Reaping the Whirlwind

I wrote in “Today’s Chaldean Chastisement” that I thought it possible that God was using Iran (modern-day Chaldeans) to punish America for her sins. Later, in “Who are the Other Gods” I explained that God has been dealing with other nations besides Israel since the beginning. Because of God’s obvious global interest, I can’t help but wonder how America plays in the grand scheme of things. I know that God’s chosen people are no longer a national entity; they are a spiritual congregation from all nations. Yet what would God think of a nation so clearly founded on His biblical principles going the way of ancient Israel?

These passages from Hosea struck me as particularly pertinent:

Indeed, they sow the wind

and reap the whirlwind. (8:7)

 

The days of punishment have come;

the days of retribution have come.

Let [God’s people] recognize it!

The prophet is a fool,

and the inspired man is insane,

because of the magnitude

of your iniquity and hostility. (9:7)

 

You have plowed wickedness and reaped injustice;

you have eaten the fruit of lies

Because you have trusted in your own way. (10:13)

 

But you must return to your God.

Maintain love and justice,

and always put your hope in God. (12:6)

 

The book of Hosea closes with these words:

 

Let whoever is wise understand these things,

and whoever is insightful recognize them.

For the ways of the Lord are right,

and the righteous walk in them,

but the rebellious stumble in them. (14:9)

 

I am not suggesting that the judgment God brought on the nations in Old Testament times is directly applicable to America. However, we hear the Lord say, “I am Yahweh; I do not change.” In the fourth chapter of Amos, God lists all the disasters He brought on Israel; He ends each with the line: “Yet you did not return to me.” The implication is obvious yet chilling. God wreaked havoc to cause Israel to repent. The prophets assure God’s unrepentant people that He will show mercy if they return to Him. They did not. They paid the price He promised.

 

R.C. Sproul writes in The Holiness of God: “Far from being a history of a harsh God, the Old Testament is the record of a God who is patient in the extreme. The Old Testament is the history of a persistently hard-necked people who rebel time after time against God. The people became slaves in a foreign land. They cried out to God. God heard their groans and moved to redeem them. He parted the Red Sea to let them out of bondage. They responded by worshiping a gold cow.”

Summing up God’s plans for the infant nation of Israel, Moses warned: “After the Lord your God has driven [the nations] out before you, do not say to yourself, ‘The Lord has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness.’ No, it is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is going to drive them out before you. It is not because of your righteousness or your integrity that you are going in to take possession of their land.”

Commenting on this passage Sproul writes: “God reminds Israel that it is not because of their righteousness that He will defeat the Canaanites. He wanted to make that point clear. Israel might have been tempted to jump to the conclusion that God was ‘on their side’ because they were better than pagan nations. God’s announcement made that inference impossible. Since it is our tendency to take grace for granted, my guess is that God found it necessary from time to time to remind Israel that grace must never be assumed. On rare but dramatic occasions He showed the dreadful power of His justice. He killed Nadab and Abihu. He killed Uzzah. He commanded the slaughter of the Canaanites. It is like He was saying, ‘Be careful. While you enjoy the benefits of my grace, don’t forget my justice. Don’t forget the gravity of sin. Remember that I am holy.’”

It is not unusual to hear someone suggest that God has blessed America uniquely because of her initial founding on biblical principles. Like Sproul says of ancient Israel, we too might imagine God is “on our side” because of a special relationship. I don’t pretend to know what God’s mind is toward America. I do know without doubt what His mind is toward evil, and America is descending further and further into a dark abyss of immorality. I am certain the principle of reaping what you sow is universal. I would not be surprised to learn that God applies it to nations as well as individuals.

Someone might be tempted to say that all this “Bible stuff” is irrelevant to the present world situation. I disagree. C. S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity, “[those] who did the most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next.” Thinking of the next world (the new earth where righteousness dwells), setting our minds on things above (where Christ sits enthroned above the nations), praying that God’s will be done on earth as it is in Heaven – these are the actions that are most needful. We are ambassadors from another kingdom, the Kingdom of the Holy God; let’s be about the King’s business.

Related posts: Bringing the Kingdom; Today’s Chaldean Chastisement; Who Are the Other Gods?; Light Shining in Darkness; Read This or Die