On the heels of being told (see previous blog) that Streamside has a solid prophetic aspect to its warning about ignoring the perfect unity Jesus prayed for and commanded us to obey, I found myself quite by “coincidence” immersed in reading about the travails of Israel in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Lamentations and in parallel with the travails of the early church with “teachers” who disavowed the true humanity of Jesus in 1, 2 and 3 John.
First I was reading about God’s judgment for disobeying His commandments, and then I was reading how Jesus trumped those commandments with His new one – to love God with all our hearts, soul, mind, and strength; and to love one another unconditionally as He has loved us.
I found myself reading about how no one ever imagined that Assyria could completely occupy Jerusalem and that the invader commissioned by God as punishment would suddenly appear in the north. And that God would not stop with military annihilation, but He would add a horrible plague.
In the last 48 hours, Ebola arrived in New York City and terrorists attacked our neighbor and ally to the north!
And suddenly, God has shown me a stunning pattern, straight from the Bible:
- Israel – Old Testament
- God chose Israel as his children
- God commanded them to obey
- They split in disunity between Israel and Judah
- They disobeyed God’s commands over and over
- God severely punished his children, but never stopped loving them
- God promised redemption and future glory
- Christian believers – New Testament
- God chose us as his children, grafting us into the vine with Israel’s messiah
- God commanded us obey his new commandment
- We split the Church in disunity between Catholic and Protestant
- We have disobeyed God’s new commandment over and over to this day
- Is the day of our punishment at hand?
- God promises redemption and future glory
Call it a hypothesis, worthy of critical examination.
But also call it a stark warning.
I believe Streamside has now been called to warn the Church of Jesus Christ to humble itself, pray, seek the Lord’s face, and turn from our wickedness of disunity before it is too late (2 Chronicles 7:14).
As ominous as it sounds if it is already too late, this is actually a glorious invitation for peace through perfect unity. God is not pleased with us any more than He was with Israel. But we can change that.
Surely, for such a day as this, in this era of global connectivity, we can mold true unity through unconditional love for each other – both Christians and Jews.
Come back next time and let’s explore some obvious objections to this hypothesis further.