Sometimes I think God must be so torn between wanting to
rescue His Beloved Believers
... and waiting to rescue His Beloved non-believers…
John 3:16-1 (NIV)
For God so loved the
world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not
perish but have eternal life. For God
did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world
through him. Whoever believes in him is
not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because
they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
As my teens were discussing sad facts relating to gross and godless confusion regarding sexuality and gender, I moaned, wept and cried aloud, Oh Lord, my God, this world is not my home...
Until we grasp the awfulness of sin (why-sin-is-so-sinful/)
we cannot grasp the awesomeness of God's love in sending His Son to the
cross and until we realize the awfulness of rejection we cannot realize
the awesomeness of His acceptance of us
God's Wrath against Sin (Jeremiah 6:10-21; Jeremiah 25:15-33; Jonah 1:4-10; Acts 27:13-26)
18The
wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness
and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness.
19For what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.
20For since the creation of the
world God’s invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature,
have been clearly seen, being understood from His workmanship, so that
men are without excuse.
21For although
they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him,
but they became futile in their thinking and darkened in their foolish
hearts.
22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools,
23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images of mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
24Therefore God gave them up in the desires of their hearts to impurity for the dishonoring of their bodies with one another.
25They exchanged the truth of God
for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the
Creator, who is forever worthy of praise! Amen.
26For this reason God gave them over to dishonorable passions. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones.
27Likewise, the men abandoned
natural relations with women and burned with lust for one another. Men
committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the
due penalty for their error.
28Furthermore, since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, He gave them up to a depraved mind, to do what should not be done.
29They have become filled with every
kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and hatred. They are full of envy,
murder, strife, deceit, and malice. They are gossips,
30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful. They invent new forms of evil; they disobey their parents.
31They are senseless, faithless, heartless, merciless.
32Although they
know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things are worthy of
death, they not only continue to do these things, but also approve of
those who practice them.
Though holy sorrow steals our mirth and weighs the heart
with prayer
Though common care of earth gives birth to more of common
care
Pray through the highs and lows of life where joy and strife
enmesh
That we labor for more than futile fruitlessness of flesh
This blip-like fellowship with rose and thorny thoroughfares
Is more than season-smorgasbords to gratify starved stares
The hunger that we harbor in the hollow of the heart
Is a desperate dagger without faith to do its part
Too much of what we know is not enough to satisfy
And what we see will never be the answer to our cry
Oh Lord, my God, deliver us from gluttony of greed
Buoy these barks of dust to trust what You have guaranteed
