SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/18/2015
4:03 PM
My Worship Time Focus: False
Prophets
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Micah 2:6-11
Message of
the verses: “6 ’Do not speak out,’ so they speak out. But
if they do not speak out concerning these things, Reproaches will not be turned
back. 7 “Is it being said, O house of Jacob: ’Is the Spirit of the LORD
impatient? Are these His doings?’ Do not My words do good To the one walking
uprightly? 8 “Recently My people have arisen as an enemy-You strip the robe off
the garment From unsuspecting passers-by, From those returned from war. 9 “The
women of My people you evict, Each one from her pleasant house. From her children
you take My splendor forever. 10 “Arise and go, For this is no place of rest
Because of the uncleanness that brings on destruction, A painful destruction. 11
“If a man walking after wind and falsehood Had told lies and said, ’I will
speak out to you concerning wine and liquor,’ He would be spokesman to this
people.”
We are looking at similar things that
happened to the true prophets of God, to Jeremiah and also to Amos, and to
Ezekiel too as the false prophets were telling the people that God could not do
anything to Judah and Jerusalem because His covenant was with them and also His
temple was in Jerusalem. “The prophets
prophesy falsely, And the priests rule on their own authority; And My people
love it so! But what will you do at the end of it? (Jeremiah 5:31).” Amos 7:10-17 says “10 Then Amaziah, the
priest of Bethel, sent word to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, "Amos has
conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel; the land is unable to endure all
his words. 11 “For thus Amos says, ’Jeroboam will die by the sword and
Israel will certainly go from its land into exile.’" 12 Then Amaziah said
to Amos, "Go, you
seer, flee away to the land of Judah and there eat bread and there do your
prophesying! 13 “But no longer prophesy at Bethel, for it is a sanctuary
of the king and a royal residence." 14
Then Amos replied
to Amaziah, "I am not a prophet, nor am I the son of a prophet; for
I am a herdsman and a grower of sycamore figs. 15 "But the LORD took me
from following the flock and the LORD said to me, ’Go prophesy to My people
Israel.’ 16 "Now hear the word of the LORD:
you are saying, ’You shall not prophesy against Israel nor shall you speak
against the house of Isaac.’ 17 “Therefore, thus says the LORD, ’Your wife will
become a harlot in the city, your sons and your daughters will fall by the
sword, your land will be parceled up by a measuring line and you yourself will
die upon unclean soil. Moreover, Israel will certainly go from its land into
exile.’"” We see in both of these
sections that the false prophets were attacking both Jeremiah and also Amos for
teaching the truth that God told him to teach.
One of the problems with the false prophets
was that they had a shallow theology and allowed sin without a problem with
it. There thought were as long as the
people participate in religious services that everyone will be okay with the
Lord. If they were not teaching the
people the right things then they would not be okay in the eyes of the Lord.
The other day I was listening to a radio
talk show host who I listen to from time to time and he was speaking of how far
one of the parties we have here in our country has fallen away from the Constitution
that we as a nation are suppose to follow.
I realize that our Constitution is not like the Law of God, but many of
our founding fathers were true believers in Jesus Christ and therefore had good
ideas of how the country should operate and put them into the Constitution, and
now people are looking at it like these false prophets during the time of
Micah.
I have mentioned that there were thing that
these false prophets were missing in their thinking that God would not destroy
Israel or Judah, and that is that God had unconditional covenants made with
Israel and conditional covenants with Israel and God would punish both Israel
and Judah because they were breaking the conditional covenants that He made
with them. Deuteronomy chapter 28 spells
a lot of this out as we have mentioned in earlier SD’s.
Dr. Wiersbe writes “It is God who speaks in
Micah 2:7b-13 as He defends His faithful servant. The fact that these religious leaders
rejected Micah’s message didn’t mean that the message was wrong; it meant that
the hearers were wrong. The way we
respond to God’s Word indicates our relationship to the Lord. ‘He who is of God hears God’s words;
therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God; (John 8:47 NKJV).”
We will continue looking at this section in
our next SD.
12/18/2015 4:47 PM
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