In reality, they aren’t merely a sayings, they are lies.

You see this image? That’s you and I on the right.

We stand judged and condemned before a Holy God. Jesus is in our shoes, if you are a believer. Jesus is taking what rightfully belongs to us: death. That ultimate penalty for our sins is placed upon Him. The wrath of God is placed upon Him while we are made righteous.

That is reality.

If that doesn’t strike you, what about Jesus’ own words:

“Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am (He), you will die in your sins.” –John 8:24.

When Jesus says “I am,” He is calling Himself God. The “He” was added by the translators because of our English grammatical usage. Jesus is saying “I AM WHO I AM” as found in Exodus 3:14, the voice from the burning bush. It’s the same phrase He uses in John 6:20 and John 18:6.

You have a choice: face the wrath of God or believe that Jesus is who He says He is.

There’s only one way to heaven, friend. No matter how “good” you think you are, Jesus is the only way. We will all face our Creator one day. You are either going to stand condemned or righteous.

If you are not yet a believer, how does John 8:24 strike you?

May He Increase!

“The lights are going out all over America . . . America is now on the unlit, unpaved road to nowhere.”

Indeed, if you look around, the cardiac patient is on the table, hooked up to IVs but the medications are doing any good to a patient that has lived far too fast, on borrowed time (money!) for far too long!

I also ran across some recent YouTube videos by self-help guru, Tony Robbins. I actually watched the videos which were posted on a Christian blog over at The Economic Collapse. Makes for interesting viewing. The second of the two videos I found more worthwhile.

We’ve covered topics about the Decline of the United States here at May He Increase. We asked the question “Are We Past the Point of No Return?” We have even looked at what could possibly be one instance of America In Biblical Prophecy.

America: we need to repent! Christians: we need to get back to the basics of our faith. We need to start walking our talk! This goes firstly for me.

My family and I are partly responsible for this financial crisis America finds itself in. We are just as guilty as the next guy for buying stuff we didn’t need. We need to repent for getting our eyes off God and putting them on the false gods and idols of comfort and entertainment. We need to humble ourselves and seek the Lord’s face again.

As Christians, I’m sure many of us can see what we are starting to go through as possibly a judgment of God. And why shouldn’t God judge America? I think the question is: How can God not judge America soon?

Think I’m over-emphasizing this point? Check out these statistics from the National Coalition for the Protection of Children & Families.

By the time I finished the list, I felt nauseated and like a dark spirit entered the room.

You might be asking: where is the linkage between America’s financial crisis and pornography? Friend, it’s all related! Look at what we are choosing over our Creator! How much longer do you think God is going to allow this?

“For we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before the Lord that the Lord has sent us to destroy it.” –Genesis 19:13.

You’ve probably heard of “this place”: Sodom and Gomorrah.

Ruth Graham, the wife of Billy Graham, had this to say of America and its relationship to Sodom and Gomorrah:

“If God doesn’t judge America, He will need to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah!”

Wake up American Christians! Let us all repent, turn from our wicked ways, and seek God’s face for our bankrupt–in every way–nation!

May He Increase!

To recap the previous five woes:

1. Covetousness
2. Drunkenness
3. Flaunting of Sin
4. Perversion of Moral Distinctions
5. Pride and Conceit

The Six Woes of Isaiah: Woe #6 – Drunken Leaders

Woe to those who are heroes in drinking wine and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who justify the wicked for a bribe, and take away the rights of the ones who are in the right! –Isaiah 5:22-23.

Again we see the warnings against drunkenness. The “heroes in drinking wine” speaks of those who can drink like an athlete can run. It’s similar to the “valiant men in mixing strong drink.” The “strong drink” is the Hebrew word “shekar” which means a “strong drink, intoxicating drink, fermented or intoxicating liquor.”

When are leaders are intoxicated, it’s an easy step to “justify the wicked for a bribe.” In the Hebrew, the word for “bribe” indicates a gift to corrupt a judge or to free oneself from punishment.

How picturesque of what occurs in so many boardrooms of corporate America nowadays. Does Enron or MCI bring to remembrance recent corporate scandals? Doesn’t this describe so many of the scandals of even our own elected officials?

At the same time, we get the leaders we deserve. Ancient Israel experienced the same. God tells the Israelites:

“Where now is your king that he may save you in all your cities, and your judges of whom you requested, ‘Give me a king and princes’? I gave you a king in My anger and took him away in my wrath.” –Hosea 13:10-11.

Israel had a king: the King of the Universe, God Himself. But it wasn’t good enough for them. In spite of God warning the people about asking for a king, they went ahead and did it anyway. The people foolishly went to Samuel and asked for an earthly king.

The Lord said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in regard to all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me from being king over them. Like all the deeds which they have done since the day that I brought them up from Egypt even to this day–in that they have forsaken Me and served other gods–so they are doing to you also.” –1 Samuel 8:7-8.

Are we any different? If we continue to shove God out of our own lives, will we not let that pervade all of our decisions including the way we vote and the business ethics (or lack thereof) in our working lives?

What will happen if we do not heed these woes?

God pronounced His judgment on Israel through Isaiah, Hosea, and the other prophets. Specifically, through Isaiah, God says:

Therefore, as a tongue of fire consumes stubble and dry grass collapses into the flame, so their root will become like rot and their blossom blow away as dust; for they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. On this account the anger of the Lord has burned against His people, and He has stretched out His hand against them and struck them down. And the mountains quaked, and their corpses lay like refuse in the middle of the streets. For all this His anger is not spent, but His hand is still stretched out. –Isaiah 5:24-25.

