah who is to speak to the leadership of Babylon, Babylon herself, and/or to those who are the victims of Babylon and desire to be free, we must capture the lie and see it for what it is. God declares the lie which “she” espouses: “I am and there is none beside me.” Perhaps to the rest of the world such a statement speaks of her, Babylon, arrogance in comparison to other kingdoms and rulers. It is “comparison” which Satan loves to use to pit one person against another. Worse, comparison is what Satan uses to pit us against ourselves. For the mighty ones of God, Jewish and Christian, her statement speaks to the spiritual conflict that is of greatest important. She speaks with the very lie of Satan himself who declares for himself what God has spoken about Himself: I AM and there is none beside me.” From Deuteronomy 6.4: “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is One. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” Just today, I received notification of a new follower on my Scriptural Reflection Page. The name of the new follower was “God.” Intrigued, I was not amused. While I would be humbled to have “God” following my work to share insights on His word to others, I did not pretend to think this was He. Truly it wasn’t. As I perused “God’s” page, it was clear to me that this was not the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David and Jesus. The author of that page claimed to be a God of many gods equally valid and authoritative but all resembling “one God.” The manifestations of personalities and deities foments in the face of the One True God. yes, foments as Jesus declared to the church in Laodicea “Be hot, be cold but do not be lukewarm lest I spew you from My mouth.” (Revelation 3.16) Just the mention of that verse ought to drive us back to the verse which is known as “the gospel in miniature”: “For God so loved the world that He gave us His only begotten Son that whosoever would believe in Him would not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3.16) We must be of firm conviction in our adherence to the gospel. Either we believe it or not. We dare not seek to vacillate between the two ends of the spectrum and believe settling in the middle is a reasonable response. The desire for everyone to “meet in the middle” only creates a muddled mess. It is that kind of chaos which God must have found before “…in the beginning.” Notice there the separation which was created: light and dark, night and day, earth and heaven, land and water, even life and death. What? God did not create death in the act of creation. Just because we do not see a thing doesn’t mean it isn’t there.

We believe in God, right? Jesus told His disciples, “If you have seen Me, then you have seen the Father.” (John 14.9) The problem is that the disciples had forgotten how to see the Father. What they desired was a physical manifestation of God Himself in all His glory to make an appearance definitively. This desire showed the struggle many of us go through. We want to believe but cry out for tangible evidence. Yet, the evidence is all around us. So, what of death being created within the “seven days.” Mighty ones of God, if there is life there is death. God’s command to Adam to not partake of the Tree in the middle of the garden, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil lest he die, is the evidence. Sadly, we make a huge deal about death in the world which often pales life by “comparison.” David saw it and sang about it with these words, “Yes, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.” David’s focus was on life far more than it was on death. Death is real even in the Kingdom of God. In the end of “worldly time” death will exist just not in the New Jerusalem. Death will exist in the Lake of Fire where the souls who would not choose God as their God would forever dwell in torment. There they would suffer the consequences of their own making. Not any different than the situation which “The Queen” called into being herself. Her boast? “I am and there is no other.” No other what? Kingdom, Power, Dominion, Authority, Reality? She boasts that she will never be a widow nor suffer the loss of children. Yet God knows the truth and speaks it plainly: she will know both because she is not God. Even her efforts to control and manipulate the world (magic and sorcery) will be of no avail. There are no “smoke and mirrors” sufficient to hide the truth and embolden the lie so that everyone, even God, would believe it. Ultimately, there is only One, One God.

Mighty ones, this is a portent of the times in which we exist. In this moment, there are many who would report of their ultimate significance and authority. They do not walk humbly. They make promises to the contrary that greatness is attainable without obedience to God Himself. The loss of a “husband,” prophetic for the alliance created with other nations, indicates the frailty of such treaties and dalliances. The loss of “children,” prophetic for the generations to come who are the offspring of those alliances, speaks to the muddled composite of mixed beliefs, belief systems and personal desires to validate the decision of a person to not walk in the paths of righteousness. Bold statement? Hard truth! It is no different a truth than the one Jesus declared, as recorded in John 14, “I AM the way, the truth and the life.” There is only one and there can be no other. Mighty ones let us walk with such humility and integrity on this earth so that the world cannot influence us to accept the lie as truth. Instead, let us be the influencers in the world, as light and salt, to demonstrate the lie can never be the truth. As Paul declared, “And if we do not preach Christ and He being crucified, then our preaching is useless, and our hope is in vain.” (1 Corinthians 15.14)

TODAY’S PRAYER IN RESPONSE TO GOD’S WORD:

Father, in these days we are finding the need to believe even more real than ever before. We all have known trouble, some in greater ways than others, but You are offering us the assurance that we will not be consumed by it forever. Regardless of the “time” we are in and the “time” we have been given, we ask for Your Holy Spirit which Jesus asked You to share with us, to lead and guide and direct us in the paths we should go. Teach us what we still need to learn. Empower us to put that learning into action. Bless our actions not as a works righteousness which we know is folly but righteous works which declare Your glory and further witness the truth that can set all who believe free from death. So may we live by the name of Jesus our Christ. AMEN.