Morning Moments

Recently I saw a video clip of Oprah Winfrey that went something like this: “I remember when I was younger that I was in a church listening to the pastor and suddenly something he said changed the way I thought. He said, ‘God is jealous’. “ Then she goes on to tell how upset she was that God was jealous OF her. But she missed the whole point. This week I want us to consider a negative attribute of God. We only want the positives like love, mercy, grace. But there are negative attributes also that cannot be ignored.

When the Lord wants us to understand something He put it in language we can best understand. So let’s now consider an interesting text from Ezekiel 23:25 –
“And I will set my jealousy against thee, and they shall deal furiously with thee: they shall take away thy nose and thine ears, and thy remnant shall fall by the sword: they shall take thy sons and thy daughters; and thy residue shall be devoured by the fire.”

To understand the context look at the first couple of verses –
1 The word of the LORD came again unto me, saying, 2 Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother: 3 And they committed whoredoms in Egypt; they committed whoredoms in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and there they bruised the teats of their virginity.

The two sisters represented the two capital cities of the divided kingdom, Israel in the north and Judah in the south. The cities were Samaria and Jerusalem. Because it would be very difficult for us to understand how anyone could so love a city or nation, or the inhabitants of it, God uses relationships we understand to teach us of relationships we do not understand.

The spiritual significance is to be seen as the natural (lost) and the carnal (fleshly) man. Both are creatures of the Creator God, and both plunge headlong toward the judgment of God; the natural toward eternal separation from God and the carnal toward eternal loss of reward from God.

The warning is to the wise who will “turn from idols to serve the true and living God,” as Paul wrote about the Thessalonians. REMEMBER – God chastens whom He loves and scourges every son. The natural is as Ephraim about whom God said, “Let him alone, he is married to his idols.” But the carnal is as Judah who responds to the chastening of the Lord by repentance and restoration.

In the case of Israel and Judah, they had made alliances with the wicked and begun to embrace the political policies and practices of perverted people. The priests, the prophets, the princes, and the people had turned from the Lord and He was JEALOUS. He had to GIVE THEM UP to get them back. He had to let them go to let them learn. He had to back away for them to come back to His way.

For now let’s just close by saying that sometimes, we have to lose to learn and that is precisely what the Christian does through the discipline of God who is not jealous OF you, but jealous FOR you. He doesn’t want anyone “messing” with His woman so to speak, because He loves her so much. That means you and me so let’s not cast our eyes in another’s direction.

By the way, would someone pass this along to Oprah, she needs the understanding.

PRAYER: Thank you, Father, for the pictures story you give us as little children who are just learning to read. We are Your children and we get excited about Your teaching. Thank You.