And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another. Then many false
prophets will rise up and deceive many. And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end shall be saved. Matthew 24:10-13
It is easy to follow Jesus and to stand for righteousness when everything we experience is pleasant and it seems that every prayer we pray is answered almost before we even say amen. Thank God for the seasons where we seem to walk in divine favor and we experience the desires of our heart being granted. The rubber meets the road, or the true test of our faith is when the answers of our prayers are delayed and the harder we pray the more difficult the situation seems to become.(Yes prayers get delayed, Gabriel told Daniel he heard him the first time, but was delayed twenty-one days by the principalities of the land.) We live in an instant society where we can get almost anything we want in a short time. The teachings of the modern church have almost made God out to be a form of Santa, and we have become so focused on our desires, our comfort, and our timing that we forget that we have been called to battle. Yes, I said battle, we will all go through seasons that we must do battle for our faith. If we were not going to face great opposition, why would the Bible tell us to put on the armor of God? Armor is the protective gear worn into battle. Perhaps you have showed up in life ready to do battle against the spiritual wickedness in high places, and the battle has taken longer than what you expected it to take, and you find yourself loosing heart and your prayers are not as intense and it is harder to firmly stand on the word of God, declaring and decreeing just seems like empty words. If we are not careful, after we fight and do not see the results, we are believing God for in the time we allotted Him, we become offended at Him. Before you get all sanctimonious, Jesus said in Matthew 11:6 “Blessed is the man who is not offended at Me.” How can a person get offended at a perfect God who is good in all His ways? Being human, we tend to think we know how and when God should answer our prayers and meet our needs instead of simple trusting Him and allowing Him to work all things together for our good like Romans 8:28 promises. It is easy to believe that if we walk with Jesus, we will not get offended, boy are we wrong. Jesus told His disciples He was going to die, and Peter the man who had rightfully identified Jesus as Christ, the Son of the Living God, quickly told Jesus he was wrong and how Jesus should set up His kingdom on earth. Under the right circumstances and pressure, all of us are susceptible of being offended at God.
One way people become offended with God is when God does not do things the way they think He should. The story of Naaman is found in 2 Kings 5. Naaman was the commander of the army of Syria who had a major issue, he had leprosy. A young slave girl from Israel had compassion on him and told him that there was a prophet in Samaria who could heal him. As Naaman arrived at Elisha’s house, the prophet did not even grace Naaman with his presence but sent a servant with instructions for his healing. I am sure Naaman thought Elisha would greet him and be sympathetic about his condition and do something to get rid of the leprosy, instead a servant came out and told him to go and dip in the Jordan River seven times. The Bible tells us that Naaman was furious, he did not like the instructions he was given and was going home without obeying the word of God given by Elisha. Naaman would have missed out on his healing, had his own servants not reasoned with him. They asked him “had the prophet not told you do something great, would you not have done it?” Naaman repented and obeyed the instructions Elisha sent him and each time he dipped in the muddy Jordan river, his body came out of the water with leprosy until the seventh time he came out of the water, his skin was clear. I wonder how many miracles we miss out on because God’s directions are not how we think He should answer our prayers and we choose not to obey. Sometimes God’s instructions are not what I think they should be, in fact He asks me to do something that I thought was beneath me or the other person did not deserve. In those seasons, we just have to humble ourselves before God and trust in His process. I do not know about you, I am strong willed and it took me a lot of years to quit telling God how to fix my problems, and learn to ask for direction and clarification on what I am supposed to do and to just believe that He will do what He promises.
It is also easy to get impatient with God when He does not move when we think he should. In 1 Samuel 13, Samuel told King Saul he would be there in seven days to offer the sacrifice, and Saul got impatient with Samuel and offered the sacrifice himself. The bible says that as soon as he finished offering the sacrifice, Samuel came. Another way we get offended at God is by putting God on our timetable and expecting Him to complete our request in the time frame we allot Him to work. Galatians 6:9 “And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due seasons we shall reap if we do not lose hope.” Ecclesiastes 3:1 “To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven.” In all honesty, God is not bound by time. In Joshua 10, Joshua was fighting against the Amorites and the sun started to set, Joshua commanded “Sun stand still… So, the sun stood still and the moon stopped till the people had revenge upon their enemies.” Isaiah 55:8-11 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways.” Says the Lord, “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways., and My thoughts higher than your thoughts. For as the rain comes down and the snow from heaven, and o not return there but water the earth, and make it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater. So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth, it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish all that I please and it shall prosper in the thing which I sent it.” Just because God does not do something on man’s timeline does not mean He is not on time. In fact, God went into the future and worked His way back. Isaiah 46:10 “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times that are not yet done, saying “My counsel shall stand, and I will do it.” God is not finished until His word is completed 100%. His Word does not return void. What would have happened to Jarius’ daughter if he had judged Jesus off of his timetable? She had already died, and what if Jarius had said, Jesus is not here and will not heal because He did not come immediately instead of allowing the woman with the issue of blood to get His attention. I wonder how many miracles we miss out on because we try to hold Jesus to our preconceived time.
