A wise man was out walking, and he saw a lovely baby in a pram full of life,and the wise man said,'but this child shall die.As he walked on he saw a young lad came skipping along,full of the joys of spring,and the wise said ,'he also shall die. As he continued his walk he observed coming out a church,a young couple that had just got married,and he thought about their future,getting a home,having children,and many other things,and then he said ,'they also shall die'.As he walked along he met an old man whom he spoke to,the old man shared many things with him,his past joys ,and even his hope for the future,and as the wise man walked away from him,he thought,'he also shall die'.Why does this world have such a stench of death about it,we are reminded of this in many ways in the continual wars that are raging,and the dreadful natural disasters..It was Martyn Lloyd Jones, who wrote, 'from the moment we are born ,we are dying'. He also said,''that all the trouble in the world today is due to the fact that man is not right with God.'This is because sin has entered into the world ,and the moment it came death became a reality.(Genesis 2 v17/ Romans 5 v12.),Yes the grim fact is this we all shall die,but there is hope,for our lovely Saviour Jesus died that even though we die we shall live (John 11 v25).Through Him sin can be forgiven ,and a new life will be granted to all who trust Him as one's Saviour.
In a recent sermon I preached on prayer I finished by reading a lovely hymn, by James Montgomery ,I leave it with you.
'Prayer is the soul'sincere desire,uttered or unexpressed,
The motion of a hidden fire,that trembles in the breast.
Prayer is the burden of a sigh,the falling of a tear,
The upward glancing of an eye,when none but God is near.
Prayer is the simplest form of speech,that infant lips can try;
Prayer the sublimest strains that reach,the Majesty on high.
Prayer is the christian's vital breath,the christian's native air,
His watchword at the gate of death,he enters heaven with prayer.
Prayer is the contrite sinners voice,returning from his way;
While angels in their songs rejoice, and cry,Behold he prays!
O Thou by whom we come to God, the Life,the Truth,the Way!
The path of prayer Thyself hast trod; Lord teach us how to pray!
Last time we mention Nineveh ,and that God was going to judge them,for their wickedness, they conquered many nations among them the northern kingdom Israel.This had been a judgement on the northern kingdom of Israel for their sinfulness.But as Gordon Brown writes,' God uses Assyria to discipline Israel but she exceeded the mandate God gave her and acted with greed and arrogance'. The fact is they were an exceeding cruel people showing no mercy on those they conquered, a Julia Woods writes about an Assyrian relief showing,'bodies impaled on sticks,tongues being cut out,people being led out by lip rings,heads being piled up,dismembered bodies with scattered limbs and severed heads serving as ornamental decorations on walls and structures and totem poles made of human heads'. One Assyrian king boasted,'3000 captives I burned with fire....from some I cut off their hands and their fingers.from others I cut of their noses,their ears and their fingers. of many I put out their eyes'. They were also involved in witchcraft and the occult, all of these these things made them ripe for judgement. Julia Woods further comments,'Atrocities committed in the name of a nation appears to bring judgement on the whole nation'.The more I read history the more convinced I am of mankind's fallen nature,and the more convinced I am, of mankind's need of a Saviour called Jesus.
Assyria was a very powerful nation,their capital was Nineveh , most Christians know the story of the reluctant prophet Jonah whom God sent to Nineveh to warn them, that judgement was coming because of their great wickedness. The result was they believed the prophet,and turned from their sinful ways and sought God's forgiveness,and God forgave ,and did not judge them.But sad to say that didn't last for long instead of things getting better things got worse.God raised up another prophet,who proclaimed ,that judgement was coming,his name was Nahum.As one writer declares,' For perhaps a hundred or more years God had continued to be patient,to no avail,again the historians tells us ,' Nineveh has been called 'the concentrated centre of evil in the ancient world'.It is Gordon Bridger who writes ,'If we persist in rejecting God and His Word,He gives us over to sin and judgement.' He further says,God is very patient. Justice will be done,and reminds us
'Tho' the mills of God grind slowly
Yet they grind exceeding small'
A writer in a national newspaper wrote,' Eugenics was invented by a certain kind of person,solid in their belief that they were superior,to describe other people they thought to be unfit,badly raised, inclined towards feral immorality or just from bad stock'. She further comments,' The birth control pioneer Marie Stopes was partly inspired by her desire to prevent ''reckless breeding'' from the ''worst end'' of the social scale. And then of course ,there were the Nazis'. There will always be people who think they are better than others,today in schools, some children will be made feel they are inferior to others. As one looks at history we see it magnified to a fearful scale,and so it will continue,for we humans are so often given over to pride, which drives us to look down on others.It is all very flawed and deeply sinful, the fact is God loves everybody,that means everybody,He puts no one down on account of any deformity, colour ,status, nationality,He loves everyone.He loves everyone so much that He give His only begotten Son,that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. (John 3 v16)
