ESOCS Devotional 5 February 2025 – Why God Allows Punishment
MEMORY VERSE: ““And it shall come to pass, when ye shall say, wherefore doeth the Lord our God all these things unto us? Then shall thou answer them: Like as ye have forsaken me, and served strange gods in your land, so shall ye serve strangers in a land that is not yours.” Jeremiah 5:19 KJV
TEXT: JEREMIAH 5:18-31
“Nevertheless in those days,” says the Lord, “I will not make a complete end of you. 19 And it will be when you say, ‘Why does the Lord our God do all these things to us?’ then you shall answer them, ‘Just as you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods in your land, so you shall serve aliens in a land that is not yours.’
20 “Declare this in the house of Jacob
And proclaim it in Judah, saying,
21 ‘Hear this now, O foolish people,
Without understanding,
Who have eyes and see not,
And who have ears and hear not:
22 Do you not fear Me?’ says the Lord.
‘Will you not tremble at My presence,
Who have placed the sand as the bound of the sea,
By a perpetual decree, that it cannot pass beyond it?
And though its waves toss to and fro,
Yet they cannot prevail;
Though they roar, yet they cannot pass over it.
23 But this people has a defiant and rebellious heart;
They have revolted and departed.
24 They do not say in their heart,
“Let us now fear the Lord our God,
Who gives rain, both the former and the latter, in its season.
He reserves for us the appointed weeks of the harvest.”
25 Your iniquities have turned these things away,
And your sins have withheld good from you.
26 ‘For among My people are found wicked men;
They lie in wait as one who sets snares;
They set a trap;
They catch men.
27 As a cage is full of birds,
So their houses are full of deceit.
Therefore they have become great and grown rich.
28 They have grown fat, they are sleek;
Yes, they [c]surpass the deeds of the wicked;
They do not plead the cause,
The cause of the fatherless;
Yet they prosper,
And the right of the needy they do not defend.
29 Shall I not punish them for these things?’ says the Lord.
‘Shall I not avenge Myself on such a nation as this?’
30 “An astonishing and horrible thing
Has been committed in the land:
31 The prophets prophesy falsely,
And the priests rule by their own power;
And My people love to have it so.
But what will you do in the end?
Read Other ESOCS Devotional Here
From our text, God would bring the Babylonians from the north in order to exercise His destruction of Judah and Jerusalem. They will come with great army and arrows that will kill many. They will devour the land, taking captive their sons and daughters. They will have no mercy on the Jews.
From our memory verse, the Jews will ask why God allowed calamity to come upon them; they will also ask how God could justify allowing such to happen. The first reason why God allowed such to happen was that they served other gods leaving the real God – the only true God, the God -of their fathers. They created these idols to satisfy their own desires.
The second reason was an indictment against their character. They showed little concern to obedience to the will of God. When they reviewed the work of God in their history, they ought to be moved to be loyal to Him. Other reasons for their punishment was because of moral decay, social injustice, creation of false religion by their preachers who only preached what the people wanted to hear, etc.; and in all, the people loved their way of life and hated any preacher who would condemn this. So, their end was destruction.
We attract punishment to ourselves when we ignore God’s counsel and behave the way we like. We conform to the standard of this world. The temple of God (our body) becomes the temple of immorality. God does not force anybody to serve Him; rather, He has given us freewill to choose whom we shall serve (Deuteronomy 30:19).
William Shakespeare said; “Men are sometimes the architect of their fate.” Let us be careful.
CHALLENGES
- Disobedience to God’s commandment attracts punishment from Him.
PRAYER POINT
- Dear Lord, give me the ability to live a life of righteousness all the days of my life.
FURTHER READING: Numbers 12:1-10; Deuteronomy 30:15-19; Revelation 3:15-16
ESOCS Devotional 5 February 2025
