Time with Abba, Singing Praising 親親爸父，唱詩歌頌 : OT DAY 553 - Leaving God, Living for Own Self, Brothers Killing Each Others, Nations Being Destroyed (Please click here for English podcast)

Sunday, October 30, 2016

OT DAY 553 - Leaving God, Living for Own Self, Brothers Killing Each Others, Nations Being Destroyed (Please click here for English podcast)

Silence

1. Put on your “brakes” and stop for a moment of silence

2. Wait for God. Breathe deep for God's peace and feel His presence. Exhale your worries.

Praise and Thanksgiving

1. Think through your day, all the times that made you smile

2. Thank God for all those moments, and for all those people

3. Open your heart to praise the Lord

Turn away from evil and do good;
seek peace and pursue it.

The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous

and his ears toward their cry.

The face of the Lord is against those who do evil,
to cut off the memory of them from the earth.

Psalm 34:14-16

Confession and Repentance (Subjective Shifting Devotion Method http://bishopsilas.blogspot.ca/2009/08/count-down-5-subject-shifting-devotion.html)

1. Pray for the Holy Spirit to work in you:

“Dear Holy Spirit, shine your light into the places of darkness in my life. Show me my sins, everything that blocks me from encountering God. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.”

2. Through the Holy Spirit, examine yourself for a short silence and then pray:

"Dear Lord Jesus, thank you for dying on the cross for our sins and being victorious over death and sin. I confess my sin to you(pause, to tell Jesus what the Holy Spirit has shown you). Forgive my sins by your blood and help me follow you. Holy Spirit, fill me that I may be able to receive your gift to love God and His people. In Jesus Name I pray, Amen."

The Word (2 Kings 16:1-20)

English(ESV): https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=列+王+紀+下+16&version=ESV

In the seventeenth year of Pekah the son of Remaliah, Ahaz the son of Jotham, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 Ahaz was twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. And he did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord his God, as his father David had done, 3 but he walked in the way of the kings of Israel. He even burned his son as an offering,according to the despicable practices of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel. 4 And he sacrificed and made offerings on the high places and on the hills and under every green tree.

5 Then Rezin king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, came up to wage war on Jerusalem, and they besieged Ahaz but could not conquer him.6 At that time Rezin the king of Syria recovered Elath for Syria and drove the men of Judah from Elath, and the Edomites came to Elath, where they dwell to this day.7 So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and rescue me from the hand of the king of Syria and from the hand of the king of Israel, who are attacking me.” 8 Ahaz also took the silver and gold that was found in the house of the Lord and in the treasures of the king's house and sent a present to the king of Assyria. 9 And the king of Assyria listened to him. The king of Assyria marched up against Damascus and took it, carrying its people captive to Kir, and he killed Rezin.
2 Kings 16:1-9

Let's have a time to be still and give the Holy Spirit space to speak through the passage we have just read. Offer this time up to Jesus as you listen to him, while listening to "Gabriel's Oboe"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmax47l2hLU

My Listening

We talked about how Judah was faithful in three generations and how Israel was so evil that they were soon being destroyed totally in yesterday's message. Today we vividly see the next generation of Judah, King Ahaz did not do what was right in the eyes of God and everything collapsed, spiritually, politically and ethically. It turns to be a disaster of God's nation killing another God's nation! Terrible!

Let's see how Professor John Goldingay tells us:

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Goldingay) :

The Israel and Aram have become allies instead of enemies because of a desire to resist Assyria, and they lean on Jedah to join them in doing so. Judah's response is to appeal directly to Assyria for support against Israel and Aram.
These events suggest another take on the complexity of the challenge that is involved in being the people of God while also living in the real world. Here one political embodiment of the people of God (Israel) is allying with another nation (Aram) to resist the superpower, and it is then joining with that ally in threatening the other embodiment of the people of God (Judah) and invading its country. That other embodiment of the people of God is then appealing to the superpower for support against its own brother, and even bears responsibility for the fact that the superpower undertakes its first invasion of Israel.

John Goldingay. 1 and 2 Kings for Everyone. Louisville,KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011, p.158.

When people leave God, they will turn each others and killing each others, marriage, family, church, society or nation are sooner or later being destroyed.

We really need to do what is right in the eyes of the Lord our God!

Dear Lord Jesus,
Open our eyes to see if we have been doing what is right in your eyes. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Reflect on these questions:

1. How do you feel about this terrible tragedy of God's people killing God's people?

2. How can you prevent yourself from doing that and help other people not doing that?

3. What have you got from Jesus today?