The presence of the Holy Spirit always is felt in a stronger, deeper way when we come together in our study and fellowship times!
SELF-DECEIT. This past Sabbath, it seemed our study group felt pricked about self-deceit. We could see the reality of the dangers described in our key Scripture passages resulting from making our own decisions outside of counsel from God’s word. It all came down to each believer’s willingness to trust God’s way or our own - and we have two strong pictures of our Lord’s broken heart plainly putting this before us. In the fifth chapter of Genesis, He reveals the sin-sick condition of the pre-Flood generation:
And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that...when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great...and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually (5).
And by the time of the break up of the Israelite nation that he had shaped, we see those generations caught in the same set of behaviors in God’s word through Jeremiah in chapter 16 through 17:
It shall come to pass, when thou shalt shew this people all these words, and they shall say unto thee, Wherefore hath the Lord pronounced all this great evil against us?Then shalt thou say unto them, Because your fathers have forsaken me, saith the Lord, and have walked after other gods, and have served them, and have worshipped them, and have forsaken me and have not kept my law; And ye have done worse than your fathers; for behold, ye walk every one after the imagination of his evil heart, that they may not hearken unto me (16:10-12).
OUR HEART FOR GOD. This condition of those who will not stay obedient to God’s words comes out of constant decisions to do one’s own thing - to go with our own ways and prefer our own reasoning. God always speaks plainly to His people, laying out their errors with pain, and pronouncing his judgments - even while holding out the promises of hope and restoration if we will repent and turn away from sinning against Him. But the confrontation with our own evil is important for us, as we see in Jeremiah’s continued prophesying:
Thus saith the Lord; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh...Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is. For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters...
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? (17:5-9)
Trusting and believing in our own strength and innate virtue is a mistake. Our capacity to trust this spiritual insight and believe it will determine our decisions to obey the Lord and walk in His truths...
*May God's Spirit Be With You As You Study - And Experience His Guiding You Into His Will*
