King James Version, with Nii Okai's journal notes · 2 notes
1Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear:
Remember when we were kids and you did something really naughty and, say, Dad was angry 😡.
You were expected, and knew you had to make amends and apologize. You couldn't just walk back and pretend nothing happened and expect your favorite toy and game to be given you.
Many times we do what is wrong, our conscience pricks us, but we pretend nothing has happened and we go on living our lives, instead of repenting and coming back to God our Father so our relationship is restored.
Sin separates us from God.
There's a flip side to it.
2But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.
3For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness.
4None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity.
5They hatch cockatrice’ eggs, and weave the spider’s web: he that eateth of their eggs dieth, and that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper.
6Their webs shall not become garments, neither shall they cover themselves with their works: their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands.
7Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and destruction are in their paths.
8The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their goings: they have made them crooked paths: whosoever goeth therein shall not know peace.
9Therefore is judgment far from us, neither doth justice overtake us: we wait for light, but behold obscurity; for brightness, but we walk in darkness.
10We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes: we stumble at noonday as in the night; we are in desolate places as dead men.
11We roar all like bears, and mourn sore like doves: we look for judgment, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far off from us.
12For our transgressions are multiplied before thee, and our sins testify against us: for our transgressions are with us; and as for our iniquities, we know them;
13In transgressing and lying against the LORD, and departing away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.
14And judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter.
15Yea, truth faileth; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.
Is this so much like our time, where he who walks upright becomes the target and the prey?
As I look at the ills of Israel at this point in their history, I ask myself, why does God continue on with them?
It is because he has a covenant with Abraham. Looking at his love and dealings with Israel as compared to other nations, it seems unfair.
And the demands of justice can be raised against God for his unjust love for Israel, but then God can reference them to their source, Abraham, who literally endured injustice for God and gave his all, including his posterity, to the Lord.
Since Abraham did this, it was no longer unjust for God to constantly keep his eye on them and bring them back to himself when they repent.
It is the same demands of love and justice that Christ Jesus met on his cross, that through his blood we continue to be forgiven of our sins.
Of course, it doesn't mean we can do what we want, because if we do we will be punished and reap the consequences; just that when we repent, we are restored.
But why choose such a hard path of suffering, only to repent, when one can be in constant peace with the Lord?
16And he saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor: therefore his arm brought salvation unto him; and his righteousness, it sustained him.
17For he put on righteousness as a breastplate, and an helmet of salvation upon his head; and he put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloke.
18According to their deeds, accordingly he will repay, fury to his adversaries, recompence to his enemies; to the islands he will repay recompence.
19So shall they fear the name of the LORD from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the LORD shall lift up a standard against him.
20And the Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob, saith the LORD.
21As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the LORD; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed’s seed, saith the LORD, from henceforth and for ever.