DOES OBEDIENCE MATTER TO GOD?

Last week we talked about the fact that God was getting Israel ready to cross over to the promised land by telling them the rewards they would receive for being obedient to His commands.

We related that this is a type of the truth today; that whoever keeps God’s ways with all of their heart, mind, body and soul will receive an abundance of blessings, either in this life, or in the life to come.

This is always fun to think about. These are the things we will be thinking of this Thanksgiving season as we all sit around our tables of plenty.

However, there is a flip side. Disobedience has its consequences and there is nothing fun to think about in relation to those results.

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to our every-Thursday on-line bible study called COME AS A CHILD. We have been making our way through the Book of Leviticus and we are studying Chapter 26 today. The first part of this chapter was given last week. If you missed it you can review it here: https://theinseasonlifestyle.com/blessings-from-obedience/

There is only one chapter left in Leviticus after this one! If you have been with us since Genesis that means we have now walked through Genesis, Exodus and Leviticus together. Hasn’t it been fun and exciting? Isn’t it wonderful how God shows each of us a different little piece of the whole puzzle and puts all of our thoughts together in such an amazing way? Thank you for staying with this study. I promise you are going to enjoy the up-coming study of Numbers also.

In the meantime; we have a little further to go in this Leviticus journey. Sometimes the last words are the most important words. Let’s see what God is saying to His nation about disobedience.

WHAT GOD HAS TO SAY ABOUT THOSE WHO ARE DISOBEDIENT

God always says what is needed. He doesn’t put in anything extra or leave any pertinent facts out either. Today we will hear of how he will punish those who are disobedient.

For those who do not want to keep God’s commandments and decrees, and those who abhor God’s laws and make their own laws in its place, for those who violate God’s covenant; God warns He will bring sudden terror and wasting diseases that will make you blind and zap your strength. Everything you work so hard for will go into the hands of your enemies. The fruit of your labor will be lost. You will be defeated in battle and those who hate you will rule over you. For the most part; you will live in constant anxiety over what is going to happen next.

This is only the first of what God will do to those who do not want to be faithful to Him. All of the above will be repeated seven times over and over again until God accomplishes a holy nation of obedient people. If the disobedient still refuse to listen to God and live in His ways He will cause great catastrophes that will ruin crops and the trees of the land will not yield their fruits.

THE CONSEQUENCES FOR DISOBEDIENCE GRADUALLY BECOME WORSE

If the disobedient still refuse to listen their children will be attacked by wild animals, their cattle will be destroyed and their land will become desolate. The people will die and become few in number. Those once very busy roads will now be deserted.

If the disobedient still refuse to listen and keep God’s covenant; He will be hostile toward them and afflict them with the sword of their enemies. When they try to withdraw into the cities He will send plagues and they will be given over to the enemies. Their bread supply will dry up. Ten will share what one would have previously eaten. Food will become rationed. After those have eaten that small portion; they will still be hungry.

MORE CONSEQUENCES FOR NOT OBEYING GOD’S BEST WAYS TO LIVE

If the disobedient still refuse to listen to God after all of this has come to pass; they will become so hungry that they will actually eat the flesh of their sons and daughters. Can you imagine how horrible this time will be?

As this happens God will destroy all of the high places and put out the incense altars of the people living in the land. (Note that this pertains to pagan worship practices and God abhors such things.) He will pile the dead bodies on top of the lifeless idols and turn their cities into ruins and lay waste their sanctuaries.

By this point in time; no sacrifice will please God.

He will abhor these disobedient, dishonoring and ungrateful people.

Even their enemies will look at the state of their land and be appalled. God will scatter them and then chase them out of their land with a sword.

THE LAND WILL ENJOY ITS SABBATHS

After all of this, the land that God had given them will lie desolate and deserted; but it will finally enjoy the Sabbaths that it did not have when the disobedient lived there.

Some disobedient people will survive; but their hearts will grow so weary and fearful that even the sound of the wind blowing will frighten them. They will run and try to hide, but they will stumble upon each other and fall; even though no one is pursuing them. They will not be able to stand and they will perish before their enemies.

Their nation will fall.

