Sunday: A Quick History
When the Israelites had finally entered the Promised Land, after years of wandering in the wilderness, it wasn’t long before troubles began. All it took was for a new generation to arise, one that didn’t know the Lord
(Judg. 2:10), and a spiritual crisis started that, in many ways, infected the nation all through its history. It’s a problem that, indeed, has infected the Christian church as well.
Read Judges 2:1-15. What caused the crisis, and how was it made manifest?
Image © Lars Justinen from GoodSalt.com
Judges 2:11 says: Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord
(NIV). Each generation, one after the other, moved one step further from God until the nation was doing exactly what the Lord had told them not to do. Due to their sin, they faced one crisis after another, but even then the Lord had not given up on them. He sent them judges (Judg. 2:16), who delivered them from their immediate woes.
After the era of the judges, the nation entered a time of relative peace and prosperity under what has been called the United Monarchy,
the rule of Saul, David, and Solomon, which lasted about one hundred years. Under David, then Solomon, it grew into a regional power.
The good
times, though, did not last. After the death of Solomon (about 931 b.c.), the nation split into two factions, Israel in the north and Judah in the south. Much of the blame can be placed on the misguided rule of Solomon, who, for all his wisdom, made numerous mistakes. The tribes had long suffered grievous wrongs under the oppressive measures of their former ruler. The extravagance of Solomon’s reign during his apostasy had led him to tax the people heavily and to require of them much menial service.
-Ellen G. White, Prophets and Kings, pp. 88, 89. Things were never the same again for God’s chosen nation. Everything the Lord had warned them not to do, they did, and thus they reaped the doleful consequences.
Think about the problem of the next generation not having the values and beliefs of the one before it. How have we, as a church, dealt with this issue? How can we learn to transmit our values to those who follow us?
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The world is geared up towards consequential-ism in which the basic rule is
1.the theory that human actions derive their moral worth solely from their outcomes or consequences.
2.the theory that ethical decisions should be made on the basis of the expected outcome or consequences of the action.
And with Utilitarianism's common goal is as follows;
An ethical philosophy in which the happiness of the greatest number of people in the society is considered the greatest good. According to this philosophy, an action is morally right if its consequences lead to happiness (absence of pain), and wrong if it ends in unhappiness (pain); we are having our successors vulnerable to these two dangerous philosophical lifestyle that is permeating the world-over.
Our next generation must be grounded on the basic tenets of Love God foremost and Love for fellow humans as supreme and that is only found in the Decalogue and the Mount of Beautitudes. If not then we as a church are in for a rude awakening and need of revival and reformation which we should avoid but at the looks of things our Church is going to need true spiritual revival and reformation. We must now go back to the basics, The Bible and Bible only and just discard those philosophical ideologies that negates and rebuffs our fundamental beliefs and Sola Scriptures. We need to be careful as to discard the 3 factions in our world wide church; The Conservatives versus The Liberals versus the Middle of the Pendulums as SOP warns do not try to be on the far right of the pendulum nor on the far left but be balanced in the middle of the pendulum.
But we need not to panic for if we fail as a church The Lord is going to start a revival and reformation to primitive Godliness as experienced by the Early Church at Pentecost more than 2 millennium ago. But nevertheless we should strive with all earnestness to unite with God for an immediate and decided revival and reformation now to back to the Our First Love lost as warned against the Ephesians in Revelation 2 that when we love God we obey His Commandments out of our love response to John 3:16. That is the only way we can rid of our next generations from all philosophical heresies and conservatives and liberals and just be simply Christ Minded as Saint Paul advised in Philippians 4:8.
Spiritual decay and apostasy do not occur by chance. Israel’s crisis of spiritual depression and resulting ruin were largely self-inflicted. Exercising freedom of choice they made conscious decisions to pattern the posture and policies of the surrounding nations who did not know better (Jonah 4:11).
The people who were privileged to be the repositories of truth and beneficiaries of Jehovah’s choice blessings (Deuteronomy 33:13-16) gazed at their neighbors and coveted the fleeting pleasures they thought they might have. The connection between worldliness and idolatry was not clear to them.
Among the mistakes of the Lord’s chosen was voting by acclamation for a human king, thereby rejecting God’s established order and His direct authority (1 Samuel 8:4-5). To Israel this was nothing; for the culture demanded it and it would bring them in line with accepted customs, and give the nation human advantages, they hoped.
Jehovah permitted, and even assisted in the selection of a king (1 Samuel 9:15-17), but He never endorsed the foreign idea, and never barred the natural consequences (1 Samuel 8:11-18). The problem was the people of promise progressively believed more in what they saw on the outside (1 Samuel 8:19-20) than in whom they knew on the inside (Exodus 20:2).
How much do you really believe in the Creator and His word, the Bible? What in your day to day life confirms this? Take a moment to think about it. Does the Bible matter in your daily choices concerning conversation, deportment, entertainment, finances, health, interests and more?
