Wednesday, October 28, 2020

The Responsible or the Irresponsible


 If we think about the faithfulness of God, do we see ourselves faithful to Him, to our spouse, to our children and even faithful to our grandchildren? Are we faithful in our job where a committed heart is seen to do the best job without wavering?

Hosea 7:1-4 NKJV  "When I would have healed Israel,

Then the iniquity of Ephraim was uncovered,

And the wickedness of Samaria.

For they have committed fraud; A thief comes in;

A band of robbers takes spoil outside.

2  They do not consider in their hearts

That I remember all their wickedness; Now their own deeds have surrounded them;

They are before My face. 3 They make a king glad with their wickedness,

And princes with their lies. 4 " They are all adulterers.

Like an oven heated by a baker—He ceases stirring the fire after kneading the dough, Until it is leavened.

 

Yikes! In this, the category of all sinners is the word adulterers! It was a “spirit of harlotry” that had made a way in and through the Israelite culture. Do we see this is true today as well?

I remember in the 1980’s of men appearing before cameras to say they were living a gay lifestyle! Their faces had dark markings, these brown splotches and much bruising from a dreadful disease. These once strong men were now those who had a physique of skin and bone where the disease of AIDS had set up its home. And it was AIDS that was plastered on the cover of magazines, newspapers and on people’s lips! I remember us (our family) talking about! The answer to us seemed simple: STOP IT! But even instructed what that will bring: like diseases like syphilis, herpes, and AIDS, there were also the other things that were seen: like broken homes, broken marriages, rebellious children and then children raised by only one parent. Yet, today we have children coming over the border who do not know their parents or are they likely choosing not to say who their parent is just to escape?

From Hosea 7:3 we see the “ they make the king glad with their wickedness” and in this word, the indication is toward leaders as in business but also education. It can also include a government . Evil is pointed to by the finger of God. It is expressed in those with evil in mind to profit from a never ending cesspool of faithlessness. Yes, they make money and they do it to gain more power! This can be seen of those choosing to pad their own pockets that incites death for a community and possibly the world. Have we not seen that in the age of corona-virus? So the list can include” doctors, the pharmaceutical houses, booksellers, movie makers and some lawyers of late!

 

WE are told that faithlessness is rising in 2 Timothy 3:1-5   NKJV But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2  For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3  unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4  traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!

Paul, the apostle, declares when he wrote: “evil men and impostors will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived” found in 2 Timothy 3:13!

People are human kind and they are The Unreliable Human: Psalm 146:3   NKJV   3 Do not put your trust in princes, Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help.

Jeremiah 17:5 puts it even more bluntly, "Thus says the LORD: 'Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart departs from the LORD.'"

Human beings, compared to God, are fundamentally untrustworthy. If they do know God, they can depart from Him. While people must be trusted from time to time in everyday life. But there are those times that to lean on them is much like leaning on the broken crutch of human aid. Ultimately, we are bound to be disappointed because people—even the most well-intentioned—will fail us. Just ask anyone! How about asking the folks in Louisiana who are still without power and they have had two more hurricanes to hit them.

People today are no different from when Moses wrote the Pentateuch or Paul his epistles, but the occasion to sin, or the lust to do so has increased with a great frequency and intensity. Thus we likely look like what Noah saw when he went into the Ark for safety as the Flood was about to appear. We have seen an environment changed to commit more sin from the 1980’s of the 20 century to reach a pinnacle of great magnitude where we see human nature is taking advantage of it at every turn and in every arena whether it is in the medical field or on the field of sports! You and I have been born into and yes indeed have unwittingly contributed to creating it!  

How many of those R-rated movies did we keep our focus on? How many times did we change from being truthful to lying at some degree about something or against another?  And you and I become the guilty of creating such a place as that environment of lustful attitudes that sin daily and bring down the innocent! Yes that place and position is a place where the faithful is not seen nor heard. So sad to see for what is God purposed is for our good and no evil in our final outcome!

We can see living a life of faithfulness is frowned upon. When living in a world of which self-centeredness is being promoted to its greatest extent in human history, and how many of us still shake our heads at this downward spiral of man? Certainly commercials make the most of those appealing advertisements that gratify us: Why wait, why deny ourselves, do it, you deserve it, why not go along with everyone else?  THAT word is broadcast….”go ahead”….you deserve it! Then this one: YOU would look great in this___________!  Fill in the blank, for you know better than I what you would look great in: a new house, that new Lexus or that cruise you have mooned over for years!

I am amazed at what has come to be the Panavision of adultery displayed for people of all ages to see and where there is no gasp or a quickness to stop the pornographic pictures and slides of people on billboards and on T.V. commercials. There are people in tubs without clothes for young 4 and 5 year old to view with no thought of the depravity of it. And of course, satan, the author of depravity is behind this: with that emotion stirring music, that partially clad couple which is supposed to be somehow attractive and acceptable to those who have no spouse, or those looking for a spouse where the oppressed want because they “deserve that better thing” and are never thinking of the prospect that they are being duped into the world’s thought system!

