{"id":5967,"date":"2023-11-04T17:47:50","date_gmt":"2023-11-04T22:47:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/?p=5967"},"modified":"2023-12-15T13:39:46","modified_gmt":"2023-12-15T19:39:46","slug":"america-america-god-shed-his-grace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/?p=5967","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;AMERICA, AMERICA, GOD SHED HIS GRACE . . .&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>America has indisputably been blessed by God because America had God&#8217;s Foundation on God&#8217;s Word, even before the Revolution, and we called upon Him throughout our history.<br>American Exceptionalism, on display for all human history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>IN GOD WE TRUSTED<br>GOD BLESSED AMERICA<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As I was reading the Bible chapters for the previous article, SO YOU WISH THE WORLD WAS DIFFERENT, I was particularly caught by Ezekiel 20.<br>It is different from the chapter before and after chapter 20.<br>It is straightforward and clear to follow, as it reviews God&#8217;s perspective on leading the people of Israel.<br>And it struck me so black and white, thinking about America as I read how God dealt with Israel so severely, because He cared for them so deeply.<br>He would not let them go, even when they turned from worshipping Him.<br>He <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">had<\/span> to turn them back, to bring them back, for the sake of His Name, because He had broadcast to the world that Israel was His &#8220;chosen&#8221; of all people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There may not be a Biblical record of America being similarly chosen by God of all nations, but there is abundant circumstantial evidence of His hand in the affairs of this country from day one.<br>For starters, our founding documents were inspired and written by people anointed by God with Bible principles for governing by the people, that go back long before the Declaration.<br>This had never been done before.<br>Others have eloquently reviewed hundreds of details in the rest of the American story, that have God&#8217;s handprint.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My question here is this:<br>After all God has done for this country, and through this country, I don&#8217;t know if God feels obligated to send what it takes that will turn us around and bring us back to Him in true repentance, like He always did for Israel ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then . . . He caused Israel to &#8216;disappear&#8217; after nearly four millennia, and now . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He may, He can, cause America to disappear after nearly four centuries.<br>He is obligated to do something&#8212;judgment&#8212;serious, swift, complete, undeniable, unavoidable judgment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Can God be influenced in any way at this late hour ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For sure, we cannot expect another reprieve&#8212;like 2016-2020, which was an answer to many prayers&#8212;without a fundamental change in America to God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Back to a similar time in history, God said He would have spared Sodom for a few righteous&#8212;50, 40, 30, 20, 10&#8212;3 was not enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In America today, I&#8217;m afraid we have a mistaken notion of what it means to be righteous, one of the remnant, those Jesus knows, His people, humble, praying, seeking His <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">face<\/span>, seeing our specific wickedness to get rid of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We get used to Bible verses on sin and repentance and teaching on them, and we think we satisfied them.<br>But we expect to avoid anyone that gets personal about my sin and points a finger in my face and says, &#8220;You&#8217;re the man.&#8221;<br>Daddy did that, and people did not want to hear it, and preachers hated him, and wanted him gone, and one called on God to kill him.<br>It cost Daddy to speak against evil in the church, in Christians, repeating Jesus&#8217; words.<br>It cost John the Baptist to confront the Jewish King Herod for his sexual sin, telling him it was unlawful.<br>It cost Dietrich Bonhoeffer to confront the church that condoned Hitler, finally getting caught plotting to kill Hitler.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When evil gets bad enough close to home, pacifists become activists.<br>When sin slaps us in the face, we say something (or do we?).<br>When Jesus&#8217; words convict us, we stop laying up treasures on earth (or do we?).<br>When Jesus tells us to get rid of our stuff&#8212;because that&#8217;s where our heart is&#8212;in order to follow Him, do we ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Living too long accustomed to the good things Sodom had to offer, Lot&#8217;s wife&#8217;s heart was there.<br>Even after God sent His angels for escape, she had to &#8216;just look&#8217; at what she had to leave behind.<br>The cost was too great for her to leave it all, and it cost her EVERYTHING.<br>What is the cost to American Christians of what God is calling us to leave behind now ?<br>What greater cost when we just can&#8217;t do it ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Do we think we can continue with all the good things we have going, in each of our lives, and still follow Jesus with our whole heart ?<br>Sounds like the deadly rationale of Lot and his family in Sodom.<br>They chose to live there, and they lived well there&#8212;too well, too comfortable.<br>We are living in Sodom&#8212;times ten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8211; &#8211; &#8211;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Something has got to register.<br>WE&#8217;VE GOT TO BE DIFFERENT&#8212;DRASTICALLY DIFFERENT !<br>OR ELSE ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God may not save America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">will<\/span> judge America, severely, now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">will<\/span> judge His people in America, for &#8220;anyone loving the things of this world, the love of the Father is not in him.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>America has indisputably been blessed by God because America had God&#8217;s Foundation on God&#8217;s Word, even before the Revolution, and we called upon Him throughout our history.American Exceptionalism, on display for all human history. IN GOD WE TRUSTEDGOD BLESSED AMERICA As I was reading the Bible chapters for the previous article, SO YOU WISH THE [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,2,4,9,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-educational","category-faith_based","category-financial","category-political-cultural","category-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5967"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5967"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6082,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5967\/revisions\/6082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.awordforthought.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}