Isaiah's vision about what would happen to Judah and Jerusalem really is a case against his children. God tells Judah and Jerusalem to learn to do good, seek justice, punish those who hurt others, help the orphans, stand up for the right of widows (Isaiah 1:17). Also still good advice for us today, wouldn’t you say? A few more questions.: Do you think the world today follows this advice? Do you think the United States follows this advice? Do you follow God’s advice? Do you like what is going on in this country, or are you complacent, not wanting to be involved, just happy with our own little part of the world? Isaiah says in (verse 18) “The Lord says: “Come let us talk about these things. Though your sins are like scarlet, they can be as white as snow. Though your sins are deep red, they can be white like wool.” We do not often think of inaction as a sin. I wonder what God thinks?
In the 19th verse the Lord says: “If you become willing and obey me, you will eat good crops from the land.” Do you believe the Lord still talks to us? What do you think he would say to you, to the United States , to the world today? Most of us in the United States do not have to worry about food, but we still say “Give us this day our daily bread,” when we say the Lords prayer.
I have always thought that God has a plan for my life, I’m not sure I always listen to him when he speaks to me, and I am sure there are many in this world that do not ask. It is so easy to just live our life day by day without thinking about what God wants. Even if we do go to Sunday school and church we are not often taken out of our comfort zone. We may go to Common Ground on Thursday nights, which can take us out of that zone, but for the rest of the week are we aware of the needs of those less fortunate then us?
Do you think that God just wants us to worship him on Sunday morning, maybe read our Bibles occasionally during the week, but forget about the 137 or so street people who have come through our doors on a Thursday night How about the other hungry people in the world? I’m grateful to the members of our church who do work on the homes destroyed by hurricane Katrina, for the youth who go on mission trips, for those who help support these endeavors with money when they are physically unable to do the work.
My dad died in 1976 and in 1978 Gene Hoak was instrumental in the E. T. Jones Bible Class publishing a booklet of several of dad’s poems.. Among them the following:
THE VOLUME YOUR BEING WRITES
What volumes do your words of mouth – your deeds’
Reveal. How well they show just what you are
Because you make your own the best of creeds
To whch the hearts of men have clung thus far.
I read it from your eyes, your lips – your mein,
As much as from the things you do or say.
Your tiniest, fleeting smile’s a pictured scene
O kindly acts you’ve done along life’s way.
Yet does your retrospection find them not;
And well enough, for all unconscious acts
Blend with one’s being: are moreover, wrought
Into the texture of eternal facts
And these eternal facts show forth the you
Of yesterday – today – tomorrow, too.
Percy Peek
Yesterday is gone as is today. But what will you do with tomorrow?
Gloria Peek
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