Amos 8:11-12 “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord God, “That I will send a famine on the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. They shall wander from sea to sea, and from north to east; they shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, but shall not find it.”
Last Sunday, Pastor Herk of the Little Church in the Pines at Bass Lake, California preached a sermon on the passage above. He stated that during morning devotionals with his wife, they discuss how it seems today that our country is being dismantled and it appears that almighty God has caused a spiritual famine on the land that is having a tremendous impact on our world. With all the biblical material, resources and teachings available today via television, radio, the internet, books, compact disks, digital on thumb drives, classes, seminars and church Bible Studies, it has never been easier to find the answers and meaning of God’s Word, Will and Way for our life and the Gospel truth. With such a plethora of access and opportunity for spiritual understanding from the Word of God, how could there be a spiritual famine in the land?
It is mainly due to an erosion (the eating in or away; the corroding, the deterioration, and the gradually destroying by degrees) that has taken part in the Christian church by drafting away from their Theological moorings, the abandoning of the Great Commission by Jesus and not fulfilling the Cultural Mandate to engage society for the advancement of the kingdom of Heaven. Churches begin with the “right” motives and beliefs in accordance with God’s Word, but over time and with secular pressure (the norms and morals of worldly humanistic culture) have seeped into the midst of the church, weakening and eroding them slowly, little by little, precept by precept. One of the fundamental functions of the Christian church is to equip the saints to engage their culture an community for Christ, but today, the church is not preparing people with the truths of God’s holy Word for the hard realities that are taking place in our Society. God’s people need to know the truth and speak the truth in love, being a godly help in these difficult times that we are facing.
What people do not need is more “Pop Psychology” theories on human behavior, “Interpersonal Relational ministry” or trendy, “hedonistic, watered-down, guilt-free churches that got us into the erroded state that we are now in. We need to know the truth of God’s Word in this fallen world in order to properly minister within it. Many pastors in this land have become “weak kneed” with the Gospel, lacking power and resolution out of fear and the desire not to offend the sinner. Our beliefs dictate the choices that we make and those choices lead to action. If what we are taught is faulty (if they do not line up with God and His holy Word), then our beliefs (our view of this world and how we are to live) will be faulty (off-center and totally out of balance) and our actions will be wrong and our inactions in dealing with others, society and our culture, a disgrace to God. Bad doctrine creates bad ethics, sinful behaviors, and immorality, so we need to be grounded in the truth.
Jesus said in His “high priestly prayer of John 17:14-1, “I have given them Your word; and the [God-rejecting] world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that You should take them out of the [sinful] world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the [fallen] world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. We need to be grounded in the truth of God’s Word. The Christian church cannot give in and acquiesce to the God-rejecting world. Christ’s church cannot allows the godless world beliefs creep in and usurp God’s sacred Word.
In Genesis 1:26-28a, 31 God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. Then God blessed them. Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day.”. When God’s created the human race, He created us perfect. But, sin entered the world when the devil’s lies and deceptions tempted Adam and Eve to doubt God, so mankind fell into the bondage, erosion of live and death created through that sin.
Ephesians 2:4-8 “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.” By God’s mercy and love, He provided a way for us to be redeemed by Jesus’ atoning sacrifice on the cross in our place. John 3:16-18 explains this, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”
How far have we fallen? The state of humanity without God is “I’ve fallen and cannot get up!” Every evil and hurtful thing in this world, whatever it is, is rooted in the “fall of man” on the Garden of Eden that brought sin into and cursed the entire creation. Genesis 3:1-8 recounts, Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’” Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was
good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings. And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.
This crafty and deceiving process that the Satan used on Eve in the Garden of Eden is the same process that he uses on us today by sowing seeds of doubt into the Word and commands of God. The focus is on God’s boundaries and restrictions (not to keep things from us, but to keep us safe), as the world, the flesh and the devil keeps tempting us to cross the line in disobedience for perceived personal gain. We need to stop focusing on what we do not have and start focusing on what God has given us, then begin gratefully enjoying in contentment. Instead, in the flesh we continue to doubt and question God’s Word. Anyone who puts a question mark behind the Word of God instead of an exclamation point, is being played by Satan. When we question God’s Word, we stand in judgment of it.
Let's continue Pastor Herk's message on the spiritual famine in our land on the next post.
In Christ, Brian
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