August 22, 2025

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“There I will put them on trial for what they did to My inheritance, My people Israel, because they scattered My people among the nations and divided up My land. They cast lots for My people and traded boys for prostitutes; they sold girls for wine to drink.” (Joel 3.2b-3)

TODAY’S REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD TO US:

I do not think that you can read these two verses, unless you are not familiar with it, and think of the story of the Prodigal Son. In that story which Jesus told, the younger of two sons convinced his father to give him his portion of the father’s inheritance before the father was even dead. We might safely assume that at that point in time, the son considered his father “dead” to him. Why? Perhaps it was because the father seemed unfair to him with rules, guidelines, regulations and expectations. Maybe he thought that his older brother was treated differently and more leniently by the father than he was. Maybe he thought his father was holding him back from “being all he thought he could be.” We do not hear of the boy’s mother, the father’s wife, in the story. Yes, it is the nature of parables to not be expected to answer every question and provide every detail. It does leave the story open for interpretation and discussion as long as the main point is not overlooked or made a lesser priority. The story tells us what the younger son did with his portion of his father’s inheritance. It is here that I have to invite you, mighty ones of God, to consider that the inheritance is not necessarily what one receives after a death but what one has to give to others after their death. It is the father’s “inheritance” to give. The inheritance includes money, property, titles and a legacy. It is a total package. That is what is speaking to me as I read from the words given to Joel for the sake of Israel and the world through them. God is speaking of all that belongs to Him as His inheritance to give.

Of course, God will never die. How will we gain the inheritance being the children of this Heavenly Father if He will never die? Well, like the father of the prodigal, it is the prerogative of the father to do as he pleases with what is his to give. It is his investment into the lives of his children not limited nor contingent on death. Oh wait. As mighty ones of God and followers of the Christ, Jesus who is the only begotten of the Father, we have received our portion of the inheritance already. We received it when we confessed our sins and need for the Father’s love, His mercy and His grace in order to live in this world and regain our place in His presence for eternity. We received it when, by faith, we professed that Jesus of Nazareth, born of Mary and raised by Joseph in the ways of the Lord, is the Christ of God and the Messiah. He is the Lamb of God who came to take away the sting of sin which is eternal death and dying. And, if I am not mistaken, died. He died on the cross. He died a horrible death being crucified on a cross. We have to embrace the reality of Jesus’ death and for a brief moment that He thought His Father was dead to Him. We can hear that as on the cross before He breathed His last breath, He uttered, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” He spoke what we all have said in our own lives at one point or another. We all have considered that God is “dead” to us because He expects too much or provides too little, because He is a “harsh” taskmaster or an absent owner or maybe because He just won’t do what we want for ourselves or because bad things happen regardless of how good we think we are. So, before things get out of hand we make our demands: Give us what we want! And do it now! Or else!

Or else what? What is it that we think we can do to punish God or hold Him accountable as the guilty party in the court of spiritual law? It is clear that those who were the enemies of Israel were “holding court” against them at Jerusalem. Their siege of that great city and its inhabitants was an execution of their justice against Israel and her God. What they wanted was the elimination of God’s people by reducing them into physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual poverty. “Break their bank,” so to speak, and then God will be dead to us as well. With their God dead, then the enemy can flourish in their own deceit as they trade the truth for a lie. What? You don’t think that happened? You don’t think it happens even now? Hear again the words of Joel 3.2b: “There I will put them on trial for what they did to My inheritance…” And what was, is, His inheritance? It was, is, “My people and My land.” The enemy desires to steal, usurp and demean God’s people and God’s earth. The enemy wants “the Father” to surrender “their” portion of the inheritance so they can have it now. They want it now, as often we do, without any accountability or responsibility except to be true to “one’s self” and not to any other. The land, the property, the people and the mission become only objects for consumption instead of investments for the future and seed for a greater purpose in the days, months, years and eternity to come. What they forgot, and sometimes we forget, is that God is not a thing nor an object nor a “good idea.” God is real, tangible and inevitable. God is omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent. God will not only hold us accountable and responsible, He is accountable and responsible as well to Himself and to those who call upon the name of the Lord and dwell according to His purposes. God is not to be mocked nor put on mock trial. There will be an accounting and save for Jesus the Christ, our belief in Him, we have no good future which is completed in that “eternal tomorrow” yet to come.

Mighty ones of God in Christ Jesus, this is the question: What shall we do with our portion of God’s inheritance which He has already shared with us not because He has died but because He has believed in us and His word invested into our lives today?

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

Father, in these days we are finding the need to believe even more 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 but as righteous works of faith, hope and love in Jesus’ name. AMEN.