The people rejected the word of the Lord through the prophet because they were afraid of the Chaldeans, Babylon. They ran to Egypt. God used the same thing they were afraid of, to punish their disobedience.
"Nice story. What does it have to do with me?" you may ask. Wel, you may be living it right now.
Take it like this:
Judah means praise, but is also Yeshua/Jesus' tribe. He is the Lion of the tribe of Judah. So Judah represents Him.
The Chaldeans, Babylon represents Religion or a religious spirit.
Egypt represents the world or the spirit of the world.
Can you see where we are going with this?
It's been a while now that all that live by the Name of 'Christian' has been rejecting the religious spirit. " It will kill us," they say." We will end up being slaves of religion." People do the most outrages things to be 'non-religious'. At the same time the beaten path of prayer, worship and the word is cast aside. Really, how many congregations still have a midweek prayer meeting where people truely pray?
The more mature, grounded ministers warn: "Stay the course. Just focus on Jesus. Keep the focus on Christ and Him crucified." They call for a return to the Word, to praying, to true worship. They are scoffed at, dismissed and ignored.
The people run to the spirit of the world. They dip into Egypt's feeding troths. They "borrow" the methods of the world and wonder why the Holy Spirit never shows up in their meetings. Their gatherings look like Rock Concerts or Corperate Conventions. They have programs and some have none, its one big hippie fest. They organise like the world, they advertise like the world, they train like the world, they sin like the world.
Running scared of the spirit of religion, they rejected God's warning, and ran right into the spirit of the world.
Listen to me!!!!
Stay the course. Pray! Every day, pray. Every meeting pray. Pray about everything. Ask God to intervene. Pray, pray, pray!!!
Open the Bible. Yeah the old fashioned New King James will do. Read it and do it. Re-translating it to fit your pet doctrine does not work. Just read it. It does explain itself if you would just bother to stick with it.
Then worship Him in simplicity, sincerity, with all your heart. You do NOT need two guitar players, a keyboard, drums and a leadsinger who sounds like a rockstar. All you need is a heart that truely loves Him, adores Him and wants to give Him glory.
And don't worry about the religious spirit. God is well able to manage His own house.
