As we start the year 2009, it is good to think about our great God especially what He has done. Our God has created all things we see and enjoy. He has made you and me in His image. He has designed our universe including our temporary place of abode-Earth. He has put in it all the living creatures He made. So there is much waste to try to find some form of life elsewhere. Such activity merely shows rejection of His revelation.
Filipinos are degenerating in appreciation of God’s works. We are gradually setting aside the traditional view, which is essentially right, of the truth of the divine creation of the universe and humankind. We do this by allowing the error of humanity that espouses man-made theory of origins to exist side by side with the long established truth. This attitude is not high scholarship, but blatant rebellion to the truth of creation. Humanity evasively declares reliance on scientific truth as he can not contain the conscience-pricking creation truth.
There is now a growing voice to absolutely remove from any science literature the creation truth. What are we going to do if this becomes legal locally? Then, we must imitate our Baptist forefathers’ methodology. They, for centuries, survived in the caves and mountains to escape the prosecuting ire of both the state and the Romanist church. The only legitimate course of action after evasion is to resort to a clandestine manner of existence. It may be hard but history is on our side. Scriptures is also on our side as the winning position. They can not fully eradicate our belief and behavior. Someone somewhere will always grasp this longing for truth and take it until the last breath.
For now, we see the terrible repugnance of Filipinos towards God’s works. They show distaste to the perfections of divine workings. More errors are promoted even by the religionists. Not behind are the false teachers in the garb of dominant Romanists, the cultists, and the deceived Charismatics. They promote ecumenism and boastfully call it divine workings. They spend much on these activities rather than on scripturally mandated efforts. You see, these groups spend millions of pesos in order to launch political and religious fun fares in the name of watchfulness. They do not bear the name of true God, neither do they promote the workings of God nor are they instruments of God’s works.
Moses wrote a song to show the faithfulness of God (of Israel) and disclose the corruption of the people of Israel. In his description of God’s faithfulness, he will teach us that God’s work is perfect. In contrast to this, man’s achievement is full of corruption. Israel will apostatize in the midst of her material prosperity. She will depart from God’s standards. Perhaps Israel would have been better if she remained poor and needy.
Moses described God as the Rock. He repeats this in verses 15, 18, 30, and 31. As such God is stable and permanent. He does not move or change. David, after experiencing victory over Saul and others, declared God as His rock in 2 Sam. 22:2-3. He learned God in the same way that Moses did. Further, David uttered the same truth in Psa. 18:2. So God’s work is indeed perfect as it needs no improvement. Why? For it is permanent and stable. Whatever God has made, that is perfect.
Did God make man? Did He make man and woman only? Or did He also make homosexuals? If God’s work is perfect then there is nothing that man can do (reinvent or revise) to improve the condition of man. Genesis 1:26-27 clearly provide answers to above queries. God hates homosexuality (practice and behavior) as it is a perversion, if not rebellion, to God’s standards. See how God acts towards this error of homosexuality in Romans 1:26-32.
To say that there is no God who made the universe including the earth is clear antagonism to God and His Holy Scriptures. It is an act of discriminating the centuries-old belief of humanity or, at least, of the Bible-believing Baptists. To make laws that outlaw such belief is pure authoritarianism and undemocratic legislation favoring only the elite, falsely so-called scholars who hide their religious convictions in the garb of science. To change our laws in order to favor those whom God has declared as in error is another evidence of instability. We can not take this error lightly and naively. We must equip our young ones to provide a defense in the future. We must enable them to provide a good fight in the near future. Retreat is not surrender. We must conserve our gains from depletion by the enemies.
So what God has made will never change. They are stable and permanent. His ways are free from imperfections. They are truthful, perfectly just (or equitable) and right (Psa. 33:4b). We must accept them by faith after discovering these truths from diligent study of the Holy Scriptures. We must replace the errors thrown upon us with these stable, equitable, and perfect truths. Our nation, just as others, will continue to deteriorate as a result of these changes in philosophy and practice. Filipinos are taking more powers into their hands to direct this nation. Anything they do not like is immediately aired in various avenues. Propaganda is employed. Followers are encouraged. Our sinful senses are the ultimate determinant of morality not anymore the stable and permanent truth derived from the Holy Scriptures.
Moses criticized Israel for her corruptions. See verses 5-7 for the basis. She was earlier warned about apostasy in the midst of prosperity. But she forgot the forewarnings and embraced the error. So Moses contrasted her with God. Israel did not bear any resemblance with her Father God’s attributes. Incidentally, note here how God expects Israel to resemble divine qualities in their conduct. What we learn from the God of Scriptures must be implemented in our lives for imitation. So we must make laws after His pattern for imitation.
Israel also disregarded God’s goodness as evident in His workings (Psa. 28:4-5). She did not make much of God’s deliverance from Egypt. This is a truth very much repeated in the whole OT Scriptures. Why? This is where God’s magnificence was seen by the whole world. Miracles occurred to favor Israel against another nation. Yet she easily undermined this. Beware of falling into similar trap as we recall our great salvation from the fires of hell when we trusted Christ as Savior.
Israel forgot who made her a nation. Verse 6 says, “Hath he not made thee, and established thee?” Here she neglected what God has done for her as a nation. God established her way back in Abraham. He can also unmake her as a nation. This is what He would do in the days of the divided kingdom of Israel (post-Solomonic period). How many nations lately realized that God who made them great as nations is now making them into miserable ones? Can this occur also to an individual believer? We see local churches that were once great and dedicated to God are no longer the same due to this sin.
Israel failed to realize that God alone made them strong and stable. See verse 12 for the basis. She relied upon the false gods of human wisdom and ingenuity. She gradually declined absolute dependence upon God and His revelations. As we experience knowledge advancement and economic prosperity we can rely upon these earthly strengths and decline to depend upon divine provisions especially His absolute power. Beware of this error as the fall of Israel may become ours, too. Let us not make idols out of knowledge, education, experience, and economic advancement. They are truly empty, for God alone is our sufficiency.
Both sinners and saints may keep rejecting the authority of God’s words upon their lives. They do this by charging the Holy Scriptures with irrelevancy and need for revision especially in matters of readability. We must strongly oppose these changes for they are inconsistent with what we learned from Moses’ declaration that God’s work is stable and permanent. And those who reject this truth will surely deteriorate to corruption. Amen!
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