SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 11/15/2023 9:22 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-3 “The
Intense Compassion”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
23:37-38
Message of the verses: “37 "O
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to
her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers
her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. 38 "Behold, your house
is being left to you desolate!”
As I begin today’s SD I want to look at the
following part of verse 37: “How often I
wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under
her wings.” We can see from this section
that God’s ultimate plan and desire for His people was not to punish them, but
to gather them back to Him like “a hen gathers her chicks under her wings.” This shows the true compassion that the Lord
had for His children. MacArthur writes “There
was a beautiful intimacy and tenderness in Jesus’ words and no doubt in His
voice as He mourned over His people. He
had come “to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him,” (John
1:11).” I like the way that John continues
as John then wrote “12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become
children of God, even to those who believe in His name, 13 who were
born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of
God. 14 And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory,
glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John
1:12-14).
In Psalm 36:7 David also had something to say about
God’s wings: “How precious is Your
lovingkindness, O God! And the children of men take refuge in the shadow of
Your wings.” It was truly God’s great
desire that all men, and I am especially talking about His people Israel, would
take refuge under His wings. It was in
many times and in many forms that Jesus had often given invitations such as
seen in Matthew 11:28-29 “28 "Come to Me, all who are weary and
heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 29 “Take My yoke upon you and learn from
Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.”
Now we want to look at the end of verse 38, and I
have to say that this part of the verse is not something that is good as Jesus
finishes this verse by saying “and you were unwilling.” In my other blog today I was going over what
Paul said to the Jews at Rome after He finally got there after his long, very
rough sea adventure as seen at the end of the book of Acts. The Jews there were still unwilling to come
to their Messiah and Paul, like Jesus did earlier quoted from the book of
Isaiah. “"The Holy Spirit rightly spoke through Isaiah the prophet to your
fathers, 26 saying, ’GO TO THIS PEOPLE AND SAY, "YOU WILL KEEP ON HEARING,
BUT WILL NOT UNDERSTAND; AND YOU WILL KEEP ON SEEING, BUT WILL NOT PERCEIVE; 27
FOR THE HEART OF THIS PEOPLE HAS BECOME DULL, AND WITH THEIR EARS THEY SCARCELY
HEAR, AND THEY HAVE CLOSED THEIR EYES; OTHERWISE THEY MIGHT SEE WITH THEIR
EYES, AND HEAR WITH THEIR EARS, AND UNDERSTAND WITH THEIR HEART AND RETURN, AND
I WOULD HEAL THEM."’”
It was and still is a great tragedy that the Jewish
people were unwilling to accept their Messiah who would have, if they had been
willing, given them the kingdom, and it was still true in the days when Paul
ministered in Rome at the end of the book of Acts. It is still true today, not only for the
Jewish people but for many, many Gentiles who have heard the truth of the
Gospel that even though all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,
that by accepting the salvation that Jesus offered when He took their place on
the cross that many are still unwilling to accept that salvation that He
offered for them.
MacArthur
writes “Nothing in Scripture is more certain than the truth that God is
sovereign over all things; but God’s Word nowhere teaches determinism, as this
verse makes clear. God was abundantly
willing for Israel and all men to receive and follow His Son, but most of them were
unwilling. They did not turn from Christ
because of fate but solely because of their own unwillingness. When a person rejects Christ, it is never God’s
desire or God’s fault but always his own.
“A
privilege was given to Israel that is absolutely unique in the history of
mankind, and with that privilege came great opportunity and
responsibility. The incarnate Son of God
came into his midst as the Son of David, her own Messiah, Lord, and
Savior. He taught and healed and
exhorted and entreated. In His
unparalleled truth and love He demonstrated God so perfectly that He could say,
“He who has seen Me has seen the Father (John 14:9; cf. 12:45). Yet Israel rejected that revelation and
forsook that opportunity, and in so doing brought upon herself God’s wrath and
judgment.
“Because
Jews are God’s chosen people they are the objects of Satan’s fiercest
hatred. Therefore when God removed His
protective hand from Israel it was to expose her to the worst furies that Satan
could bring upon a people. It is Satan’s
continual desire to eliminate them, because they are specially beloved by God
and because to destroy them would be frustrate God’s promise of bringing them
back to Himself (Rom. 11:26) and giving them to Christ as an inheritance.
“Yet
although Israel as a people has suffered because God withdrew His blessing from
them, many individual Jews have come and continue to come to Christ in saving
faith. God has never been without a
chosen remnant (Isa. 10:22; Jer. 23:3; Ezek. 6:8; Zech. 8:12; Rom 9:27).”
Lord
willing I will finish this section in my next SD tomorrow, but I want to remind
those who will read this that this was written 1988, and what can be seen in
these words from MacArthur are something that is going on today in the state of
Israel, as Satan has many people’s and nations who hate Israel and it is
actually written in the charter of Hamas to kill any Jews that they run into,
to wipe Israel off the map. Let me end
this by quoting Genesis 12:1-3 “1 Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go forth
from your country, And from your relatives And from your father’s house, To the
land which I will show you; 2 And I will
make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so
you shall be a blessing; 3 And I will bless those who bless
you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families
of the earth will be blessed.’” God is
saying in this highlighted section “Don’t mess with Israel or I will mess with
you.”
11/15/2023 10:11 AM
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