Moab

“For your name’s sake, O LORD, preserve my life! In your righteousness bring my soul out of trouble!” (Psalm 143:11)

No one plans on dying in Moab. But Elimelech did. His two sons did. This man, whose name means “My God is King” left Bethlehem (The House of Bread) to go down to the place of backsliding. Moab came into being by Lot (Abraham’s nephew) and his oldest daughter. It was incestuous and ungodly. The child’s name was named Moab (Genesis 19:37). The Moabites had a false god by the name of Chemosh (Numbers 21:29). When a Moabite man was desperate for the help of Chemosh, it was a common practice for the father to sacrifice one of his children to this demonic god (2 Kings 3:26-27).

It was to this land that Elimelech took his family. He left the land of Bethlehem to “improve his family.” Elimelech lived a lie. Elimelech was the king of his own life, and it’s certain the Lord wasn’t. During the days of judges this man typified a man “who did what was right in his own eyes.” Instead of following the path of repentance and faith, trusting the Lord to provide for his family’s needs during the famine months, he moved to follow what seemed best to him. He chose the road to Moab.

Don’t streak down to Moab. It’s not worth it. Stay the course! Stay with God! Don’t become a platinum member of this club. The price and cost is too high. Elimelech, preoccupied with packing his U-Haul for Moab, never sought the solution: Jehovah God. Whatever you do–whatever I do–we both need to turn and run to the Lord. Ride out the hard times while trusting in the goodness of God.

 

 

Similar Posts

  • A Mind to Work

    “So built we the wall, and all the wall was joined together to half of it in height; for the people had a mind to work.”  (Nehemiah 4:6)

    The people in Nehemiah’s day worked hard at that wall — almost as if they were going to finish it in one day.  It took them fifty-two days, which was quick work at that, but they labored at it so desperately that it looked as if they were trying to do it in a day.  It was that spirit that was with them which roused the attack of the enemy.

    Satan never bothers half-hearted Christian people, but once you are desperate for God and become burdened for the salvation of men, then all hell will oppose you.  Sanballat and Tobias were both the agents of Satan.  Their scorn was a cloak for something else, they were angry that the work was progressing.  If the people jeer at our Christian testimony today, it is because they have no argument against the gospel.  The world will always be angry at any message which exposes sin.

    Watch what happens when you get up with others and try to rebuild the walls that have fallen down.  See if all hell will not come against you when you rise up to build.  The enemy of God will try to ridicule and loathe the work you are trying to complete.  But if we stay away from the rubbish of the wall that has fallen, and refuse the activity of action, then you will find your own life surrounded by passivity and selfishness.  Satan has no reason to disturb you for he has you in his catch and he knows the work will not be approached.

    If we are not building then we are tearing down.  If we are not with Christ then we are against Him.  Either we will love Him or hate Him, there is no middle ground.  Thank God for Nehemiah and the people who had a mind to work, a heart to pray, and an eye to watch.  The apostle Paul said, “…I labored more abundantly then they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me” (I Corinthians 15:10).

  • The Christian Faith Entrusted to Us

    “As for you, speak the things which are fitting for sound doctrine” (Titus 2:1).

    Biblical knowledge is meant to be both intellectual and experiential. There are two sides to the same coin and it is meant to be enjoyed together. Knowledge without response is like an incomplete sentence or a song without a chorus. We have to go beyond merely quoting the truth….to obeying it.

    Why are we to contend for the faith? Because there are false teachers, wolves in sheep’s clothing, counterfeits, apostates in our pulpits across the church scene.  Theology was important to Jude and Paul. God takes the truth seriously. We must know what and why we believe. That is God’s call on every believer.

    Our faith is not primarily a feeling. It is belief based on fact. It is more about a grounded assurance than personal philosophy. We can not simply make up facts or imagine things about God and then base our lives on those thoughts.

    Faith fads, theological trends, popular contemporary thinking, is carrying an unthinking church away from strong historical beliefs and Scripture. Just believing something doesn’t make it true. It’s either true or not, independent of our belief in it. Everything that is not Scriptural and experientially defended in our daily lives sets up misrepresentation of the God of doctrine and truth. Just ask the woman at the well in John’s gospel chapter four.

    It may feel as if the Word of God is rocking back and forth, swaying to the fads of Christianity, but it is not…for the Word of God is stable, it is not changing, progressing, or emerging. We are called to stand for and proclaim what is true, and even when necessary to expose false teaching and heresy. Always ask, “What does the Bible say? And not “Does it make me feel good, happy, or accepted by others?”

     

     

     

     

  • When Tolerance is Intolerable

    “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can withstand it?”–Revelation 6:17

    The Day of the Lord will be a day of ferocious intolerance. It is better to turn to God’s grace while it is freely offered. The world will become more tolerant while at the same time turning more rigid and biased toward Christians and their Christ.

