WHAT TO DO WHEN THINGS COULDN'T POSSIBLY BE
WORSE.
"What to Do When Things Couldn't Be Worse" is
based on what Ezekiel said about 590 B.C. during
Israel's "darkest hour". You'll find chapter
and verse references and our comments are in
brackets.
When things can't possibly be worse, "look up"
and get an eye full of God. There He is, high
above, sitting on His throne surrounded by
brilliant light. (Ch 1 vs 25-28)
(Did you know that this same God, high, mighty
majestic, creator of the universe, yet at the
same time watching over each flower that opens,
loves you?
You are made in God's image, designed to enjoy a
life of harmony, sharing His love, friendship
and creation. He has specially prepared plans
for your life, but he loves you too much to
force them on you. He leaves you free to choose
His way or your own. In fact, everybody begins
by choosing to go their own way. This breaks His
"law of love" and separates us from Him, a
spiritual and physical death penalty. Even so,
He continues to care for us, sharing our
resulting pain and sorrows. He showed the depth
of His love by paying your penalty and
eliminating the cause of your separation. He did
this by dying in your place at Calvary and
opening the way for you to be reunited with Him.
All he asks in response to His love, is belief
in what Jesus Christ has done for you and a
genuine desire to go His way rather than your
own. If you want to do this, then tell Him in
words like these:
"Dear God, I have been going my own way and
now I want to turn and go your way. I believe
you will forgive all my past sins and give me a
new life as a member of your family. I believe
the way to do this is through trust in your Son
Jesus Christ. Thanks for accepting me."
You are now a member of God's family and will
need to meet with others to give and receive
encouragement. You can do that by meeting at
home. Our book "How to Meet With God At Home"
tells how or by attending a church of your
choice.)
You may or may not feel any different but the
fact is that God The Holy Spirit has taken up
residence in you. You are God's person and He
will speak in His loving way through you. You'll
find many are stubborn, obstinate and unwilling
to listen. Do not be afraid. At the end of the
day they'll know God's person has been among
them. (Chapter 2)
You do not have to go to a strange culture and
learn a foreign language, your mission begins
with your own people. Whatever their outward
circumstances, without God they are exiled from
true living. Quietly observe and as you see them
through God's eyes you'll be overwhelmed with
their need. Don't speak until God tells you to.
When He says speak then speak, when He says move
then move. If you do not issue a warning when
told to, you will be accountable. Be sensitive
and obedient to the quiet inner voice of God the
Holy Spirit as He directs your speaking and
actions. (Chapter 3)
God will show you how to draw the attention of
the people around you to the fact that their
problems are caused by rejecting God's
directions about how to live. (Chapters 4 & 5)
We are surrounded by non Christian nations but
our moral standards often are lower than theirs.
So God has withdrawn His favour and the mess we
are getting into will serve as a warning to
these nations. (Chapter 5)
Finally it will dawn on some that their
adulterous hearts and eyes that lust for created
things rather than the creator, has grieved God.
Then they will see themselves as God does,
loathe their evil attitudes and actions and
really come to know who He is. (Chapter 6)
Warn people that God will judge them according
to their conduct so that they will come to know
who God really is. Wealth will not save them
because it made them stumble into sin. They
won't get much help from institutional religion
because God's truth is often not taught there.
There's plenty of religious activity and calling
upon the Lord but God is not listening to much
of it. (Chapters 7 & 8)
The sin of the Christian church is very great,
the land is full of bloodshed and cities are
full of injustice. Those Christians who grieve
and lament over this situation will be spared
but God will destroy all the rest without pity
or compassion beginning with the "Christian"
church. (Chapter 9)
God knows what is going through the minds of the
smugly complacent Christian leaders. They will
really know who the Lord is when He drives them
out of their cosy church enclaves because they
haven't obeyed His word but been conformed to
the standards of the Godless world around them.
Those who "wake up to themselves" will be
restored and God will give them an undivided
heart and a new spirit so that they will be
careful to obey the Spirit of God's word. They
will be His people and He will be their God.
