Running With The Horses, Part 1
So many times we bring our anxieties and concerns before God because we live in a time of uncertainty. In fact, I guess there has never been a time of certainty, because we do not know the future. But we see Jeremiah coming before God with a question that has been echoed all through time: “Why does the way of the wicked prosper?”
We want to take a closer look at this passage in Jeremiah 12:1-4: “Righteous are you, O Lord, when I complain to you; yet I would plead my case before you. Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all who are treacherous thrive? You plant them, and they take root; they grow and produce fruit; you are near in their mouth and far from their heart. But you, O Lord, know me; you see me, and test my heart toward you. Pull them out like sheep for the slaughter, and set them apart for the day of slaughter. How long will the land mourn and the grass of every field wither? For the evil of those who dwell in it the beasts and the birds are swept away, because they said, ‘He will not see our latter end.’”
God answers Jeremiah with this answer in verse 5: “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?” Jeremiah had a very good question for the Lord. I guess it could be a question for every generation.
We want to look at God’s response, not in Jeremiah’s day, but in our day. How does God’s response pertain to us today? The Bible speaks a lot to us about the perilous times. We have seen many wars over the years and nations who have treated their people unjustly. Since Israel became a nation and the Jewish people have returned to their homeland, along with the whole world now connected in every way, we have everything aligned for the New One World and the Anti- christ. We know with the coming of the end times that darkness is going to overcome the light.
Paul tells Timothy this in 2 Timothy 3:1-5, “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.”
We see here that there is coming a time of lawlessness to prepare for the man of lawlessness. Isaiah 5:20 tells us this: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” Today we are seeing just that, a time when you cannot reason with anyone, because when people believe that good is evil and evil is good then we have lost all reason, lies become the norm, darkness becomes light and the foundation of all things fall apart.
Let’s look at God’s response to Jeremiah. God tells Him, “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?” We see that God was saying to him, and to paraphrase it, “If you can’t handle it when times are still fairly good, how will you handle it when times get really bad?”
So let’s now look at these horses that we are going to have to run with.
Revelation 6:1-2 tells us, “I watched as the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals. Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, ‘Come!’ I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest.”
This is not the return of the Messiah. This is the Spirit of Antichrist. He is a deceiver and a liar trying to get God’s people to fall. 2 Thessalonians 2:1-4 tells us, “Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Messiah Yeshua and our gathering together to Him, we ask you, not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of Messiah had come. Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.”
1 John 2:18 says this, “Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour.”
1 John 4:1-3 tells us, “ Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Yeshua Messiah has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.”
In the end times the one world religion will be Humanism. Humanism denies the existence of the one true God and His Messiah. It says that we are all gods. It denies the commandments of God because it is a lawless religion.
Revelation 12:17, “So the dragon was enraged with the woman, and went off to make war with the rest of her children, who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Yeshua.”
Today we have seen a significant drop in church attendance and as time goes on, we will see droves of people leaving behind their beliefs. Our youth have fallen away greatly. Fewer and fewer people are becoming ministers of the Word. People do not believe that the Ten Commandments are relevant in today’s society. Words like sin, judgement, and blood have been removed because our Gospel message today is a message that is seeker friendly. Our churches must not look like a church or act like a church or even sound like a church. Yes, the spirit of antichrist is riding throughout the world seeking whom he may conquer.
So the question is now to us, “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?”
Hebrews 12:1-2 says this, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Yeshua the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”
2 Peter 1:1-11 tells us this, “Peter, a servant and an apostle of Messiah Yeshua, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Messiah Yeshua. Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Yeshua our Lord, according as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that has called us to glory and virtue: whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these you might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that you shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Messiah Yeshua. But he that lacks these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and has forgotten that he was purged from his old sins. Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if you do these things, you shall never fall: for so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Messiah Yeshua.”
And finally 2 Corinthians 13:5 tells us, “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Messiah Yeshua is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”
It’s time to draw closer to God so that you will be an overcomer.
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