Today’s Choice is Simple But Vital: Fear God or Fear Man
Natural affection has been overwhelmed by selfish indulgence. Common courtesy is uncommon. Everywhere is war. I am old enough to remember when gentility reigned. People may have disagreed, even intensely, yet they held mutual regard and respect more important than winning arguments. Peace was more important that prevailing.
Now, the world is upside down. It is far more important to prevail. Attack and counter attack are the watch words. The struggle to force others to conform to one agenda or another has become institutionalized. It now proceeds behind the force of law. In the name of “fairness”, war is waged, justice dies, and with it, all interest in finding common ground. The rule of law is succumbing to mob rule.
In another time, when people generally agreed and focused on the Two Great Commandments, blessings multiplied. When love for God translates into love for one another, peace prevails of its own accord. But when that love is washed away by selfish ambition, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, destruction follows: always has, always will.
Destruction and misery are in their ways. The way of peace have they not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Romans 3: 16-18
We have tried putting a smiley face on the misery. We have said we will master our fate. We accommodate sin, then try to manage it, telling our young people to do whatever they like, as it kills them. We manage our own affairs financially without regard to divine principles. We limit population by any means, even if it means killing children. We elbow out the God of Nature, and manage Nature ourselves. We steal from one to give to another and call it justice. We worship the creation, not the Creator. We worship ourselves, claiming we are god.
Inevitably, when misery and destruction visit our pride and presumption, we make excuses, redouble our efforts, frantic to gain some kind of control in the accelerating swirl of chaos and mayhem that we’ve created. We tell one another it’s not that bad, things will get better. We pass another law. We make another ruling. We give more power to some individual or other, desperate for a deliverer, rejecting the true Deliverer.
They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. “Peace, peace”, they say, when there is no peace. Jeremiah 6:14
People who should know better, the ones who claim to know God, make matters worse. They compromise with the world. They endorse the gimmicks born of man’s wisdom. They forsake the wisdom of ages, showing cowardice in the face of the cultural cancer spreading like wild fire. Instead of applying real medicine, or seeking prevention, they participate in the death dance, its music the song of self-reliance, greed and lust. Priests and pastors and rabbis who should sound the warning, crying out for repentance, instead fill their cups and their bellies, leading others to the wallow.
This will happen because these evil prophets deceive my people by saying, “All is peaceful” when there is no peace at all! It’s as if the people have built a flimsy wall, and these prophets are trying to reinforce it by covering it with whitewash! Ezekiel 12:13
Eternal, absolute truth has always existed and always will. The ebb and flow of history tells the same story: when people embrace truth and call on the living God to help them live according to truth, all are blessed, there is plenty in the land, and peace, sweet peace, is the centerpiece of His banquet table.
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. Proverbs 9:10
But when man plays god, insisting other men fear only the man in power, the wrath of God is poured out. It is called the great and terrible Day of the Lord.
For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night. While they are saying, “Peace and safety!” then destruction will come upon them suddenly like labor pains upon a woman with child, and they will not escape. But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief. 1 Thessalonians 5:2-4
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