October 21st, 2024
by Leah Farster
by Leah Farster
I used to read the Old Testament thinking God was so harsh and scary and I felt doomed and an inability to ever please Him, but I was reading all wrong!!! The entire theme of the Old Testament is God’s love for man. His desire to bring the light. His love and light to the world through the Jews and ultimately through Jesus.
Ezra is a great example. You’ll read the story and think, “How mean, how harsh, that’s not love and tolerance!” No, actually it’s not in our view and it is in God’s view. You see God sent the priest and prophet Ezra to clean up His people, after many years of exile in Babylon. They had intermarried with pagans and God told them to separate from these pagan’s, their “strange” wives. Today we would call that cruel! But God calls that love. “Where’s the compassion?” You ask. Oh, it’s there! God is perfect and righteous and He had to insist that His people, with their eternal call, obey Him in order for the Messiah, the Savior of the entire world to come. And He (Jesus) had to come through His chosen people the Jews. Had the people not obeyed, God’s wrath would have fallen upon them to bring them back in line for their own good, to bring them in right relationship with God, and to bring forth the Savior of the world! They did comply, separated from their pagan wives, and followed God, and many went back to their homeland.
Our call is to live here yet be separated from evil, rely on the Lord and live in peace with Him. No good comes by disobeying the Lord and living apart from Him! He is always working to bring you to Him, so that He can love on you and help you, but sin separates you and dooms you. There is no life apart from God through Jesus here or in the next life. His lack of tolerance is actually love to bring you to Him! Tolerance would leave you in sin and that’s not love.
Blessings
Ezra is a great example. You’ll read the story and think, “How mean, how harsh, that’s not love and tolerance!” No, actually it’s not in our view and it is in God’s view. You see God sent the priest and prophet Ezra to clean up His people, after many years of exile in Babylon. They had intermarried with pagans and God told them to separate from these pagan’s, their “strange” wives. Today we would call that cruel! But God calls that love. “Where’s the compassion?” You ask. Oh, it’s there! God is perfect and righteous and He had to insist that His people, with their eternal call, obey Him in order for the Messiah, the Savior of the entire world to come. And He (Jesus) had to come through His chosen people the Jews. Had the people not obeyed, God’s wrath would have fallen upon them to bring them back in line for their own good, to bring them in right relationship with God, and to bring forth the Savior of the world! They did comply, separated from their pagan wives, and followed God, and many went back to their homeland.
Our call is to live here yet be separated from evil, rely on the Lord and live in peace with Him. No good comes by disobeying the Lord and living apart from Him! He is always working to bring you to Him, so that He can love on you and help you, but sin separates you and dooms you. There is no life apart from God through Jesus here or in the next life. His lack of tolerance is actually love to bring you to Him! Tolerance would leave you in sin and that’s not love.
Blessings
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