The outside practices and policies which appeal to the believers and are imported into the remnant church or personal life give some indication of where the affection lies and what the saints really believe, in spite of what they say.
The prayer of the faithful is “Lord make me a Christian in my heart;” and they really mean it.
What happened to the values of the succeeding generations in Israel? This problem impacts us today, not only as a church, but as families and as individuals. As the individual goes, so goes the family and the church.
In our homes we must maintain that personal connection with God that will be passed on to our children. We cannot expect our children to remain faithful if we compromise our values. It begins with the little issues of life and eventually becomes full blown.
The question is what are we doing as individuals that will impact the future generations. We must consider how the practices in our homes, work places as well as in the politics of the church affect our children.
How does the Lord make us a Christian in our heart?
Received into the heart, the power of the grace of God will regulate the desires, purify the thoughts, and sweeten the disposition. The grace of God resusitates the mind and energizes the soul. It enlarges the capacity for feeling, for loving. We ask and allow Christ into our hearts, then the Holy Spirit works secretly, silently, steadily, to transform the soul. The natural inclinations are softened and subdued. New thoughts, new feelings, new motives, are implanted. A new standard of character is set up—the life of Christ. The mind is changed; our intellect is aroused to action in new lines. Christ has our full attention now. Our conscience is alive. We are now equipped with traits of character that enable us to do service for God.
Mmm I really find the question at the close of Sunday most intensely thought provoking. It reminds me of the sermon I listened to this past sabbath which was on lessons from the ant economy and hingged on Proverbs 6:6. From the ant economy much can be learnt and I am sure a number of things can be outlined by each of us as we apply our minds on it for example considering how industrious ants are and how well ordered their lives are. Ants also take time to care for each other, for example, none is without employment. They have unity and work very well together, whether there are in 100s or 1000s, to fulfill a specific aim/mission/goal/purpose. The other key lesson that I learnt from the sermon was that ants know how to do 'trans-generational investment' as opposed to just living in the confines of the needs of the current generation and thus seeking for mere self aggrandizement. Generation after generation of the ant kingdom continue to maintain their system of harmony, order, unity and industry with great consistency. How much more should we who are so fearfully and wonderfully made and are the crowning act of God's creation, created in His very image ()!
In a practical sense, my humble view is that:
1. Due diligence needs to be applied firstly in submitting self completely (Luke 9:23) into the Hands of the Potter (Isaiah 64:8;Jeremiah 18:6) so that He can put us back together again. It requires painstaking effort at time to win in the battle against self for self is always striving for the mastery and yet this is a battle worth fighting which as we prevail in we are able to continue the walk in the path of the just that shines brighter to the full light of day (Prov. 4:18).
2. Parenting must begin before a child is born though one cannot learn all that parenting in entails before actually having a child or adopting one:
- Both father and mother should work as a united force to untiringly impart the knowledge of God to their children from as early as possible even whilst the child is in the womb. We are not to wait until the child can speak to start teaching and training the child, we by God's grace should start really early and this requires much patience and determined effort.
Oh that God may help us to be faithful in this key aspect of family life for indeed God is looking for a generation that will bow the knee to any of the idols of this age (1 King 19:18) which include entertainment, wealth, vain glory, social and education status and fashion to name a few...Oh Lord revive and reform us again!
A very good question at the end of the lesson. We must be aware that small compromises here and there are what leads a people to turn our backs on God over time. Has it been happening in the remnant church? There should be no compromise on the principles of God. Our safeguard is the Scriptures.
1. As stated so many times in previous statements; The issues started with the generation that compromised w/current residents of God's promised land. (Judges 2:2) One may not see the ripple effect of his/her sin but this may be Jeremiah's (Jer 2:1-15) way of showing us that our sin DOES effect others to the 3rd and 4th generations.
2. The NET Bible says in Judges 2:10 that "a new generation grew up that had not personally experienced the Lord's presence or seen what He had done for Israel."
The AMP says ". . . and another generation arose after them who did not know (recognize, understand) the Lord, nor even the work which He had done. . ."
It seems important for each generation to be taught history in terms of God. What is God's hand in events. This not only keeps a generation looking to God instead of themselves as the resolution but also teaches the next generation how to find God in their own lives.
We need to have a PERSONAL relationship with God, otherwise its just tradition, rules, processes. And these, when interpreted w/o God's will, can be broken.
3. The following verse keeps sticking in my mind in relation to this lesson (and my life.)
Deut 4:29 (NIV) "But if from there you seek the Lord your God, you will find Him IF you seek Him with ALL your heart and with ALL your soul." (also: Jer 29:13, Joel 2:12, etc. . . .)
Evidently this can not be a part-time relationship with God to make it work for this generation or the next.
We have not done a good job in leading our young or next generation to Christ. Who will train our children in the way of the Lord? Who will tell them of the way they should walk. Have we left this job to those who know not our God?
These are the question?