Who Sees? Who Knows? God Does

Isaiah 29:13-14 ESV

 

And the Lord said:

“Because this people draw near with their mouth

    and honor me with their lips,

    while their hearts are far from me,

and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men,

therefore, behold, I will again

    do wonderful things with this people,

    with wonder upon wonder;

and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish,

    and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden.”

 

In today’s Christian world, at least here in America, the gospel that is largely being taught and accepted is not the gospel of Jesus Christ, but it is a half-truth man-created gospel for the purpose to pacify sin and to lead people away from following Jesus with their lives. For it discourages repentance, obedience, and submission to Christ as Lord, and it encourages continued and deliberate and habitual sin without conscience.

 

Therefore, a large percentage of those who call themselves Christians here in America fit with this description of God’s people in the days of Isaiah. They are full of error because they are mainly being taught the thoughts of man and not of God, and they are primarily following the flesh of man and not the Lord Jesus. So, they are also wandering from the truth to follow after lies, and they are not testing what they hear to make sure it is the truth.

 

They go through the motions of religion. They attend weekly church services, and they sing their songs, and they listen to their sermons, and they may even serve in areas of ministry within their institutional churches, which are not the true church, but their hearts are far from God. Their confessions of faith, therefore, are lip service only, for they do not honor the Lord as God, they do not obey him in practice, but sin is what they practice.

 

Thus, if they are wanting to give off an image of righteousness, they will sin in secret, and they will hide their sins, and they will not take responsibility for their sins, sometimes blaming God, and sometimes blaming others that they are still in the sinful condition that they are in. But they don’t want to let go of the sin, and therefore they will not yield control of their lives over to the Lord, and they are believing that they don’t have to.

 

They are thinking only of self without consideration for what their sins are doing to others who they are sinning against. They think that their sins are just their sins and they refuse to see that their sins are impacting the lives of those who they are sinning against. Thus, marriages are falling apart, and children are now engaged in sexual immorality, and families are being broken down while they go on living in sin claiming Jesus as Savior.

 

And the Scriptures teach that God will discipline, he will correct, he will chastise and rebuke. And he does warn of divine discipline and correction, and he does warn of judgment according to our works, and his word does teach us that if we continue in deliberate and habitual sin, making sin our practice, and in not obeying the Lord, that we will not inherit eternal life with God no matter what we profess with our lips.

 

[Rom 2:6-8; Gal 6:7-8; 2 Co 5:10; 1 Co 6:9-10; 1 Pet 1:17-21; Gal 5:16-21; Eph 5:3-6; Rom 6:16; Rom 8:1-17; Jn 15:1-11; 1 Jn 2:3-6; 1 Jn 3:4-10; Rev. 2-3; Rev 21:8, 27; Rev 22:14-15; Matt 7:21-23; Heb 10:26-27]

 

Isaiah 29:15-16 ESV

 

“Ah, you who hide deep from the Lord your counsel,

    whose deeds are in the dark,

    and who say, ‘Who sees us? Who knows us?’

You turn things upside down!

Shall the potter be regarded as the clay,

that the thing made should say of its maker,

    ‘He did not make me’;

or the thing formed say of him who formed it,

    ‘He has no understanding’?”

 

People continue in deliberate and habitual sin because they want to, but also because they feel they are able to get away with it, for they are able to sin in secret without anyone knowing what they are doing. And with today’s modern technology and pocket sized computers/phones we carry around with us, the world of sin is easily accessible to anyone without anyone seeing, even while seated in a crowded room in a corner.

 

So, many people can be and are one thing when they are with other people and another when they are alone when they think no one can see what they are doing. But in reality, they are the same person all the time, it is just that they put on a false persona when they are around people they want to fool. Yet those who know them best, if they are discerning, should be able to see the duplicity and recognize their sin cycles.

 

They definitely turn things upside down. Those who are trapped in sin will make up all kinds of excuses for why they are still trapped in sin, and they will twist the Scriptures to their advantage to make them say what they want them to say in order to ease their consciences so that they can keep on sinning. Thus they now call obedience to the Lord works-based salvation and they teach we don’t do works, so they call good evil and evil good.

 

They do not honor God as the holy God that he is, for they believe they don’t have to, and they see that what Jesus did for us on the cross is all for us and that he does it all and that we do nothing, and as though he is just a genie in the sky there to do everything for us while we do nothing for him in obedience to him. And some people are teaching that God is just so enthralled with us humans that he just wants to hang out with us.

 

So, they have it all twisted. They have it all backwards. There is no fear of God in their lives and it is barely being taught anymore. They think they know better than God and that they can make up their own faith and that they can create their own gods in their own minds who will not care that they are vegging out on porn or on sexual idolatry of any kind. They think God is just there to serve them and they don’t have to serve him.

 

Isaiah 29:22-24 ESV

 

“Therefore thus says the Lord, who redeemed Abraham, concerning the house of Jacob:

 

“’Jacob shall no more be ashamed,

    no more shall his face grow pale.

For when he sees his children,

    the work of my hands, in his midst,

    they will sanctify my name;

they will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob

    and will stand in awe of the God of Israel.

And those who go astray in spirit will come to understanding,

    and those who murmur will accept instruction.’”

 

Sometimes it takes tragedies, hardships, disasters, illnesses, job losses, or being caught in sin red handed and having to face strong correction before some people will come to their senses and to the point to where they will repent of their sins and turn their lives to the Lord or back to the Lord. And some people, no matter what hardships they face, will never surrender their lives to Jesus Christ but they will stubbornly hold on to sin to the death.

 

Revivals do happen, though they seem rare these days, at least here in America. But I believe that there is going to be a last days revival before our Lord returns, but that it won’t happen until things get much worse and people begin to have their eyes opened to the truth of what is going on. I believe the world and including America is under the judgment of God right now and that through judgment there will be people who will turn to God.

 

But we who do honor Jesus Christ as Lord of our lives and who do walk in the fear of the Lord, and who do make obedience to our Lord our practice, by the grace of God, and in the strength of the Lord, we have the hope of a better world to come. Jesus Christ will return one day and he will take us to be with our Lord forever. And there will be no more sorrow and heartache and crying, for sin will be no more, and righteousness will reign supreme.

 

Sweet Beulah Land

 

By Squire Parsons

 

I'm kind of homesick for a country

To which I've never been before.

No sad goodbyes will there be spoken

For time won't matter anymore.

 

I'm looking now, just across the river

To where my faith, shall end in sight

There's just a few more days to labor.

Then I will take my heavenly flight.

 

Beulah Land I'm longing for you

And some day on thee I'll stand

There my home shall be eternal

Beulah Land, sweet Beulah Land

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW8W7RXg6AA

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