📖 Jeremiah 48:7
Chapter 48 of Jeremiah is a prophecy against the nation of Moab. God’s wrath against Moab was its pride and harsh oppression against Israel. Moabites were rich and were proud of its riches.

MATERIAL WEALTH AND ITS IMPACT

💰 When it comes to security, material resources appear to have the capacity to insulate us from danger and hardship. But money has at best a limited capacity to keep us safe.

💰 If we trust in it for ultimate protection, we are headed for DISASTER.

📝 In today’s text, Moab was warned that they would be lost / destroyed because of their ultimate trust upon them for its security (v 7). And they would see a complete ruin and destruction of their nation (v 8-10)

✍🏻 Author Randy Alcorn writes, “It’s not just because wealth might be lost ; it’s because wealth will always be lost – either it leaves us while we live, or we leave it when we die. No exceptions”.

📝 The Bible point out (a number of times) that the rich would face serious spiritual danger if they are away from it’s teaching.

1Timothy 6:17-18 offers five instructions for ” those who are rich in this present world”:

1️⃣ Do not be arrogant.
2️⃣ Do not put your hope in wealth.
3️⃣ But put your hope in God.
4️⃣ Be rich in good deeds.
5️⃣ Be generous.

💞 Beloved Church, we all know that money can buy goods and services. It has so much power to fool us into thinking that money supplies our needs and offers security.
Watch out :
✅ Money can become our FIRST LOVE.
✅ We tend to trust in the SEEN rather than in the INVISIBLE LIVING GOD.
🙏 Let us walk by faith not by sight.

📝 King David exhorts us, “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we TRUST in the name of the Lord our God” Psalm 20:7

WHAT ABOUT YOU AND ME❓

Glory to God 🙌
✍🏻 Mark Boje
Arunachal Pradesh, India 🇮🇳

Writing On The Wall: Let’s Learn To Read It

There is a speciality for today’s portion and the remaining chapters of the Book of Jeremiah. They contain the prophecy about the fall of every known nation of that period.

Egypt will be defeated at Carchemish(ch.46),Philistines will perish(ch.48),Moab will fall (ch.48), Ammonites will be scattered in the battle, the defeat of Edom, the plundering of Damascus, the disaster of Kedar and Hazor, the peril to Elam (ch.49), the total devastation of Babylon (ch.50). How clearly all these had been predicted!

After reading this, we may wonder whether Jeremiah was a prophet of doom. In Isaiah’s prophecies we see rays of hope in the dark clouds. It was all about the coming of our Saviour Jesus Christ. But all that Jeremiah had to tell the people was about the impending disaster. We cannot blame Jeremiah for it. That was the mission God entrusted with him. He did not bring doom; he just cried out to the world about the doom that was at the door step.

There is a common thread for all the mishaps enumerated above. It is God who does it all: avenges, plunders, breaks, defeats in the war, axes them like those who chop wood, makes you small and cuts off.

In my opinion, those people had a clear advantage on two counts.

1. They were kept forewarned about the impending disasters through the prophecies of Jeremiah.
2. They were informed very clearly that God was going to do all these to them.

In other words, the people were informed of who, when and where they were going to be attacked. What more is needed for anyone to escape from the attack?

And yet, nobody tried to escape. And therefore nobody was spared either.

They did not take the prophet’s words at face value. And as such, they did not bother to pray to God to save them.

Today we hear the word of God and prophecy-like messages. We see events which are real warnings. But we don’t heed them. And we don’t feel the urgency to pray to God to avert them.

But one thing is sure, if we read the writing on the wall and pray to God, there is hardly anything that cannot be averted.

George Joseph Trivandrum