Don't Mess With My Kids!

God is a very protective parent and when someone messes with His kids, in this case the Israelites, He doesn't ignore it. In the shortest book of the Old Testament (21 verses), Obadiah warns the nation of Edom of its upcoming destruction because of the way they have treated Israel.

As descendants of Esau, the Edomites are blood relatives of Israel, and of all people should have been the ones to rush to the aid of Israel's problems. Instead they participated in the attacks, looted their land and captured fugitives for the enemy! They will soon learn that an enemy of Israel is an enemy of God. Because of Edom's indifference, defiance of God, their cowardice and pride toward their blood brothers in Israel, Obadiah gives them God's message of upcoming disaster!

I found an article from Bible.org that I'd like to share with you. It looks at some personal application we can make from this short, but powerful book of Obadiah.

1) Pride deceives and leads to more sin. How true! When we think we're "getting away" with sin, we are deceived and challenged to do more dangerous things.

2) Sin follows a downward path. Our sins progress starting with complacency, then promotion, then finally participation. You've heard of the slippery slope?

3) God will keep His word. God is faithful! Obadiah said Edom's judgment would be complete and in fact it was! The entire nation of Edom, and its people, were destroyed forever.

4) God will punish sin. God sees who is mistreating His children and will judge them accordingly. It shows us that God is in control and will punish sin in His own way and in His perfect timing. This is important for us to know and believe when we face tough times.

5) God will protect His own. God is good and love us. He will care and protect us from our enemies.

These last two ideas that God is in control and that God is good are extremely important to living the Christian life. There principles are often repeated throughout the entire Bible. Unfortunately for us, we want to be in control! We want God's blessing, but we want to call the shots as well. We sometimes struggle with believing God can and will take care of us, so we take matters into our own hands and we find ourselves living points 1 & 2 - deceived by pride and following sin down a destructive path!

God is good all the time - all the time, God is good! So when we face difficulties, it doesn't mean God is not there or that He doesn't love us. The difficulties are for our own character and spiritual development. We can get through the tough times if we believe in God's goodness and faithfulness.

Prophecy, as in Obadiah, is not just gee whiz information for our heads so we can know what God did and will do in the going to preserve His people!

* Bible.org/ Hampton Keathley IV

BLOG COMMENT: Have you ever tried to take control out of God's hands and into your own? What were the results?