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Thursday, September 17, 2015
To whom much is given, more responsibility
This week, The Daily Jot has been writing about responsibility and prophecy–that those who are commenting and teaching on prophecy need to be responsible about it. Using inflammatory words, trading on fear and intrigue, and taking Bible verses out of context to advance an agenda are all things that are irresponsible when people’s hearts and souls are seeking the Lord and trying to decipher all the events that seem to be leading up to the Lord’s return. When we are not responsible about these things, and quite frankly, are not circumspect and accurate in what we say about the Bible and the Lord’s return, we lose credibility and impact those whose faith may falter when predictions don’t come true.
There was a lot written in the past year about how the Shemitah of 2015, ending on September 13, would result in a complete collapse of the US economy and the economy of the world. In the year of the 2014-15 Shemitah from beginning to end, the US stock market declined about 3.6%, hardly a market collapse. There were claims made that the Shemitah held the “mystery of everything” and that it “determined the course of your life without you knowing it.” Much of Christianity was wrapped around this discussion for the year. The Shemitah, while very interesting, holding the mystery of everything and determining the course of your life without you knowing it, is not scriptural–this is intrigue and leads to fear.
In the last days of the 2015 Shemitah, some said there were striking signs. On September 10, a rainbow appeared over the tower at Ground Zero in New York City. While this sign in the heavens would appear to be a comfort to the nation near the anniversary of 9-11, Shemitah commentators claimed it as a sign of pending judgment, saying, “…America desecrated the sign of the rainbow by using a vessel of God to celebrate the Supreme Court’s striking down the biblical definition of marriage…It was not only the White House that was lit up-the Tower at Ground Zero…was also bathed in the colors of the rainbow. And now on 9/11, God causes a real rainbow to cover the tower-I wouldn’t take that as a ‘good sign.'”
The year long attention to the Shemitah raised a powerful general point–there are consequences for going against God’s laws. The context of scripture, however, must be paramount. In Genesis 9, God made a covenant with Noah and mankind that he would never again destroy the earth with water. In verse 13, the Lord says, “I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.” Irrespective of homosexuals using the rainbow as their symbol, God’s covenant remains. The number of events that could be linked prophetically are increasing rapidly. Coincident, real or just interesting, we need to be responsible and use the scriptures as our foundation in discerning so that we are not taken by intrigue, motivated by fear or deceived by false prophets that arise in the latter days.
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