FROM YOUR PASTOR’S DESK:
WHO SHALL NOT RECEIVE THE SEAL (or MarK) OF GOD?
Please first read and review Ezekiel 9 : 1- 11, KJV.
“The class who do not feel GRIEVED over their OWN spiritual declension, nor MOURN over the sins of others, will be left WITHOUT THE SEAL OF GOD. The Lord commissions His messengers [destroying angels, not human agencies], the men with slaughtering weapons in their hands: [Eze. 9: 4-6 quoted; read it please for yourselves!].
“Here we see that the CHURCH—The Lord’s sanctuary— was the FIRST to suffer the stroke of the wrath of God. The ‘ancient men,’ those to whom God had given great light, and who had stood as guardians of the spiritual interests of the people, had BETRAYED their trust. [Judas was among the first Twelve disciples!].
They had taken the position that we need not look for MIRACLES and the MARKED manifestations of God’s power as in FORMER days. ‘Time have changed.’ These words strengthen their UNBELIEF, and they say, ‘The Lord will not do good, neither will He do evil. He is TOO MERCIFUL to visit His people in JUDGMENT.
“Thus ‘Peace and safety’ [1 Thess. 5:3] is the cry from men who will NEVER AGAIN lift up their voices like a trumpet [in reproofs and warnings] to ‘show God’s people their transgressions and the house of Jacob their sins.’ [Isa. 58:1]. These ‘DUMB DOGS that do not bark’ [Isa. 56: 10, 11]] are the ones who feel the JUST VENGEANCE of an OFFENDED God. Men, women, maidens, and little children all PERISH together’ [Eze. 9: 5,6].” Vol. 5 Testimonies for the Church, p. 211.
I am daily striving and struggling by God’s abounding grace through prayer and study to remain faithful in “giving the “trumpets” of the three angels messages a “certain (with certainty) sound,” to be a “faithful watchman on the wall,” to “cry aloud and spare not and show God’s people their sins and the house of Jacob their transgressions,” and “examining and proving myself daily whether I am really “contending for the faith once delivered to the saints” which today is the present, sealing truths—-all because I love God, His immutable law which is the transcript of His character, and “the truth as it is in Jesus.”
This is the only way I can hope to receive the “mark” or “seal of God in the forehead” revealed Ezekiel in the Old and John in the Revelation. This is also the only way I can avoid being called by a just, righteous, and offended God “a blind, ignorant watchman, a dumb dog that cannot bark, sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber,” Isa. 56: 10, 11].
I can yield to the temptation to indulge “false charity” and fail to “call sin by its right name,” and make people “feel good.” But I choose to heed all the warnings against all undershepherds, including these: “When they shall say, Peace and safety; then SUDDEN destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall NOT ESCAPE.” 1 Thess. 5: 3.
And this: “When I [God] says unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou giveth him not warning, not speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, TO SAVE HIS LIFE, the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity: BUT HIS BLOOD WILL I REQUIRE AT THINE HAND.” Eze. 3: 18 (see verses 17-21).
This is what is also meant by “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is God who works in you both to will and to do His good pleasure.”
(To be continued). Bless all, NMF
