I’m not so sure that I’m not guilty of calloused ears when it comes to the news. Almost nothing shocks me anymore. I try not to look at images, because those I cannot get out of my mind, but words, they just make weary. Not the gospel! I cannot read it without feeling the Spirit bubble up in my soul. But I guess not everyone is like that, or perhaps they just don’t read, else the Spirit would convict them for leaving God’s side. I’ve had that experiences as well. But the world right now is so calloused to not only the news, but to anything that doesn’t directly effect them. And that for certain is not a new story.
In the book of Isaiah, God has a conversation with Isaiah that I fear we are seeing repeated, but this time it’s with Christians, not Israel.
Isaiah 6:9-12 KJVS
[9] And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. [10] Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. [11] Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate, [12] And the Lord have removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land.
A great forsaking. SADDEST. WORDS. EVER.
As I understand it when the Lord removed men far away, it speaks to the Lord allowing the Jews, by means of the Romans, to be carried away captive out of their own land, and dispersing them among several nations of the world as judgment for their sins. While few Christians in America would consider themselves captives, their deceiving themselves. They may not be bound by man, but they are for certain bound by this world and God continues to allow them to get further and further away.
Unlike Jesus who’s parables we remember, I sometimes have problems making my metaphorical writing easily understood. I hope that not to be the case today.
Sunday after Sunday I listen as my own pastor preaches the gospel as it’s been given to him, studying to rightly divide the word, preaching with great passion. Then I wonder “How can people not feel the need to come to church and support the ministry of Victory Baptist Church, but more importantly show their love for God? Their ears, or perhaps it’s their hearts have become calloused. It doesn’t effect them like it does those who are actively seeking a relationship with God. But the price they’re paying is far greater than they could possibly understand, else they’d be in their pew where they belong.
We are experiencing a great forsaking and many of them aren’t even aware they’ve forsaken God and just as He did Israel, God let them go, let them be captured. This world has calloused their minds and hearts to the understanding that they’ve even drifted away. They think their fine. They think their family is fine. They know the world has problems, but it’s not “their” problems, right?
As time marches on and the day of the great calling away of the church draws nearer it’s going to be eternally their problem. If they’re saved, truly saved, meaning that they believe in the death, burial and resurrection of Christ and the fact that He was and is the only payment for our sin debt, then they’ll be in Heaven. Possibly regardless, but there none the less. But what scares me about people out of church is that I don’t have proof of their relationship with God, and I’m not so sure they have one, else why wouldn’t they be in church. So when the Lord calls His church home, will they be there? I don’t know. That thought makes my stomach roll over in a sickened state. And if, praise God, they are a child of God, what about their family that have watched them forsake the Lord and make no importance of a relationship with Him, what about them, will they be there? God helps us to realize that the falling away of the church is a falling that sending people we love into the pits of Hell for eternal separation. If that does not stir the heart of a child of God, you are in serious trouble spiritually.
I’ll leave today’s post with this thought. Pray for America. Pray that the world calloused minds soften and the churches fill one again with the children of God. Pray for revival. Start with your own. Then spread the word! Amen!