They will be a nation no more, and all will go to the hands of the enemy.
Anyone left living in the land will be punished for the sins of their ancestors.

A TIME OF TERROR WILL COME TO THE DISOBEDIENT

Can you imagine how terrible this will be?

There came a time in the history of Israel (actually there were several different occasions) when almost all of these things physically happened in one way or the other. But; all that holds true for Israel (God’s physically chosen people) will also hold true for God’s church made up of the Christians (God’s spiritually chosen people.)

This is what we have to look forward to as a nation if things do not change and we do not begin to live out God’s best ways to live and keep His commandments and bring true and pure sacrifices of love and obedience to God. These are the pure and holy sacrifices that God desires.

This is what always happens to the disobedient; in any time, in any circumstances, in any nation.

GOD WILL STILL SHOW MERCY TO THOSE WHO REPENT

However; (don’t you love it whenever God says ‘however’?) If repentance comes and sins are honestly and sincerely confessed to God, (not just your own sins but also the sins of your ancestors) the unfaithfulness and the hostility toward God (which made God hostile toward men with uncircumcised hearts in the first place) will be put aside because the act of repentance will help God to remember His covenant with Jacob and Isaac and Abraham.

GOD ALWAYS KEEPS HIS PROMISES

God will again come to remember the land that lies in Sabbath. He will not completely destroy those people who have repented in the foreign lands where He has scattered them and caused them to go.

Because He is God and because He made a covenant with their ancestors; God will have mercy of those who are left.

He will again act as their God.

THERE IS GOLD IN THE STUDY OF THESE SCRIPTURES

This is a very mild version of what all God was telling His people in Leviticus Chapter 26.

You should really tear this chapter apart, verse by verse and look up the hidden meanings prayerfully.

See what else God shows you about being obedient right now; right here; in your own life. There is much wisdom and knowledge to be gained if you do.

A PEOPLE MADE READY

God’s people have now been instructed, taught, built up, refined, and made ready.

They KNOW what God expects of them in the land of promise.

Those of the Nation of Israel were now practicing these things before God in the wilderness. Soon they would begin to practice them in their own new homes that God will so lovingly and abundantly give to them when they reach the land of promise.

When they reach this land that is full of pagan practices; the land will become known to the world as the Nation of Israel. It will become known for being the pattern of how God wishes for all other nations to live before Him.

WHAT WILL THE PEOPLE DO NOW THAT THEY HAVE WISDOM FROM GOD?

Now, in a million ways; the people of Israel KNOW the truth of God; they have been taught by God Himself and lead by Moses.

The question is; what will they do with the wisdom they have gained?

ARE WE TRULY GIVING THANKS TO GOD?

It is the same question we should be asking ourselves today as we sit around our tables of plenty and say that we are giving thanks to God for all that He has done for us as a nation.

Is this really what we are doing?

Are we truly following God’s best ways to live in all the days of our lives?

Can we turn and begin to live out the things that God demanded of Israel and save our own nation from the things that happen to those who are willingly disobedient?

There is a form of godliness that is just that – only a form.

The litmus test is in the daily living that we do once we know God’s best ways to live.

Let’s truly show our thanks this year.

LEARNING TO BE THANKFUL IN OBEDIENCE AND GRATITUDE

Let’s do more than lip service to our God; let’s live out the things that He has commanded us to live out.

We should not be going into that place of disobedience; but we should set our faces toward inheriting the promises that were given to Abraham so very long ago.

As we are giving thanks this Thanksgiving – let’s let our ways speak louder than our prayers around our tables and let’s learn how to live and love and stand before our God with clean hands and holy hearts.

Let’s find that illusive Promised Land that God has told us about in the scriptures; a land flowing with milk and honey.

Remember; God always keeps His promises; but like Abraham in the covenant; sometimes we have our own parts to play.

Our nation must repent and turn.

We must turn from disobedience to obedience.

Let’s do this and once again become “One Nation Under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all” in reality; and not just in the thoughtless words of a pledge.

It is nice to be able to say the words of The Pledge of Allegiance; but we will become a fruitful and blessed nation for sure once we begin to truthfully and faithfully live out that pledge with commitment and obedience to our Great God.

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