A sad young minister and his wife came to me for counseling recently. After four troubled years of marriage and two children, they were contemplating divorce. She was the saddest looking wife I have seen in years. Her husband, the young youth minister, stood nearby, shuffling his weight from foot to foot, while his teary-eyed wife sobbed out her confession to me.
The most difficult thing in all the world for Christians to do is forgive. For all the talk in the church about forgiveness, restitution, and healing, there is very little of it truly demonstrated. We all like to think of ourselves as peacemakers, lifters up of those fallen, always forgiving and forgetting. But even the most deeply spiritual today are guilty of wounding brothers and sisters by not showing a spirit of forgiveness.
Paul introduced the possibility of a fall into a satanic setup in his letters to Timothy. He understood the dangers of a satanic trap or snare: "...lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil" (1 Timothy 3:7). But he also gave us a recovery from that satanic trap: "...they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will" (2 Timothy 2:26).
Pride is at the very top of the list of things God hates. "These six things doth the Lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren" (Proverbs 6:16-19).
"Then a man of God came to Eli and said to him, 'Thus says the Lord, "Did I not indeed reveal Myself to the house of your father when they were in Egypt in bondage to Pharaoh’s house? Did I not choose them from all the tribes of Israel to be My priests, to go up to My altar, to burn incense, to carry an ephod before Me; and did I not give to the house of your father all the fire offerings of the sons of Israel?
"There shall be a handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains; the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon..." (Psalm 72:16).
The 72nd Psalm is a prophetic vision of the dominion of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the corn, in the earth, upon the hill. Except the corn fall into the ground and die, it abides alone: but if it dies, it brings forth much fruit (John 12:24).
Almost everywhere I go nowadays, I hear people say, "I wish I could just run away from it all." Then after a sad pause, they add, "But I don't know where to run. I have no place to go. And I guess I'm too chicken."
On the night before his crucifixion, at the Last Supper, Jesus told his disciples, “Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me” (John 14:19). What an interesting statement for Jesus to make, knowing the disciples wouldn’t grasp it. One of them asked, “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?” (14:22).
In the Old Testament, Habakkuk gives us an amazing prophecy about the end times. This praying prophet’s name means “embraced by God.” Scripture indicates Habakkuk was a man who wrestled with the Lord faithfully in prayer. And his prophecy came during a time of gross immorality.
Isaiah warns that in the last days, God will turn the world upside down.