Those who do not "wake up to themselves" will
"suffer on their own heads what they have
done." (Chapter 11)
You'll find that most of these Christians have
"eyes to see and ears to hear" but they do
neither. However, those who "wake up to
themselves" and turn to God will know He is the
Lord. What we have been speaking of is not
going to happen in the distant future - it is
going to happen now. (Chapter 12)
There are many "Christian" leaders who pass off
their own ideas as God's. God hasn't chosen such
people at all. They lead other Christians astray
by saying "peace when there is no peace." No
better are people who write columns in magazines
and papers foretelling the future from the
stars. God will save the genuine Christians from
these people and they will know that HE IS THE
LORD. (Chapter 13)
Many Christian leaders have separated themselves
from God and set up idols in their hearts. God
says they will be cut off unless they become
genuinely sorry for this and replace the idols
with God. Then they, and those they lead will no
longer stray from God or defile themselves with
their sins. They will be God's people and He
will be their God.
God loves such leaders too much to let them get
away with what will harm them. God's judgment is
never without cause. (Chapter 14)
When God finds it necessary to judge His people,
not only they, but their land is made desolate
by their unfaithfulness. (Chapter 15)
God sees the Christian church as a baby girl
left to die in an open field at birth whom He
has rescued, clothed and nurtured to beautiful
maturity. Then she trusted her beauty to become
a prostitute using God's gifts of jewellery and
gold to make idols she worshipped. She
completely forgot what God had done for her.
God's reaction is to punish her as she deserves
to bring her to a right mind so she will
remember God's ways, be ashamed, turn back to
God and know again that He is the Lord. (Ch 16)
It's so important to realise that this is God's
moment, His hour, His day, His world, His
universe. For even the most gifted of us to run
our lives without regard to Him is a recipe for
ultimate disaster. Life is like yachting. A
man may pride himself as a competent sailor
because he can manage conditions on Sydney
Harbour, where he doesn't need charts, compasses
or navigation skills. But if he goes through the
heads to sail to New Zealand without these
things he'll be lost. So will the man who
departs this life without faith in God. Ch 17 v
24 "All the trees of the field will know that I
the Lord bring down the tall tree and make the
low tree grow tall." (Chapter 17)
If you have turned to God through faith in Jesus
Christ, and are faithfully allowing Him to
direct your life you will live. (Ch 18 v 9)
Those who reject God will surely die, unless
they turn away from their sins and turn to Him.
In this case they will live and none of their
offences will be remembered against them.
On the other hand, if a man who apparently was
right with God turns his back on Him, none of
his former good life will be remembered. Because
of unfaithfulness and sin he will die.
Talk is cheap,anyone can glibly say they believe
in God. But God knows the score, He judges us
according to our actions. He calls us to repent,
turn from all our offences, and sin will not be
our downfall. When we do this He gives us a new
heart and a new spirit. He takes no pleasure in
the death of anyone. He calls us all to repent
and live. If we don't we are like a plant
uprooted and replanted in a dry, thirsty desert
land. (Chapters 18 & 19)
Those who profess to follow God have a habit of
replacing Him with idols of their own (work,
family, sport, "church work" etc.) Yet He looks
on us with pity and doesn't punish us as we
deserve. He constantly calls us to follow His
word and Spirit's leading. But we fail
repeatedly. If we got what we deserve God's name
would be dishonoured in front of all the
unbelievers. So God will finally gather His
people in and we will sincerely acknowledge Him
to be our Lord and be genuinely sorry for what
we have done. We will really know He is the Lord
when He deals with us according to His loving
gracious favour and not according to our natural
evil ways. (Chapter 20)
When we rebel against God it "brings to God's
mind" our guilt and shows our sin in all we do.
Therefore He allows us to be "taken captive" so
we can learn to turn back to Him and trust Him.
(Chapter 21)
It's hard to tell the difference between many
so-called Christians and the rest of society
today. They treat parents with contempt, oppress
migrants, mistreat the fatherless and widows,
despise His call for pure, clean living, slander
others, commmit lewd acts, are sexually immoral,
accept bribes, charge excessive interest, make
unjust gain by extortion, - in a word, they have
forgotten God.
God will "throw them into a melting pot, cast
off the dross and refine them" to find who are
truly His. Today many priests and ministers do
not believe in or practise what God says in His
word, the Bible. They therefore "profane God's
holy things" and no longer distinguish between
the holy and the common. Church officials "shed
blood and kill people" to get unjust gain.
"Christian" leaders whitewash these deeds. They
say "This is what the Lord says" - when He has
not spoken.
With no Godly leadership it's no wonder
ordinary people feel free to practise
extortion, rob, oppress the poor and deny
justice. God looks in vain for a man to stand
out against all this for Him. So God will bring
upon these people what they deserve. (Ch 22)
Many so-called Christians have forgotten God and
"thrust Him behind their backs." This is an act
of "spiritual prostitution and lewdness." They
do this and still go to church! But God has the
last say. He will put an end to this and then
they will know He is the Sovereign Lord. They
will be judged according to their conduct and
actions - not their words. (Chapters 23 & 24)
Many non Christians will see God's judgment on
His faithless people and gloat. (Ch 25 - 28)
They too have to account to God and discover
that He is the Lord. Many of these people, in
their pride and wealth, become their own gods.
