Hosea 1 – Sons of the Living God
Joel 1 – Cry out to the Lord
Amos 1 – For three sins, even for four
Obadiah – The Kingdom will be the Lord’s
Jonah 1 – The Lord Provided
Micah 1 – Into Exile
The first half of the minor prophets: From a trivia standpoint, maybe I will remember Obadiah is only a single chapter now. My new goal is to write about what I want to remember.
Sons of the Living God: With my accountability group this morning, I spoke about the time I taught some kids what the word miracle meant. It ties in with this concept of the Living God, in that He does take action in the world, and often does so for the benefit of those who believe in Him, and sometimes even when they request it. Our lives bring God glory when we recognize His action and tell others it is all due to Him.
Cry out to the Lord: One of the many thoughts I have heard is the concept of “why does God not do some particular thing?”. The most basic response I was trained to expect was “Well, did you pray for it?” We are taught to pray without ceasing, but sometimes we neglect to actually ask God to take action. I was presented with an opportunity that I was prepared for, and I took it, prayed, and accepted. At the same time, I was presented with an opportunity I was not prepared for and I rejected it out of hand (at least in my mind). I was so busy looking for what I was praying for, I missed the opportunity to pray for something I had not been. This may be the next big thing God has for me, and I almost missed it without even trying to follow.
For three sins, even for four: This was repeated so many times in Amos that I felt I had to use it. Several times in the Bible God looks for a number of righteous people to bring blessing rather than wrath. Here it shows that even the ridiculously small number of sins of three or four will bring His wrath. I should clarify that is seemingly ridiculous, and not actually so, as in reality, God brings wrath after a single sin. More good than bad is not even close, it has to be all good, or it is sin, and God has to punish.
The Kingdom will be the Lord’s: His kingdom come is in the Lord’s prayer I pray every day and I visualize it as the future time of people living on earth under Christ’s leadership. In Obadiah, I observed that whatever the ideals of man, God was all powerful and He was in charge and nothing we could do would take His ownership of anything away from Him. The United States of America is supposed to be “For the People”, but God is sovereign, and this country is His regardless of how the powers that be try to change it into something meeting their ungodly goals.
The Lord Provided: I read in 1 Kings 18 today about God providing 7000 righteous people to continue the faith in Him as the Jews in general fell away. It was not that 7000 people stayed true by themselves, it was totally God protecting these people to accomplish His purpose. As Jesus commented, if the people would not sing, God would make the rocks sing. God provides anything and everything according to His will, and nothing good comes except through Him.
Into Exile: From a historical perspective, the exile of the Jews meant they had to live elsewhere and their faith in God was exhibited to the whole world in preparation for the coming of Christ and the spread of the Gospel. They call it the Diaspora, and the concept of God providing people who remain faithful to Him is called the Remnant. This Remnant has a role to play in the end times and may be the same group that was provided above or a later group that was provide afterwards or will be provided later. The idea for me today was that God had a plan thousands or millions or billions or maybe infinite years long. He sent the Jews into exile for a purpose and it continues to impact us today.
Our lives can be filled with many different things, but they fall into two simple categories, the holy or the ungodly. God seeks to enrich our lives with blessings to share or share about. We need to understand our lives have purpose and know our purpose is wrapped up in giving God the glory for all He give us.