SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/17/2015
1:37 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
The Witnesses’ Attitude
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation
11:3b
Message of the
verses: “clothed in sackcloth.”
I suppose that you may be thinking that perhaps it is
hard to figure out the attitude of a person by what he is wearing, but when you
think about it we even do this in today’s culture. I am a product of the growing up in the late
60’s and 70’s what some call the “hippie” generation and when one looked at a
man with long hair and perhaps having earrings, or mostly one earring back
then, and you could see men wearing a certain kind of clothing that when you
looked at them you knew that the belonged to a generation with loose morals,
smoked dope and probably did drugs. When
you went into the airport you may see people in long flowing attire having
flowers in their hands and these were known as a “flower child,” belonging to
some sort of a religious cult.
Ok enough of the “hippie generation” let’s talk about the
attire of these two witnesses who were wearing sackcloth. Now I
just did a search on the word “sackcloth” from my Online Bible Study in the
NASB95 version of the Bible and came up with 42 verses that had that word in
them and the first mention of it is found in “Ge 37:34 So Jacob tore his
clothes, and put sackcloth on his loins and mourned for his son many days.” Jacob had just heard about what he thought
was the death of Joseph and so he wanted to mourn which is the reason why he
put the sackcloth on. Now I want to look
up the word and see what the Hebrew meaning of it is: “1) mesh, sackcloth, sack, sacking
1a) sack (for grain)
1b) sackcloth
1b1) worn in mourning or
humiliation
1b2) same material spread
out to lie on”
Now let us look at the last times we find this word in
the OT: “5 Then the people of Nineveh
believed in God; and they called a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest
to the least of them. 6 When the word reached the king of Nineveh, he arose
from his throne, laid aside his robe from him, covered himself with sackcloth
and sat on the ashes. 7 He issued a proclamation and it said, "In Nineveh
by the decree of the king and his nobles: Do not let man, beast, herd, or flock
taste a thing. Do not let them eat or drink water. 8 "But both man and beast must be covered
with sackcloth; and let men call on God earnestly that each may turn from his
wicked way and from the violence which is in his hands. 9 “Who knows, God may
turn and relent and withdraw His burning anger so that we will not
perish." 10 When God saw their deeds, that they turned from their wicked
way, then God relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would
bring upon them. And He did not do it Jonah 3:5-10).” These are the last verses in the book of
Jonah and we find in them much mourning by the people of Nineveh as they were
convicted of their sins and as they felt badly about them they put sackcloth on
which was even ordered by the king. Now
we get the ideal that as we look at these two witnesses that they are probably
in mourning over what they find on earth when they begin to bear witness to the
people around them that the Lord is judging the world because of it sinfulness
and that there is still hope if one looks at what the Lord Jesus Christ did for
them on the cross for their salvation.
John MacArthur describes sackcloth as it “was rough,
heavy, coarse cloth worn in ancient times as a symbol of mourning, distress,
grief, and humility.”
Now I want to take a minute to talk about which time
period of the tribulation that these two men will be a part of, and the reason
that I want to do this is because some think that they witnesses in the first
half of the tribulation period and some think that they witness in the second
half of it. I must say that I have
always put them in the first part of the tribulation period, but when reading
and listening to John MacArthur he puts them in the second part of it. I believe that there are problems in either
part of it, but there may be fewer problems in the last part of it. I wrote the following in my Spiritual Diary
on July 21, 2005 “Starting in verse three and going to verse thirteen of this
chapter John describes the two witnesses of the book of Revelations. Verse three gives the length of their
ministry and that is twelve hundred and sixty days which is the way that the
first half of the tribulation period is spoken of in the Scriptures. These two men will begin their witness at the beginning of the
tribulation period and perhaps it will be them that will be a witness to the
144,000 Jewish evangelists. They
are described as two olive trees and two candlesticks that stand before the God
of the earth. There is an interesting
reference to two olive trees in the book of Zec. 4:2, 3; 11-14 which may or may
not refer to these two witnesses. The olive tree is certainly a symbol of the
nation of Israel and the nation of Israel is suppose to give light unto the
rest of the nations and that is what these two will be doing when they come to
the earth.” Now as far as the olive
tree, we will begin to talk about it in our following Spiritual Diaries. As far as when these men witnesses to a
troubled world I will leave that up to
whoever reads this to decide.
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: I think that I
need to put on sackcloth in my mind as I look at our world and look at our
country and do as these men will do in the tribulation, which ever time period
they are witnesses in, and that is tell this dying world of the only hope that
a person can find, and that is in salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ.
My Steps of Faith for Today: To love the Lord with all of my heart, soul,
mind, and strength, and to live in Christ’s love.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “Saul” (1 Chron. 10:1-4).
Today’s Bible
question: “Which man authored the most
books of the Bible?”
Answer in our next SD.
5/17/2015 2:11 PM
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