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Three of us sat together the other night and discussed why so many Christians are choosing not to be in Bible Study. We came up with a number of reasons but the main thought was …How busy our lives are…how even the kids have a draining schedule these days.
As I thought and prayed over this topic and how to get people to realize how badly we all need the study of God’s Word, God brought this thought to my mind, “Beware of the barrenness of a busy life.”
Being too busy will rob you of so many important things in your life. Did you know that you can even be so busy with Church Life that it will sap your spirituality? What should take precedence in our Christian life; what do you think is single most important word in the Christian vocabulary? From the moment of salvation… to our final redemption when Jesus Christ returns to take us home…from Genesis to Revelation what is the most important thing for us? Do we think that Jesus would say the most important thing is for us to stay busy? I would have to say the most important word is obedience. There is no substitute for absolute obedience.
All across America today there’s an attitude of ‘‘do it yourself theology.’’ This means that your own brains will take you through, your own culture will take you through; your string of degrees will take you through, your own works will get you through…even though God has condemned all these notions (Gal. 3:1–3)! That is not to say that hard work and hard study and hard application of truth is a bad thing…it is a great thing, but our life is a miraculous life. I cannot by any means convert myself or by any means live by the power of an indwelling Christ in and of myself…since it’s only Christ and Christ alone who can do this in me. We cannot just be totally dependent on Christ when we come to Him for salvation…but we must also live our Christian life that way too! After thirty 32 years in the pastorate, I’m painfully aware that we can be in the most spiritual circumstances (church, service, worship, etc) and yet be barren in our lives; we can have a dryness and an aridness that sucks the life, the usefulness, and the Joy of Christ right out of us. This is exactly what Jeremiah is talking about in these passages of scripture and God punctuates this amazing prophecy of Jeremiah with some of the most solemn warnings we’ll find anywhere in Scripture. I have chosen three of them that have searched and re-searched my heart this week.
I. Barrenness is a consequence of disobedience to God’s Word (Jer. 11:3).
Undoubtedly it has reference to King Josiah in his eighteenth year after having rediscovered the Book of the Law. After reading it and searching his own heart, Josiah felt convicted and sought to bring about a renewal—a revival among his people. Josiah arranged to have the Scriptures read openly. If you read the story carefully, you’ll discover that God’s people didn’t rise to the occasion. Because of their disobedience and refusal to bow to the authority of God’s Word, the prophet Jeremiah came with this warning. A similar situation is found in 1 Samuel 15:10–23. It concerns King Saul, who was commanded to smite the Amalekites. He chose his own terms of obedience and saved Agag the king and the best of the cattle. The prophet Samuel walked into that situation and heard the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the cattle. Samuel promptly rebuked King Saul with these solemn words: ‘‘You have rejected the word of the LORD, and the LORD has rejected you’’ (1 Sam. 15:26). There is no substitute for total obedience.
II. Barrenness is a consequence of not trusting God’s Power (Jer. 17:5).
Here are dramatic and devastating words addressed to God’s people, who of all the nations of the earth had seen the mighty demonstrations of God’s power. Yet they had turned from Jehovah God and sought alliances with Egypt and Assyria. God’s prophet had to come and say, ‘‘Cursed be the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength’’ (Jer. 17:5). One illustration of this principle is Moses in his early days. Moses thought that ‘‘by his hand’’ he could deliver Israel (see Acts 7:25). He smote an Egyptian, ran into the desert, and for forty years God had to show him that he couldn’t trust in his own hand. Only after those forty years of utter brokenness could God take a man who was afraid to even open his mouth and use him to deliver His people from slavery in Egypt. I want to remind every one of us that all power is inherent in God. All power ultimately belongs to Him.
III. Barrenness is a consequence of deceit in God’s Work (Jer. 48:10).
These are such vehement words that the higher critics and others have sought to remove it from the prophecy of Jeremiah and say that it’s not part of Scripture, but that is completely unwarranted. We not only believe in the inerrancy of God’s Word, but we also know that this teaching often occurs elsewhere in the Bible. One of these is in the New Testament: the case of Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1–11). There is nothing God hates more than deceitfulness in the work of the Lord. Ananias and Sapphira were members of the Jerusalem church, and they had seen Barnabas come with all his wealth and lay it all at the apostles’ feet. Ananias and Sapphira decided that they too wanted to make a good impression on the leaders of the church, so they sold some land and gave part of the proceeds to the apostles while pretending to give it all. They conferred together to lie. They presented their gift to the apostles, but the discerning Peter by the power of the Holy Spirit saw right through the fraud and phoniness of it all and said, ‘‘Why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?’’ (Acts 5:3). Immediately, Ananias and then Sapphira were smitten by the judgment of God. This illustrates the truth that God will not look with favor upon deceitfulness in the work of the Lord.
Conclusion:
Let’s bring our hearts into submission to God’s Word; let’s bring our lives into submission to God’s Spirit; let’s bring our entire actions into submission to God’s work. lets seek to draw closer to Him in every way possible. If you are too busy to spend time with God and His Word…You are too Busy. |
