We Must Keep Our Promise to God as Our Faith and Patience Will Be Tested!

“Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase and may enter and possess the land the Lord promised on oath to your ancestors. Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. He humbled you, causing you to hunger then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. Your cloths did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years. Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you.

Observe the commands of the Lord your God, walking in obedience to Him and revering Him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land – a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs gushing out into the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey; a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.

When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given you. Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have I multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. He led you through the vast and dreadful wilderness, that thirsty and waterless land, with its venomous snakes and scorpions. He brought you water out of hard rock. He gave you manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never known, to humble and test you so that in the end it might go well with you. You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’ But remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms His covenant, which He swore to your ancestors, as it is today.

If you ever forget the Lord your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed. Like the nations the Lord destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the Lord your God.” (Deuteronomy 8: 1-20)

The promise that God gave the Israelites is no different than the promise of salvation given to the Church by Jesus Christ. In both cases a promise was made to prepare a place for them where they would long for nothing. Every need would be taken care of and all of their dreams would come true.  Everyone in the world today can see the promise that God gave the Jewish nation has come true with the establishment of the Israeli Nation in 1948.

Not only has the Jewish nation received their land back after an almost two thousand year hiatus, but Israel has prospered and thrived within this barren land. Jews from all over the world have come back to the Promised Land to repopulate the land God proclaimed to be theirs.

Christians have been promised to have a place prepared for them by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He promised that if we fulfilled our obligation that He would return one day and bring us to our Promised Land. The only difference between the promise God gave to the Jews and the promise Jesus gave to the Christians is that the Jews have received their Holy Land and the Christians have not.

These promises also have come with an obligation that must be fulfilled for the promise to remain intact. We must not forget the Lord our God and we must never bow down to another god or we will be destroyed.  This is consistent with both promises.

All around the world people are proclaiming that the end of the world is at hand and that the Great Judgment is almost upon mankind. The Jews are watching for their messiah to come and to have the Third Temple built with the reintroduction of the sacrifice where Christians are proclaiming that Jesus is returning and will destroy the Anti-Christ.  Even the non-believer can see that the world has gone crazy and that we are headed for a major crisis.

The Prophetic Scripture tells us that all of these events will happen and they will happen at a time of great peril.  The entire world will be filled with crisis and everyone will be looking for a Messiah to save the world from destruction.  The current developments within the Middle East and the buildup of the world’s armies in Syria have everyone looking toward the Old Testament prophets for answers. By reading these prophets and looking at the news, we are seeing Bible prophecy being fulfilled.

The Prophet Ezekiel speaks about the gathering of armies against the land of Israel in chapters 38 and 39, while the Prophet Isaiah describes the total destruction of the city of Damascus in chapter 17. These events combined with the gathering of the world’s armies happening in Syria, which is described in Revelation chapter 16, we can see the Living God coming alive within these events.

What must be understood is that we must be careful what we wish for! Yes we want to see our promise fulfilled just like the Jewish promise was but we must be prepared for what comes with it.  God’s Judgment is nothing to take for granted and nothing to wish upon others. What He has promised to do to the sinners of the world is truly horrific.  Actually looking at these events would make anyone with a heart wish that we could find another way.  A way that does not include so much death and suffering but this is the only way.  That is why we have been warned for thousands of years, so that we may be worthy enough to not partake of God’s wrath.

We as believers must do everything in our power to make sure that the truth is upheld and that as many that would listen are told the goodness of our Lord. This is our obligation by being alive during this time.  We are told that we will be tried and that our faith will be tested to see if we are true.  By the testing of our faith we will show our goodness and love toward our Creator.  We are all made of sin and we all deserve eternal death. None of us are good enough to enter eternal salvation by our works and we must be granted His grace to enter the presence of the Lord. This is the only way and once we understand that then we know what we must do.  We must proclaim the truth and hold true to our promise to not worship anyone above our God. This will be the true patience of the saints:

“Then I saw another angel flying in midair, and he had the eternal gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth – to every nation, tribe, language and people. He said in a loud voice, ‘Fear God and give Him glory, because the hour of His judgment has come. Worship Him who made the heavens, the earth, the sea and the springs of water.’

A second angel followed and said, ‘Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great,’ which made all the nations drink the maddening wine of her adulteries.’

A third angel followed them and said in a loud voice: ‘If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives its mark on their forehead or on their hand, they too will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of His wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There will be no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the mark of its name.’ This calls for patient endurance on the part of the people of God who keep his commands and remain faithful to Jesus.

Then I heard a voice from heaven say, ‘Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.’ ‘Yes,’ says the Spirit, They will rest from their labor, for their deeds will follow them.’ (Revelation 14: 6-13)

 

Clinton Kowach

9/29/18