Good day Saints of God in Christ Jesus. You are all welcome to another new day. Glory to God for the gift of life. Happy Sunday to you all.
In our today’s episode 534 of studying and understanding the Bible, we shall be examining Jeremiah Chapter 44 titled:
Real Reason God Did Not Want The People of Judah To Relocate To Egypt
I am having a strong feeling that I need to make some reiterations and clarifications again about attributing killings in the Old Testament books to God. I will be doing this at intervals as we continue with the study of Old Testament books, using the lens of the New Covenant in Christ Jesus.
We have all seen it repeatedly written in all the books of Prophets, including this one we are currently studying that God was responsible for the destruction of the people both Israelites and foreign countries alike. Therefore, we start to see two types of God namely, the angry and monstrous God of Old Testament and the loving and forgiving God of the New Testament.
Why this contradiction?
Why would a loving God who created all mankind alike seems to like punishing people with violence, diseases, killings and destructions when they sinned or engage in any form of anti-God activity?
Did God actually do all these things?
The simplest answer I can provide based on the new covenant reality is that those terrible actions mentioned in all old testament books did not originate from God (Read James 1). Rather, they were the projections people including the OT prophets placed on God. Since they could feel that way as human, they believed God should also feel and act the same way.
Did God actually speak to these prophets like Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezekiel, etc? The answer is yes. Did all their prophecies and actions come from God? The answer is no and I will shed some light. Remember when Elijah sent fire to consume people in the Bible and the Disciples of Jesus suggested they do the same thing to a small town in Samaria that prevented them from preaching the Gospel. Jesus told them suggesting that to Him shows that they did not understand the kind of Spirit they are made of, adding that the Son of man did not come to destroy man’s life but to save them (Read Luke 9:51-55). In order words, the Holy Spirit will never ask you to destroy anyone. It also means that Prophet Elijah did what he did from the flesh. He was simply carnal. God did not ask him to do that at all.
Now, let’s quickly examine what happened in the beginning. When God created the heaven and the earth, the Bible says the earth was without form and desolate. Everything was engulfed in total darkness. You will find this in Genesis 1:1-2.
Between verses 1 and 2, many Bible scholars agreed that was when the battle of sending the rebellious angels and lucifer their master away from the heavenly realm and there was a serious war between Arch Angel Michael and these rebellious angels. These evil angels lost the battle and eventually came to the earth realm and for them to legally operate on earth realm, they possessed humans and were producing giant offspring. They taught mankind all manner of evil that we see today and many of them turned themselves into gods or deities to be worshipped. That is where idolatry and all forms of sexual sins originated from.
They did so many terrible things that God continued to warn mankind against their bad influence, because these actions came with terrible consequences. This is what happened in Genesis chapter 6. Please read the whole chapter to understand why the flood came.
The truth is that God created the whole world with order and principles whereby breaking any of them, you automatically activate its consequence. It is this consequence that the Bible calls the judgement of God.
To be fair with God, it was not God that caused those calamities and it was not God that punished those who broke the rules. Rather, mankind automatically invokes the consequences upon themselves each time any of the order or law is broken.
For example, sex is supposed to be between married couples as ordained by God. So, by engaging in it outside marriage, you have already broken the order. So, don’t be surprised when you start facing the consequences.
Another way of breaking the order by which earth operates is when you shed blood of another human being. It has a serious consequence, because God places premium value over human lives. Taking human lives makes you an anti-God and it also comes with its own punishment. All these were set up when the earth was created. This is what is also known as the law of cause and effect. This is what Apostle Paul was saying in Galatians 6:7-10. (please read).
The commonest sins among the Israelites is the sin of idolatry and sexual immorality. These are what led to the enemy’s invasions that we have been reading about all these whiles. When a person engages in sin consistently, it becomes a habit and then the enemy automatically gains entrance to afflict such person. However, when such person repents, receives Christ and is saved, the sin’s power is broken, and the person is forgiven.
This is the real reason God did not want the remaining people left in Judah to migrate to Egypt, because Egypt is full of idolatry and all forms of s*xual sins. Going there will only complicate their problems and open fresh door for another invasion – Babylonian invading Egypt. That’s what Jeremiah 44 is all about.
Before Christ arrival, in order not to break any of the principles guiding earth’s operation and thereby sinning against God, that was why Moses gave the Israelites the ten commandments and over 630 other commandments to be strictly followed.
When Christ came, he fulfilled all the requirements of these laws and their punishments. To ensure mankind don’t alter God’s creation by defiling it again and again, Christ decided to live in every believer in the form of the Holy Spirit empowering us to naturally obey all these laws. Everything was summarized in two laws: Love for God and Love for mankind. The Bible calls it the Law of Christ. Please read Mark 12:32–33. The following Scriptures will also be useful: (Romans 10:4; Galatians 3:23–25; Ephesians 2:15)
This is why in the New Covenant, we do not need the written laws anymore, because we now have the Holy Spirit in us guiding us and preventing us from sinning against God. In listening to and obeying the Holy Spirit, we have automatically fulfilled the law.
Let’s Sum It Up
God was not responsible for all the calamities that happened in the Old Testament. James 1 says so. You can’t find evil with God.
Evils happen to people because of their anti-God actions.
God Himself does not like it when His children encounter evil and that’s why He warns them ahead of time. He did that by sending various Prophets in the Old Testament and various Apostles, Prophets, Pastors, Evangelists etc in the New Testament to warn people and also preach the Good News of Salvation to them and disciple them. Matt 28:18-20
The Old Testament Prophets added or attributed God’s name to those calamities because of their limited knowledge of God. It was Christ that finally came to reveal the true nature of God to mankind.
To be continued…stay tuned and stay blessed.
Let us pray. Please declare the followings with me:
- I will not miss my turn and season to impact my generation positively. Because I am born of the Spirit of God, I refuse to walk in the flesh. I refuse to be deceived by the flesh and the devil. I will remain relevant to my generation and stay in constant fellowship with God through Christ, in Jesus name.
Bible Readings For Today: Job Chapters 16, 17 & 18 with Isaiah Chapter 1
I call you blessed now and always.
Sunday September 13, 2020 (DDMI)
