Live By Faith...Not By Fear

Jeremiah 39:16-17 -   "Go and tell Ebed-Melech the Cushite, 'This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: I am about to fulfill my words against this city through disaster, not prosperity. At that time they will be fulfilled before your eyes.  But I will rescue you on that day, declares the LORD; you will not be handed over to those you fear.

 

The prophecy of God came full circle and the city wall was breeched.  The city was destroyed…and the king was made to watch all his family die.  Then they blinded him and carried him away to be held captive in Babylon. God saved Jeremiah by having the Babylonian king put a protective order over him…as Jeremiah carried one last message to the Ethiopian who had saved his life.

 

Jeremiah…who lived a life of persecution and much trouble….was saved by his great faith and obedience to what God told him to do. He was allowed to live out the remainder of his life with the few poor Jews that had been left in Juda to farm the land for the king. The richest were all carried away to Babylon….a sort of poetic justice.

 

The king was destroyed by his own fear. He let fear so consume his heart that he never once considered that Jeremiah’s words from God could save him. In fact…he did everything he could to disprove them. His end happened exactly the way God had said it would…oh how he must have wondered how different it would have been if he had listened before it as too late.

 

Many of God’s hardest prophecies have yet to come.  The end of the world as we know it is closer than it has ever been. Those of us…that allow fear to drive our actions….will find those fears playing out even worse than we imagined them.  Those of us that choose to live by faith…and stand strong as Jeremiah did…will eventually be saved by our obedience to God. It won’t always be easy…but it will pay off in the end. 

 

Father…thank you for the reminder that you have made a way for me to escape the darkest hours of the world. It will get worse before God lets his plan to completely end evil come full circle. Forgive me for the times that I have let fear overcome my heart and let it prevent me from doing what you needed me to do. Help me to live more by the faith you planted in my heart when you saved me….let it grow and take over when life gets rough and threatens my faith in you. Amen.