Some years ago while attending district conference my wife and I stayed with a young lady who housed us while at conference. As we came to know her, she shared with us some of her struggles with God because her little brother had been murdered. It was an emotionally heart and spirit wrenching thing for her. She was working through it and learning to forgive, but it was still a struggle. From a human perspective of all the sins which we commit, with the exception of adultery, probably none is so unforgiveable as murder. Why is it so unforgiveable? From a human perspective, death is irremediable. When the person is gone we have been robbed of a relationship that cannot be restored upon this earth. Yet Jesus forgives all sin, and He calls us to do the same.
Absalom had committed murder because David was reluctant to distribute justice for his sister. That Law would have required the death of Amnon for the rape of Tamar. David was reluctant to carry out justice because it was his own son and because of his own sin. Absalom took matters into his own hands. The Law would have required the death of Absalom because he murdered Amnon. When Absalom fled to Geshur, it further complicated matters. For David to demand justice, it would require him to demand that his father-in-law, the king of Geshur, turn over Absalom. That wasn’t going to happen without war. David was certainly capable of defeating Geshur, but he made no demands probably partly because the king of Geshur was his father-in-law and ally and partly because Absalom was his son. Can you imagine the political embarrassment that this whole ordeal brought upon David? His heart yearned for a renewed relationship with Absalom, yet he could not renew it because Absalom murdered Amnon. Not only David but the country reeled in the consequences of the sin.
As blood thirsty as Joab was, he at times showed great wisdom. He concocts this whole story to make a point with David. Life is more important than justice. David is a type of Jesus, except Jesus is perfect and can raise us from the dead. When we had committed fornication, rape, murder, lying etc. the great love of the Father asked the Son to love Him and us by becoming one of us and dying in our place so that justice could be satisfied and a door re-opened to life, and we would be raised from the dead. Death is no longer irremediable. Because it is no longer irremediable, we can and ought to forgive! Now that is the glory of our Lord! Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
Psalm 79
When I arose in the morning, I received a call from someone from the Red Cross. The afternoon before our house had caught fire from a faulty electrical outlet. Two adult dogs and three puppies perished from smoke inhalation. Some friends carried their bodies off and buried them nearby. The kitchen (where the fire began) was totally charred, a gaping hole was in the exterior wall, ceiling and roof. The fire department put the fire out, but the house was unsafe to stay in. They allowed us to enter and get some valuables and things we had to have, and then the Red Cross put us up for the night in a motel. In the middle of the night after the wind had blown the house dry, an ember was fanned back into flames. About 4 in the morning the fire department returned. The call from the Red Cross in the morning was to inform me that the fire department had to return to the house during the night. One more room was now charred and two more holes in the roof. Almost everything was now covered in soot and water. Everything lay in heaps, soaked in the water used to put out the fires.
I don’t think those emotions could ever compare to the emotions wreaked upon the surviving inhabitants at the sack of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar’s army. The sanctity of the Temple had been violated. The bodies were not the bodies of beloved pets, but the bodies of beloved friends and family. There was no one left to bury the dead; their corpses were left to be consumed by carrion and rot in the heat. The living were now all slaves and were being drug off to a new land. The living felt abandoned by God because of His anger against them. In the case of the people of Jerusalem, God’s anger was truly against most of them because of their stubborn idolatry and disobedience toward Him.
But surely in the tens of thousands of people that lived in Jerusalem area and Jerusalem proper, there were some that were faithful to Yahweh. Yet they shared in the harsh anger of the Lord against the city and nation corporately. The ‘innocent’ felt His wrath every bit as much as the ‘guilty’. There does appear to be a corporate responsibility for sin. When someone else sins in such a way that leads the corporate body to bear guilt, even those who did not individually make the choice still bear the corporate responsibility. Was the burning of my house the result of God’s anger against me? Actually, it turned out for my good. I know at least one person who would probably say that the fire was God’s anger. But I think that it was more of God’s way of leading me in the midst of a fallen world. He is righteous in burning down my house because it would accomplish several things that would bring Him glory. One thing that brought Him glory was how the Christian community came together to support us in our loss. Another thing that brought Him glory was how it honed my confidence in Him. When we, the sheep of His pasture, give Him glory in the midst of our adversity, it does something in the lives of some other people. It causes them to see the reality of the Living God in our lives. It opens up to them the possibility that our Lord can also live triumphantly in them. “We will give You thanks forever; we will show forth Your praise to all generations.” How can we tell all generations of His power to deliver in adverse situations unless we walk though those situations and experience them? God walks in our midst to make us holy, even as He is holy, to show us His power and to reveal His glory. Without the adversity that we experience, it is only a tale told to us. He is a glorious King! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
Ezekiel 48
There have been a few times in my life when the presence of the Lord was so thick that I just knew that He was there. I could not see, hear, touch, smell or taste Him physically, but my spiritual senses were pulsating with His presence. Shall I speak of Falls Creek, my brother’s ordination, sitting in the dark or early morning hours praying at Hillcrest, the College of Prayer, the shower when the Lord spoke His love to me, the hospital room as a godly saint and friend went home to be with Jesus or the worship service when wounded by my brothers, I was comforted by the presence of the Lord? I could go back to each of those places now, and I doubt that I would experience His presence just by going. I don’t believe that I could say: THE LORD IS THERE, but He was. Would it not be wonderful to be able to have a place where we could go physically and know that THE LORD IS THERE?
The name of the city from that day shall be: THE LORD IS THERE. It is a fitting conclusion for Ezekiel’s book. The idolatrous harlotries of the nation had alienated the people from the Lord. Their sin had become so putrid that we watched in the beginning of the book as the glory of the first appeared to Ezekiel, but only so that he could witness the withdrawal of the glory of the Lord from Jerusalem. No one but Ezekiel saw it, but it was as real to Ezekiel as physical vision. When the glory had departed, the Lord permitted the Babylonians to destroy the city. It lay in waste for 14 years until God gave Ezekiel the final visions of the rebuilding of the temple and the return of His glory. Even the geography is changed by the Lord’s return. The people are re-deposited in the land, and the sense of His presence is thick in the city. It is so thick that the city is no longer called Jerusalem but THE LORD IS THERE.
But wouldn’t it be nice to have a place now where we could go to experience that THE LORD IS THERE? Oh we have it, but it is not on our demand. We can find Him daily by His Spirit in His word as we quiet our souls before Him in obedient waiting. It is part of His glory, when all is submissive on our part, to let us know that He is there. The problem does not lie with Him. It lies with me, but if I draw near to Him, He even helps me with my obstinacies. WOW! What a glorious King! Indeed, we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
2 Corinthians 11:1-15
The glory of Jesus is on the one hand very complex, but on the other hand it is very simple. I would expect nothing else. He is, after all, God. God is infinite. The only way an infinite being could be completely understood is to be infinite. We are not infinite. Therefore, we cannot completely understand God. But we can understand a finite part of God, which He chooses to reveal to us. The glory of the Lord Jesus Christ is very simple and pure. God the Son, the infinite being, added finitude to His person by becoming flesh. He did so to become one of us. He became one of us so that he might die in our place. He died in our place in order to pay the just penalty of our sin and to break the power of our sin. He died in our place so that He might defeat our death by rising again. Having secured the provision of these things, he now offers us life by which we may now enter into a relationship with the Living and Holy God. He does all of this for His own pleasure. It is His pleasure to love. That is why He has done all of this. It is His pleasure to be holy. That is why He has done all of this. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
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