Wednesday April 11, 2012

Read Deuteronomy 11:10-12; Rev 21-22

 

I love fishing, not just because I love to eat fish but more so, because it gives me an opportunity to enjoy the great outdoors. It gives me an opportunity to experience something of that Edenic paradise that Adam and Eve were kicked out of (not that they would have experienced the thrill of fishing).  But as I fish lakes and streams in valleys and mountains remote from all people and cities, I wonder what Eden must have looked like. I wonder what it would have been like to walk with God in the cool of the evening.

 

The Israelites had the opportunity to re-enter an Eden-like paradise. They had the extreme privilege of entering a land that God Himself watched over. God Himself would water the land and care for it and tend to it. God would watch over the land and bring rain in its season. He would make the crops and the herds thrive. He would bring in the harvest abundantly. It was a God blessed, not a God forsaken, land.

 

Of course with such privilege comes immense responsibility. Israel, as she lived in the land, was to be obedient and such obedience was meant to communicate God’s love and blessing to the world around her. Israel was a living parable to the nations of what living in a God blessed paradise looked like. She was a light to the nations, drawing them in and bringing them to God.

Being blessed by God and close to God communicates volumes to a lost and desperate world. The world needs to see believers, God’s people, close to Him and being abundantly blessed by Him (please don’t hear health, wealth and prosperity here). The world needs to see Christians deeply in love with God and refusing to compromise on His blessings. The world today, as in Israel’s day, needs to see God’s people being abundantly blessed by God and this will draw them to faith in Christ Jesus. Of course they need to hear the gospel message from our lips but they need to see it as well.

 

Prayer:

Pray for a Spirit of obedience to sweep across your church and across all the churches in your region, in your state and in your

¥ nation. Pray that God would confront and rebuke all Christians who are wilfully walking in disobedience.

¥ Pray that our brothers and sisters in China, Vietnam, North Korea, the Arab regions and in Iran and Iraq would be obedient to Christ as they face persecution for the name of Jesus. Pray that their obedience would bring glory and honour to Jesus and that it would lead many to find salvation in Christ.