"What More Could God Do?" December 20 Readings: Zephaniah 1-2, Revelation 9, Psalm 144:12–15, Proverbs 31:3-4

 

 Through the Bible in 2021

Bible Readings: Zephaniah 1-2, Revelation 9, Psalm 144:12–15, Proverbs 31:3-4   

Daily Devotional:  What More Could God Do?

Seriously. What more could God do?

Since the beginning of time, since Adam and Eve took that fateful bite of that fruit and turned their backs on God and his ways, choosing sin instead of obedience, God has been at work to display his love and to draw people back to himself in grace. He gave a law to Moses, but before Moses came down off the mountain with the tablets the people had already put other gods before Yahweh. They broke the law before they had it. Israel's history is one of constant rebellion, judgment, restoration, and then renewed rebellion. God was faithful and loving but Israel continued in sin.

Then God sent his Son to a little village south of Jerusalem, born of peasants from Nazareth. He came to show the love of God and to be the sacrifice for sin - willingly giving himself on our behalf. It is the most amazing thing anyone has ever done. Having lived a perfect life Jesus gave himself to die for us. He took the judgment of our sins on his shoulders that we might be clothed in eternal righteousness. And yet, the vast majority of humans choose to reject Jesus and his gift and embrace the sin that damns them.

God gave a law and man broke it. God sent his son and man rejected him. What more could God do? Some might say that what God needed to do was to show just how awful sin is in his eyes. That is what the Tribulation period is about. Jesus, in Revelation 5, takes the scroll and begins to break the seals to reveal the judgment of God on the world. God hates sin. God makes it clear that he will not put up with humanity's wickedness. Does God's demonstration of wrath move mankind to repentance? No, no more than his amazing love did. Revelation 9:20-21 makes this clear

The rest of the people, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands to stop worshiping demons and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which cannot see, hear, or walk. And they did not repent of their murders, their sorceries, their sexual immorality, or their thefts.

They did not repent of their evil, their idolatry. They refused to acknowledge their sin before God. The problem is depravity, the utter sinfulness of the human heart. Our hearts are not only wicked but stubborn. We cherish the sin that destroys us.

It is sad. God cannot do more than he has done, than he is doing, to love us. He has shown infinite, unlimited love, and yet our hardened and sin-loving hearts reject him. This is true of the lost person you pray and grieve for. Pray that he or she will be softened by the Spirit, that God will till the soil in that person's heart to receive the word. But it is also true even in our redeemed hearts. We are far too susceptible to holding on to sin, to resisting repentance, and loving the sin that distances us from intimacy with God.

Father, may no sin harden my heart or drive a wedge between us. May your Spirit break down the walls in my heart to make me sensitive to you.

Consider God's Word:

Which of the readings spoke most powerfully to you today?
Is the Spirit of God moving you to repent of something you are doing, to begin something new, or to change something about your life as a result of your readings? What?

We are compelled and driven by the love of God, but it also behooves us to remember that God is a Holy God and that his wrath will fall on sinners.
How can the impending wrath of God motivate you to action in this sinful world?