People do not want war in other countries, but they do not consider the War, the Murder, the Lying, the Stealing, the Coveting, and the Idolatry acts that almost everyone in the world would claim as being wrong yet, they appear constantly within schools, on the streets and within business transactions.

IF you and I would take a look at what was on the scene some 75 years ago, we see that “the trend” was already the beginning in that downward spiral because many unwittingly committed in their heart to promote that kind of behavior because they could. And they justified doing it by speaking that everybody else was doing it, too! Being faithless is playing a role in destruction. And if we play that role…that destruction is on us!

Traitors today appear as those who walk away from a marital contract.  Another traitor is that  parent who failed to protect young child when abuse was seen.  Even manufacturers will lie about the quality of their products they sell. They tell you it is of quality but falls apart upon use of the product once you use it at home. Many decades ago, I remember this commercial for Zenith. They said “quality goes in before the name goes on”.  And what is in a “name” today?

Is the “father of irresponsibility” leading us or are we resisting by what the Lord God gave us from His word?  For in today’s culture irresponsibility is leading in relationships with a disregard to the things of God. God-centeredness in our lives is the answer to faithlessness and irresponsibility. But God-centeredness is not cheap, and few are willing to pay the price: their lives!

In the context of relationship with God we find this in Psalm 50:6 Let the heavens declare His righteousness, for God Himself is Judge. The Old Testament gave a defining term when it is of God and of man. We will know HIM to be JUDGE!

And we see of what occurred in the Garden of Eden. What was chosen as a distinct disregard of what God commanded, the relationship with God was terribly marred as was the relationship between Adam and his wife! Moses was given the Ten Commandments and related laws that defined Israel's relationship with God. In keeping those laws given, they were to act righteously to maintain a relationship that had been begun with a covenant between God and His people.

 

 To obey those laws was to act righteously, because such obedience maintained the covenant relationship between God and His people. It is man who will never maintain any kind of righteousness of his own planning. But a table was set. It was the Cross, where a public display demonstrated the righteousness of God and those who believe in Jesus will have that righteousness imputed to them. It is God Who transferred the righteousness of Christ to those who trust in Him according to Galatians 3:5-6 NKJV Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?---just as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.  ( Also seen in Romans 4:3-22; Philippians 3:9) We do not become righteous because of our inherent goodness; God sees us as righteous because of our identification by faith with His Son.

A Faithful Person is seen in Matthew 24!  Matthew 24:45-51  NKJV  45 "Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his master made ruler over his household, to give them food in due season? 46 Blessed is that servant whom his master, when he comes, will find so doing. 47  Assuredly, I say to you that he will make him ruler over all his goods. 48 But if that evil servant says in his heart, "My master is delaying his coming," 49  and begins to beat his fellow servants, and to eat and drink with the drunkards, 50 the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him and at an hour that he is not aware of, 51 and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

 

The parable of the faithful and evil servants certainly teaches us to be faithful and wise in carrying out responsibilities and relationships with our fellow servants, yes, our brothers in the body of Christ.  For you and I should desire to be the prudent, the sensible showing that sound judgment in understanding people in situations and displaying discernment when dealing with them. That also means dealing with them daily not just on say Saturday or on Sunday!

Jesus gives us the  “wise” as those who exercise restraint, using sound and practical wisdom! We should be those who act in a godly manner where God’s love is seen. As the faithful, we are about loving our neighbor as we love ourselves. (Matthew 22:39).

And since we have people around us daily, we should allow Christ to lead us in that way that unites and inspires others to be faithful as well. And you and I can do this: by giving them the truth, a good example, and encouragement. In this way, we become wise and faithful stewards of the trust God has given us.

In “where we stand” , we are hopefully standing in the position  that is of a righteous person who believes in the Lord’s return so that our belief will be the set point to expect Him and that our conduct, that behavior would display that expectancy to be alert, the watchful and remain in the righteous mode where God expects us to remain.

May we not be the arrogant, violent, self-indulgent, gluttonous, and hypocritical servant, the one who believes he has plenty of time to square his relationship with God, as his conduct has become evil. For in this day and within this hour we have those who would dictate your life to you that is of the world: the false apostles, politicians, the false prophets, the media, and the false teachers, educators. For that of God is of truth to live and not die and declare God. It is the faithful in God who appear as the wise, the ready….the faithful who take a stand for God!

Psalm 62:5     Find rest, O my soul, in God alone ; my hope comes from him. 6 He alone is my rock and my salvation he is my fortress, I will not be shaken. 7 he is my mighty rock, my refuge. 8 Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge. 11 One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard: that you, O God, are strong, 12 and that you, O Lord, are loving. Surely you will reward each person according to what he has done.

 Amen!

 

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