If we allow our love for God to grow cold, we can become more easily offended. The enemy likes to make us think that God is a harsh judgmental God who takes pleasure in cruel games of manipulation. The extreme opposite is true, Jesus said in Mark 10:18, “There is no one good but One, that is God.” And James 1:17’ “Every good and perfect gift is from above, and comes down form the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.” Daniel 11:32 “The people who know their God shall be strong, and carry out great exploits.” It is our responsibility to keep our hearts pure and in love with God. We are called “To love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.” Matthew 12:30. Once a person becomes offended, they will justify quitting. We are not given a license to quit when things do not go our way. As Christians we are called to endure. The definition of endure is: to hold up under (pain, fatigue, pressure), bear, undergo, to put up with, to continue in existence; to last; remain. It is very difficult to endure when you have allowed the seeds of doubt to grow in your heart and take over your mind. The children of Israel were slaves in Egypt over forty years and took on a slave mentality. Then during the Exile period, the Jews were carried away to Babylon for seventy years. Both of these oppressive years ended when the people of God cried out in repentance and asked God for His help. Too many Christians have retreated from the battle for our nation when the election did not turn out the way we thought it would four years ago. Sadly, thirty three percent of the evangelical people who claim to be saved and living for God did not get out and vote in 2020. That is one out of every three Christians that allowed offense to keep them for fighting to keep the United States of America One Nation under God. It would be interesting to know how many of the people who did not vote, complain about the mess our government is in. As much as I would have liked a different outcome in the 2020 election, I believe that if President Trump had gone back into office in 2020, he would have had the same battle of the first four years. What seems like a gross miscarriage of justice has given the American people an opportunity to become better informed. The times we are in are similar to Zephaniah 3. “Woe to her who is rebellious and polluted, to the oppressed city! She has not obeyed His voice, she has not received correction; she has not trusted in the Lord, she has not drawn near to her God. Her princes in her midst are roaring lions, her judges are evening wolves that leave not a bone to morning.” God is giving America a wake-up call, He has not forsaken the her. Verse 5 “The Lord is righteous in her midst; He will do no unrighteousness. Every morning, He brings His justice to light. He never fails.” Then verse 8 “therefore wait for Me,” says the Lord. “Until the day I rise up for plunder.” Do not loose heart, God is fighting for our nation. He is fighting the enemy that has come against you personally. Will you endure and hold on even though things do not look the way you want them. We must continue in prayer and proclaiming God’s word over out nation and binding the works of the enemy. If we quit praying before God is done working, we will not get the full results. Elisha told Joash to take an arrow in 2 Kings 13, and strike the ground with the arrow. Joash struck the ground three times and stopped. Elisha told Joash he should have struck the ground more, and the Syrians would have been utterly destroyed. Striking the ground is symbolic for praying. Our prayers are changing the tides and rewriting our future as a nation. If we stop too soon, we will still see the rightful President back in office, but we not get complete victory over the darkness and restore our nation to its original covenant with God. AS you pray will you ask God for specific ways to pray and actions that you need to take to help restore the Unted States, it will take all of us doing our part. I know it has been a difficult few years, but He has a plan. In Luke 5 Jesus saw two boats with the fishmen nearby washing their nets, Jesus got into one of the boats and pushed out from land and used the boat for a platform to teach the multitudes from. When He was done, He told the fishermen to move out into the deeper waters and cast their nets. The fishermen told Jesus they had fished all night and caught nothing. Jesus told them to cast their nets on the other side and they caught such a great number of fish that another boat had to come and help them bring in all the fish. The United States has launched the gospel all around the world and Jesus has a plan to restore and bless our nation. We have to listen and be obedient to all He tells us to do. Being obedient means obeying the laws of the land and doing our civic duty. All Christians must get out and vote their Christian values. Let the voice of the Body of Christ be heard with your vote. A nation’s integrity is not founded on personalities, but on character and Christian Values. Psalm 33:12 “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.” Our vote for righteousness matters. Do something a little different this time, encourage everyone you know to get out and vote with you.
Cathy Nesmith