Consequences

Tonight, and the last few nights as I've lain in my bed I have been thinking about one word. Consequences. The dictionary defines the word as thus: 1.)The effect, result, or outcome of something occurring earlier: The accident was the consequence of reckless driving. Generally speaking we as Americans, think of the word consequence along the same lines as a punishment. But, I daresay, that I could not find an instance in which the word consequence was paralleled to punishment. A consequence is simply the result of an action. For example, if I were to touch a hot stove and burn my hand, is the stove punishing me? No of course not. It is simply the consequence of touching a hot stove. Or earlier today, I was using my pocket knife in a manner that it was not designed for and I cut myself quite badly. Was my pocket knife punishing me? Of course not! I was being foolish, and as a result I was injured. It was a consequence to my personal actions. Let’s continue on this line but move to the perspective of a Biblical character. In 2nd Kings 22 we come across a boy king named Josiah. Josiah’s predecessors had all been wicked men, who did wicked things, and as a result the book of the law had been lost and forgotten. 18 years after Josiah assumed the throne, the book of the law was found. Josiah, after hearing what it said, realized that not only he, but the entire nation had become guilty of sinning against God in grievous ways. So Josiah ordered that the kingdom immediately return to God, and obey all the commands found in the book of the law. Josiah even went on a rampage across the land, destroying all pagan symbols, and outlawing pagan rituals. A great revival spread throughout the entire land. Many people turned back to God. But, prophets began to arise, including Jeremiah, who foretold that Israel was to be destroyed. You see even though the nation had renounced its ways, and turned back to God, there was still a price to be paid. Now, we look at that and say that God is punishing them. I say no, he is not. You see God is a holy and just God. His actions are simply the consequence to foolish sinful decisions. We want to blame God for bad things, when truly we are the ones to blame. It is really our fault. How else should we expect God to react to sin? And that is exactly what Israel had done, sin. They turned their back on God and his word, and the consequence was that God would do the same in return. Please do not take this to any extremes, I am not saying that God is simply reacting to us, or that he is incapable of merciful decisions, or any nonsense like that. What I am saying though, is that we must keep in mind that we are to be held accountable for our decisions. God did not relish or enjoy what had to be done to Israel, but their sinful actions had consequences that had to happen. If the stove didn’t burn us every time we touched it we might think we were safe to do it twice. If the knife didn’t cut me, I might use it in that manner again, or encourage someone else to do likewise, thus causing pain to another person. There are consequences to our foolish decisions. Why is this relevant? Because, I am struggling with the upcoming election, each way I look I see evil. How can I in good conscience vote for the lesser evil, it is still evil! Part of me has begun to wonder how much we have become not like Josiah, but one of his predecessors. We are turning away from God as a country; we are losing our children, to pagan beliefs, whether it is evolution, mormonism or simple agnosticism. What kind of future will my beautiful son have? Am I still proud to be an American? Will my son be proud of the country he is being raised in? Have we incurred God’s wrath? Have we gone too far? Will my children, my grandchildren feel the result of where we have gone? You see I believe that we have become too lazy. We have been fighting the wrong battles. We have been too concerned with things like, evolution, pornography, gay marriage, and abortion. I’m not saying those things are ok, but they are simply side issues to the greater problem, we have lost the authority of scripture. We have abused, misused and undermined the word of God. There was a time in this country when a verse from the Bible would bring immediate repentance to ones actions. Now it is scoffed at and spat upon. We have made Jesus this wimpy savior who came just to love everybody, and never call out sin. We skip the verses where Jesus flips over tables, and Paul orders non-compliant sinners to be removed from the church. We re-interpret entire chapters simply so we can insert millions of years to appease almighty science. You see the real issues aren’t what we see on the cover of the magazine or in the news. The real issue is we have allowed to word of God to become watered down and politically correct. Well guess what Jesus was offensive in his time, and he is offensive now. My fellow countrymen, have we gone too far? Will a simple revival solve this nation’s problem? Even if a Josiah were to rise up now and cast down evil and set God back upon the throne of this country, would it be too late? You see there are consequences to what we have allowed to happen in our country, by our own inaction. Once again, please do not take what I am saying here to the extreme. I am not saying that we are Israel, and that the Abrahamic Covenant now applies to us. But James 1:17 causes me to pause and wonder what will become of us. “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” (Emphasis added). Our heavenly Father is unchanging. What does that mean for us and for our ancestors? So someday if my son, grandson, great grandson and so on see this, know that I am sorry for my part in what has happened to this country, for we have gone astray from our guiding principles, we have gotten lost in the fog.