But such people will know that God is the Lord
when He punishes them and shows Himself holy.
Though these people aren't often aware of it,
they are part of God's continuing purposes in
His world. (Chapters 29 - 32 & 35)
God lives in you in the person of the Holy
Spirit. His (and your) mission is to spread the
good news that people can be forgiven and
accepted as God's children by faith in Jesus
Christ. Their alternative is judgment,
rejection, and hell. You are to be like a
warning siren, as the good news not only says
how to be saved, it warns against destruction.
"Sound the siren" and the response is up to the
hearer. Stay silent and you are responsible for
those lost through not being warned.(Chapter 33)
God says that too many ministers and leaders in
institutional Christian churches look after
themselves first and put their "flocks" second.
As a result they have not "strengthened the
weak, healed the sick, bound up the injured,
brought back the strays or searched for the
lost." They rule their "flocks" harshly and so
scatter them making them a "prey" to cults,
sects and alternative lifestyle movements.
God opposes such ministers and leaders, holds
them accountable, and removes them. He then
Himself searches for, rescues, gathers, binds up
the injured, strengthens the weak of His flock
and judges them by their actions. He did this
tangibly when here in the person of Jesus Christ
and He continues to do so in the person of His
Holy Spirit working through His family. (Those
who have turned form their sins and trusted in
Jesus Christ as the one who saves them and who
they want to run their lives). There are
"showers of blessing" for His people, security,
harmony, the knowledge that God is the ruler
who has "broken their yoke" and rescued them.
God says ( Ch 34 & 31) "You my sheep, the sheep
of my pasture, are my people, and I am your
God".
Why does God go to all this trouble over us? Not
because we are inherently good or deserve it,
but because of His love for us and to show the
unbelieving world what sort of a person He is.
That way He draws them to Him too. Look at how
loving and kind He is. He "sprinkles clean
water" on you to cleanse your impurities. He
gives you a new heart and puts a new spirit in
you, so you can find peace and harmony within as
you follow His word and directions. He makes you
His person and He Himself your God. Then, when
you remember your past wrong ways and actions
you'll loathe yourself for your sin. Then non
believers will look at you and the non believing
society will look at God's rebuilt "fair dinkum"
church, committed to Christ instead of
denominational structures and know that He has
rebuilt it and they will know that "I am the
Lord." (Chapter 36)
So much of what passes for Christian church life
today is like a valley full of dry human bones.
God wants the bones to return to human form, be
filled with His Spirit and know that "I am the
Lord" who has spoken and worked this miracle. As
God directs, play your part in this process. He
is going to save them from their sinful
backsliding and cleanse them. Then they will be
His people and He will be their God. Jesus will
be their Shepherd and they will joyfully live by
God's word and Holy Spirit. The non believers
will know God "exiled" His people due to sin and
unfaithfulness but has now cleansed and set them
apart to be a channel of blessing to them.
(Chapters 37 - 42)
When God's people get "fair dinkum" about
loving, knowing and serving Him, the glory of
His person fills them and makes them radiant.
They will be ashamed of "half baked" attitudes
to God which defiled His Holy Name and led them
to prostitute themselves with the lifestyle of
non believers. (Chapter 43)
When such people meet to share a meal in
remembrance of Jesus Christ, pray, share their
lives and learn from God's word, the radiance of
God's presence is evident. The name for such
meetings is church. These are totally different
from institutions called church where non
believers and their attitudes and practices are
accepted and in some cases non believing
ministers appointed. (Chapter 44)
In God's Holy Church only true and faithful
believers will exercise leadership. They will
teach God's people the difference between the
Holy and the common, the unclean and the clean.
All this will result in a reduction of violence,
and oppression. Fair trading will begin to be
practised. (Chapters 44 & 45)
God's true church (believers meeting together,
loving God and each other, finding all their
needs met by God the Holy Spirit and His word
with them and needing no human institutional
religious structures for support) will be like
"a stream of living water brnging life as it
flows through a desert land." (Chapters 46 - 47)
Like a secure city of peace and refuge in a war
ravaged land the name of God's true church will
be "the Lord is there." (Chapter 48)
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