Willingto BeProven

Then said the LORD unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.

Exodus 16:4

Upon reading this today I realized how much we need to step out into situations that only God can handle, that only He is our provider. We are so caught up in meeting our own needs that we never come close to this blessed place, the place where God can prove us.

If we won't even dare take the test, can we dare to declare that we have passed the test? Our preoccupation with meeting our own needs continually tempers our obedience to what the Lord is calling us to do. This should not be.

Prove us, Lord!

TheGospelof God

The gospel of God is He, Himself. It is to lift Him up. We always think it's to bring Him down—to reduce Him to man's understanding. Alas, this is wrong! God must be lifted up in all His glory so that man can see all of his sin. God is the light which revealeth our every sin, even to the deepest darkest corners, and He must therefore be “turned on” brightly.

Men cannot repent if they don't first see their sin. Men cannot see their sin if they don't first see Holiness. God is the only Holy! Men cannot repent if they don't see God lifted up, rather than attempted to be brought down to our fouled and corrupted human understanding.

UntilSomethingChanges…

They perish. People—real people—are headed straight to hell as I type and as you read this. The people all around you. Not the people on the other side of the world, but people you work with, live with perhaps, and certainly many that you live near. People that you may see on TV, hear about on the radio, and those who work at the places where you shop. They're headed to hell!

Where is anyone living that they can honestly say that the vast majority of those around them are not, presently, headed straight to hell? Is there such a place on Earth? I can not think of any place like that. If one would insist that he or she lives in such a place surely they are delusional. A number of godly men have said, and I agree, that many even in our Christian congregations will end up in hell.

There is no use in wishing it weren't so. The Bible is clear. God hasn't stuttered on this point. Without Christ people will perish in hell. What are we doing about it?

I'm not trying to manipulate or cajole anyone into anything. I'm not one to suddenly jump into action, either, and don't recommend any hasty action to others. Even though the stakes could be no higher, there is a way to go about this business of “being about our Father's work.”

But, we are, at the very least, called and expected to pray about and for the salvation of the world around us. We say that we know that those around us are perishing, but our inaction and indifference betray our cold hearts. I include myself—I believe I could and should be much more enflamed here.

Whatever our circumstances, let us be found more and more in prayer and earnest seeking and petitioning after our Lord's glory in the coming of many to salvation. Let's be determined and freely willing to be fools for Christ with the message of the cross. The vast majority of people around us are going to hell… until something changes.