Make no mistake: God’s judgment is coming. It’s coming for those that reject Him in this life. God is not willing that anyone should perish. He would rather that you come to Him in repentance (2 Peter 3:9) and be born again! Don’t wait until you have no choice. It will be too late then. Repent! Give your life to Christ! He is waiting for you.

May He Increase!

Last time we looked at the perversion of moral absolutes. Each woe so far can find it’s roots in one of the most insidious of sins: pride and conceit.

This is what we will look at today.

The Six Woes of Isaiah: Woe #5 – Pride and Conceit

Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight! –Isaiah 5:21.

A short verse, but don’t mistake brevity for mildness. Pride and conceit are extremely dangerous sins and ones that God is particularly concerned with.

“The fear of the Lord is to hate evil; pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverted mouth, I hate.” –Proverbs 8:13.

But it’s interesting to note why God hates it so much: it’s really for our own good.

Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before stumbling. –Proverbs 16:18.

God warns us to remain humble. And why not? He is God! He is the Creator! We are merely the creation.

Paul reminds us that pride is a deception.

Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks that he is wise in this age, he must become foolish, so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God. For it is written, “He is the one who catches the wise in their craftiness”; and again, “The Lord knows the reasonings of the wise, that they are useless.” –1 Corinthians 3:18-20.

Oh what a prideful nation we are! We think we are masters of our own universe. We have forgotten about God who has blessed our country. We have outlawed God out of our schools!

What are some of the effects?

• Abortion rates skyrocketed in the 1960s and 1970s.
• Violent Crime, rape, murder, burglary, assault, robbery, and theft have all increased dramatically between 1960 and 2008.

What do we expect? If we outlaw God, and then teach our children that life has no meaning, there are no absolutes, and you are nothing but a cosmic accident and your ancestors were apes, then how can we possibly expect things to get better!

Pride comes before destruction. As we proceed through these six woes, it becomes more and more evident that America is headed toward destruction like all other once great societies that thought that it was “the best of times.”

What’s next?

We wrap up the series by looking at the sixth woe: drunken leaders.

May He Increase!

1. Covetousness
2. Drunkenness
3. The Flaunting of Sin

It’s not an attractive list. Can you think of a nation more dedicated to covetousness–a form of idol worship–than the United States?

Care to see what a huge market alcohol is for our nation? Watch this year’s Super Bowl and count the ratio of beer and alcohol commercials compared to the rest of the advertisements.

Is there a nation more prideful than ours about the levels of depravity to which we can sink? Between our gay-pride parades and the endless iterations of movies like “Saw” and “Hostel” not to mention the volumes of pornography that are easily available, we pride ourselves–as a nation–on everything God abhors!

The fourth woe we will look at today:

The Six Woes of Isaiah: Woe #4 – Perverting Moral Distinction

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! –Isaiah 5:20.

An obvious sequel to the flaunting of sin, or possibly the reason there can be the flaunting of sin, is that somewhere along the line, there has been a perversion of moral distinction or what is right and wrong. What we are experiencing in our nation is moral relativism.

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

The term ‘moral relativism’ is understood in a variety of ways. Most often it is associated with an empirical thesis that there are deep and widespread moral disagreements and a metaethical thesis that the truth or justification of moral judgments is not absolute, but relative to some group of persons. Sometimes ‘moral relativism’ is connected with a normative position about how we ought to think about or act towards those with whom we morally disagree, most commonly that we should tolerate them. (Emphasis mine.)

At it’s most basic form, moral relativism holds that there are no absolutes when it comes to morality and that whatever  you believe is truth to you. In other words, “you have your truths, and I have mine.” What’s the natural outflow of that? You do whatever feels right to you! Taken to the extreme, you are your own god!

These are lies.

He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous, both of them alike are an abomination to the Lord. –Proverbs 17:15.

Jesus also had something to say about this. Jesus talked about the root issue:

“The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” –Matthew 6:22-23.

Friend there are absolutes in this world and they are found in the Bible, the Word of God. The thinking behind this perversion of good and evil, light and darkness, sweet and bitter are from the devil, the father of lies. From the beginning he was behind this type of thinking!

In the Garden of Eden, God gave moral absolutes to Adam and Eve. God told them that the day that ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would die. So what happened?

The serpent said to the woman, “You surely shall not die! For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” –Genesis 3:4.

Satan lied to Eve. He directly opposed God’s commandment! And so it is with America today: homosexuality is “out of closet” and has become a government-protected relationship. Gay marriage is no longer shocking and is slowly gaining support and acceptance. Those that would oppose it are called hate-mongers and prejudiced.

God and prayer are outlawed in schools! You cannot start the day with prayer in the public school because of “separation of church and state.” Revisionist history pervades our classrooms. There are loud voices who would deny that America was founded upon Christian beliefs and values.

Thomas Jefferson said:

“God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever.”

Jefferson must be turning over in his grave right about now if he could see what has become of the country he helped to found. I believe he would be shocked at how we have perverted the foundation that he and his fellow Founding Fathers established.

The solution is for America to repent! We must all repent of the sin in our lives and give our lives to Christ!

What’s next?

Next time we will look at the fifth woe of Isaiah: the conceited.

May He Increase!