The greatest king of Israel said:
“The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good. [2] The Lord looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. [3] They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.” Psalm 14:1-3
Centuries later, Paul echoed:
Dr. McCain used to say that “compromise” was the worst word in the English language. Have you ever wondered how “compromise” gets started? Compromise begins the moment our desire for man’s praise exceeds our desire for God’s praise. Compromise occurs when our hunger to gain respect in men’s eyes outweighs our hunger to please God.
Fifty years ago, every American understood that killing a baby was wrong. Today, that subject is too argumentative and political.
By the time you read this, the election results will be history. The New Religious Right will be happy or the liberal left will be happy. Actually, the results will be whether we increased or slowed down our plummet into the depths of destruction. Billions of dollars were spent on promoting a cause. To some the cause was purely racial, they saw no other issue.
James wrote in his book,
“Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.“ James 2:19
It seems the devils have a little better theology than most of the world. Our world has multiple gods. The first mention of more than one God was by Satan in his promise to Adam and Eve:
“For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.” Genesis 3:5
The last mention of “gods” is by Paul:
“…and came trembling, and fell down…” Acts 16:29 These words describe the Philippian jailer and his conversion before Paul and Silas. Many of you are familiar with the story. Paul had been arrested for casting a devil out of a young maiden who had associated herself with them. This cost the young maiden her supernatural powers and she became a liability instead of an asset to her masters. They went into a rage over the loss of their income, arrested, beat and imprisoned Paul and Silas, charging the jailer with their safety.
Elijah was one of the most feared prophets in the Bible. He appears from out of nowhere before Ahab, king of Israel, announcing it would not rain for a few years (1 Kings 18.) We later learn the drought lasted for 3½ years. King Ahab set out to punish Elijah, but his pursuit was in vain until Elijah decided to show himself and set up a showdown with Ahab’s ministerial council. Myriads of sermons have been preached on Elijah’s prayer and God answering it by sending fire from heaven to vindicate Elijah.
ZIonica News came out with some interesting statistics regarding churches in America in their April 24, 2012 issue. Their figures revealed that over 85% of the churches are declining; when measuring church growth with population growth, only 4% of our churches are growing. One startling statistic was that no one county in the United States has more attending church today than it did ten years ago. The study showed that atheism, Mormonism and New Age groups are growing.
Not too many years ago, subjects like abortion, homosexuality, same sex marriages, children born out of wedlock, adultery, unmarried couples living together and our continued drug problem would have caused our pulpits to be on fire. Those God-called men would have preached loud and clear about God’s judgment. With our morals and convictions hitting an all time low, our pulpits are speaking of developing a better self-esteem and encouraging more tolerance. Preaching about sin is pretty much passé.
In our weekly Bible class, we are doing an overview of the sixty-six books in the Bible. We have finished the major prophets and are in the middle of the minor prophets at this time. What stands out about all of God’s men is their preaching against sin. You could really call them “negative” preachers. They cry out against and point out the sins of their own nation. They identify and point out the sins of their religious leaders. They call a spade a spade and mince no words. Before we attribute such goings-on to the Old Testament, note many of Christ’s messages.
“Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.” Psalm 127:1
It is interesting to observe all the different plans and schemes on how to build a church. You would think that everyone would be speaking about prayer, Bible study and soul winning. Those were the simple methods that worked well until people quit using them. As long as I can remember, men have been trying to do it some other way. Men just have a real problem with doing things God’s way.