Scriptures and Key Points:
- We as the Church, often fail to grasp and appreciate Jesus as the Perfect Sacrifice and the amazing freedom He won for us on the Cross through His covenant blood.
- We must continue to move from the superficial to the fullness of Christ.
Galatians 2:16 NKJV Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ…
- Choices always have consequences, regardless of how much we may try to excuse them, justify them, or even try to legalize them.
John 5:39 NIV You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me.
Jude NKJV …For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ…
- To deny Jesus’ Sinless Service is to deny the infallibility of God’s Word or the Holy Spirit’s inspiration of it.
2 Thessalonians 2:10-11 NKJV And with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie.
Matthew 5:17 NKJV “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.”
- The second sacrifice in the five primary sacrifices in Leviticus that all point to Jesus, the Perfect Sacrifice, was the grain offering.
- The Grain offering represents the obedience of sinless service (grain without leaven), which naturally flows out of a surrendered life.
To be our Perfect Sacrifice, Jesus had to live without sin to be our justifier and expunger from damage and destruction of sin and flesh.
1 John 3:5 NKJV And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin.
2 Corinthians 5:21 NKJV For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
Galatians 6:7 NKJV Do not be deceived, God is not mocked…
1 Peter 2:9 NKJV …that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
Jonah is a type of the church that is reluctant to speak the word of the Lord to a sinful and rebellious people.
- Righteous voices of truth in love and seasoned in grace need to speak to the condition of the nation.
Colossians 4:6 NKJV Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.
“My heart aches for America and its deceived people. The wonderful news is that our Lord is a God of mercy, and He responds to repentance. In Jonah’s day, Nineveh was the lone world superpower—wealthy, unconcerned, and self-centered. When the Prophet Jonah finally traveled to Nineveh and proclaimed God’s warning, people heard and repented. I believe the same thing can happen once again, this time in our nation.” – Billy Graham
Three major things that can hinder God’s blessing from a nation:
- Ritual or temple prostitution (example Hophni and Phineas)
- The shedding of innocent blood (we are now offering up our children to Molech)
- Licentiousness or moral looseness (Justifying our lusts of the eye, lust of the flesh, and pride of life)
- Compromise leads us in a path of deception and ultimate bondage.
- In our institutional Christianity, we have prostituted ourselves by choosing to live by preference rather than by conviction.
- We must counter these attacks on our religious liberties but at the same time display God’s love to those who oppose us.
Jonah 1:1-2 NKJV Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before Me.”
- Jonah fell prey to two very human desires:
- the desire to remain in his comfortable circumstances
- the desire to be liked by everyone
- Complicity or indifference, either way, we are accountable to the Lord.
Matthew 5:16 NKJV Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
If the church is going to avert national disaster, we must answer two questions:
- First, will we remain complacent in our comfortable circumstances, or will we please God and lovingly minister to our nation in hopes of turning it back to the Lord?
- Second, will we speak God’s Truth, even when it’s not popular?
“This generation of preachers is responsible for this generation of sinners. At the very doors of our churches are the masses unwon because they are unreached, unreached because they are unloved. … Sin today is both glamorized and popularized, thrown into the ear by radio, thrown into the eye by television, and splashed on popular magazine covers. Churchgoers, sermon-sick and teaching-tired, leave the meeting as they entered it—visionless and passionless! Oh God, give this perishing generation 10,000 John the Baptists!” – Leonard Ravenhill, Why Revival Tarries
“We need a prophetic generation, a multi-generational connection that will prepare the way for revival and the coming of the Lord.” – Doug Stringer
- When complacency strikes the Church, our reach is lessened and our influence is weakened.
- Before the church can minister to our nation, we must first be in line with God’s Word.
- Our ministry will crumble if we aren’t acutely aware of God’s Word and tuned in to the Spirit of Truth, Holiness and Grace.
1 Kings 19:18 NKJV Yet I have reserved seven thousand in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed to Baal…
Hebrews 12:2 NKJV Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith..
- We need to be righteous voices that speak the truth in love, seasoned with grace, even to those who may oppose us, but we must speak the truth nonetheless because it’s the truth that sets people free!
Links:
- Brown, Murillo and Kendall: If Jesus Sinned, the Bible is a Lie
- Revival: By Choice or By Circumstance?
- Battle for the Moral Soul of America
- Are we seared of conscience? Create a clean heart in us, oh God!
Books:
- Why Revival Tarries by Leonard Ravenhill
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