    God is patient and long-suffering which are the warnings to all that one day He will move in great opposition against those who refuse to believe. God is tolerant but now He commands all men to repent.

    Today Christians are considered to be narrow-minded, bigoted, homophobic, or unscientific. This is contributing to the marginalization of the church in history. We should not be surprised to feel that the NCAA and the LGBTQ is filled with contempt for North Carolina’s caution to the “bathroom bill.”

    Holding back progress, losing money that is “much needed”, keeping us in the dark ages, of all that are thrown out there are the complaints and the energy which are trying to bully its way back into the “discrimination state.”

    Because we are living in the last days, time is not our friend. The days are evil and we are to make the most of our time. We are not to panic but to purpose with urgency. We must pass our faith on to the next generation, to our children and grandchildren. This keeps us on track.

    We are bound together by a common faith in the Lord Jesus. This is the true essence of fellowship. We are His living stones. The Apostles have laid the foundation. Therefore, your time and my time is God’s story. Don’t wimp out but stay and get on track with God’s program of tolerance.

     

     

     

     

  • Self Entertainment

    “And shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock, and to scourge, and to crucify him, and the third day he shall rise again” (Matthew 20:19).

    A disciple of Christ is not doing what we feel is right or what others think we should do. God said that He would reward each accordingly by how we relate to Him. We do not work or do for Christ because we get recognition but because He gives us His strength to do His will. We are all unprofitable servants. No matter the talents or gifts we have God has to use them for His purpose and His time.

    There are only two kinds of workers in the field today: those who want a contract and agree to work for such and such amount, and those who had no contract and agreed to take whatever the Lord thought was right. Sometimes we feel cornered or sequestered because we are not getting our gifts “out there in the world” which usually means the church world.

    God has called each of us to do our jobs well. When we watch others and measure ourself by them then we are measuring with the wrong measure. God’s people are to be walking with Him daily. When we direct the responsibilities entrusted to us for our own good then we are running amok on God. Until a child of God is settled in Christ they will run around trying to feel religious, smug and satisfied in doing good religious things.

    Jesus was delivered by Judas to the high court of Israel. He was mistreated and judged. The Gentiles scourged him, mocked him, and crucified him, but God raised Him up. Don’t go by feelings of what you think you should do but go by God’s power and do what He wants to do through you. The Lord Jesus was on His Father’s timetable and no one else’s. He walked accordingly to His Father’s will and not to His own dictates.

    It is a lesson well learned when we realize it is God who raises His people up from the dead of this world and the tantalizing flesh. It takes a very discerning person to take up his cross and deny himself and walk against the winds of entertaining the flesh. The flesh (the self life) must realize it is crucified and each day we must mortify the deeds of self life. Beware of making self happy instead of dying to self for it is God who determines the reward given. What seems to be first will be last in the kingdom of God.

  • Mere Life

    “A cheerful heart is good medicine but a crushed spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22). 

     

    Too many people walk through life with gloves and a raincoat on, refusing to observe and experience the beauty and the wonder of the world around them and above them. So many have forgotten the privilege of not only earthly delights, but also of our unearthly purpose.
    Each day has its own distinctness and its own inexhaustibility. And yet how few really realize the miracle. Just because we take it for granted, doesn’t mean it isn’t miraculous. Perhaps nothing is really ordinary.
    Do not treat your faith in God as if it were an artificial limb that you strap on each day. Though faith in God is meant to be full, yet to many it only helps you to stumble along, it never really becomes an intrinsic part of you. Whatever happened to that holy wonder, that appetite for the sacred? Have we grown blind to the sacredness of everyday things and of everyday people?
    It’s been said that as we get older, we don’t regret the things that we did do, but only those things that we failed or forgot to do. Life is short, and at times it is shorter than its “supposed” to be. But there is the question that troubles me far too many times: Why do we still continue to live bland, insipid lives? Why do we waste the days that God has given us? Each day comes and we forget but once in human history that each day comes!

     

  • Are You “THERE”?

    “And the word of the Lord came unto him {Elijah}, saying, Get thee hence and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook Cherith, that is before Jordan. And it shall be, that thou shalt drink of the brook; and I have commanded the Ravens to feed thee THERE…” (I Kings 17:2-4).
    If Elijah had rambled here and around I do not believe that Elijah would have had God’s provision. “THERE” was the place of God’s will for Elijah. The ravens were sent to the brook Cherith, and no where else.

    God has a “THERE” for you and me. There is somewhere He wants us to be, something He wants us to do. True joy and happiness has to be where He wants you. We can not please God anywhere but “there.”

    We can do many lovely things and become a “success,” but always there will be the haunting sense of having chosen life’s second best. If we miss the approval of God, the high calling of God in Christ Jesus, we shall feel at the close of the day the attitude of giving all of our earthly awards and crowns for the one we missed.

    “THERE” is the place of God’s abundant power and marvelous provision. Are we “THERE”?