The greatest commandment is Deut 6: 5- Love the LORD with all your heart, soul, mind, strength. Simply, whole heartedly. So I make it very clear, this is of course in Mth 22: 37. But for a moment, what many people, Christians do not understand is the difference between whole hearted and half-heartedly. What is the opposite of wholeheartedly? You might be surprised to learn it is half-heartedly. Not, no heartedly, but half-heartedly. For it is the same as no heart. Rev 3: 16- half way, of anything, is useless; spit you out of my mouth. Christians today, think half Jesus and half world- is ok. At least you have half a Jesus. Again, James 4: 4. You just cannot go both ways. And if you say I can….you do not realise, you are away from God. 2 Chron 25: 1-28 It is about a king of Jerusalem Amaziah from 25 to 55 years of age. verse 1-2 family and place. The next thing mentioned, and usually with all the kings, is the manner of how they walked with the LORD all their life. So, imagine what they (the LORD) will say about you….he did what was right, but not whole heartedly. What comes into your mind? To me, lukewarm. Half with God, half not. Or 1/10th with God, 90% not. Let us skip 29 years and see what happened at the end...verse 27 from turning away from the LORD...from that time….he died from turning away from the LORD. Simply put….lost forever. Idolatry. This is where we should take warning that a walk, away from the LORD, and the LORD ensures that we will die away from the LORD. He did not give Amaziah a chance to come back to him. This is where we learn, all that we do, does affect others’ lives, hopefully good, but it cannot save our souls. Our eternal destiny is not dependent on what we do, good works, and Amaziah has them too, but our eternal destiny is dependent on our walk with Jesus. If you remember anything from this message, I think that is the main thing to remember. It is not how you start your walk with Christ, it is how you finish your walk with God. verse 7 God always brings people across our path, to give us good Godly information. And in verses 7-8 Amaziah is warned, do not take these men to battle with you. They are from Israel, which is now pagan. Don’t join forces with pagans. The advice was- very simply- 2 Cor 6: 14. This was God’s warning always. From beginning to end Work, school, house;. Be very careful, as believers and unbelievers have different priorities. A believer’s priority should be God’s way. An unbeliever’s priority is the way of the world. Verse 9 Amaziah does have the world in him, and he is concerned of the money he has already paid out. The LORD can replace anything you have put in. Anything. You just do it the right way. Follow the instructions of God. Verse 15 God is angry. Many people make decisions, and you wonder, where is their common sense? They do things that are so wrong. You ask them; stop, reflect, and they tell you- you stop talking and stop correcting me verse 16. God is sending a warning. They walk away from the warning as they do not like to see/admit what they do, how they think, is not logical. Verse 16 it is clear to others what God is doing; but it is not clear to the person .From pride verse 16, next failure of Amaziah is arrogance. He thinks because he won the war in verses 13, that he will always win, so he challenges Israel. People do not understand, God lets you win, so that you lose. Verses 18-19 Amaziah is given a warning. Do not go into this battle. Yes, God won with a few- and now, Amaziah thinks he can win with a few. This is where we need to understand what the end game is. Verse 20 won’t listen. Verse 22 defeated. Verse 25 God does not pay back instantly. The bad one continues in life, and so people think they have the favour of God. How can we view Amaziah death? We need to understand that the OT does not go past the grave at all. The NT does. We could apply death as the judgement. We know death is due to sin. But there are also other reasons. 1 Cor 11: 30. Here people die, before their time, in a sense, to stop them committing more horrific or grievous sins against others. Sickness and death, can be early judgement/punishment. Or we could apply Rev 22: 14-15 Outside are the dogs. Amaziah rested = died. Rev 22 In idolatry, LoF. Simple verses like Mth 24: 13 are so important. Persevere to the end, you will be saved, for you do not know if you will die in your disobedience. Let us persevere in the LORD, to the end. What is past, is over. But what is important we turn back to the LORD Jesus before we die. Then onwards. But this verse, 1 Cor 11: 30 shows how some die, due to specific sins they are committing against God’s people. God is just.
MCC Admin
19 Sivan 5781