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Luke 21 5-9 WATCH AND PRAY I 02 Luke 21 5-9 Man continues to reject God

📖 Luke 21:5-9
9th Mar 26 | 13:18
00:00

02Mat2021 - *Man continues to reject God* - _Luke 21:5-9_ - WATCH AND PRAY I (2) – Bible reading: _Romans 5:8-11_

 

As we look around, we see that man does not want to repent and turn to God. Man does not want to even take the Name of God, for we can see the anger in people when we talk about God. 

 

We, the church, must seek forgiveness from God on behalf of our people, for our people are rejecting God. How terrible the wrath of God will be, which will fall on man, who continues to reject God.   

 

We continue to take a look at the overview of _Luke 21_. 

 

_Luke 21:5-9 Then, as some spoke of the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and donations, He said, (6) “These things which you see—the days will come in which not one stone shall be left upon another that shall not be thrown down." (7) So they asked Him, saying, "Teacher, but when will these things be? And what sign will there be when these things are about to take place?" (8) And He said: "Take heed that you not be deceived. For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am He,' and, 'The time has drawn near.' Therefore do not go after them. (9) But when you hear of wars and commotions, do not be terrified; for these things must come to pass first, but the end will not come immediately."_ 

This is the agony in the heart of God. God longs for man to have the fullness of life but man is determined not to return to God and therefore man and all of creation will have to undergo the end time, fearsome experiences that await all of us.  

 

Considering the calamity that is happening and the way people are suffering. Man is asking, “Why has God has allowed this tragedy to come upon our world? It is the poor and vulnerable, who suffer the most, whereas the rich and powerful seem to have managed. How can God be loving, merciful and kind but allow the poor and the average people to suffer? How can God be fair, impartial and just?” 

These are the highly emotional questions that people are asking and they are not willing to listen to reason. Yet, our task is to help people see reason.

God gave this beautiful world into the hand of man to take care of and make it flourish for the good of all. Man was given talents, abilities, capacities and capabilities with which and *under God*, man was to have governed, developed and made creation even a more wonderful and excellent for the good of all.  

Man was to be a royal executive being in subjection to the authority of God and to also continuously grow in God's image. _II Corinthians 3:18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord._ 

We were to continuously grow in the image of God in order to fulfil the task that was given to us to be His regents having dominion over His creation, for His glory.  

As I had said earlier, since we rejected God, everything is falling apart. Since we rejected God, we are not fulfilling our role, our calling, our task, instead, we have plundered and destroyed creation, including ourselves. This is happening because man has become a victim, a prisoner in the hand of Satan to do his will. _I John 5:19 We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one._ 

All over the world, we see wars, famines, crises of various kinds, struggles and all of these are happening because the evil one is able to work out his evil agenda through man. 

The next question that people are asking is, “If this is God’s creation and man was to have dominion over God’s creation on God’s behalf and man has failed and has become a prisoner in the hand of the devil, *why does not a loving God step in and prevent the disaster in which we are in today? Why isn’t God doing something to make this calamity go away?*”

Consider this analogy with me. Imagine a parent-child relationship where an overbearing father is always looking over the shoulder of his child, always correcting, always preventing the child from making mistakes, always preventing the child from falling and so on. Would that be a healthy relationship? No, that would not be a healthy relationship.

What should the father do? The father or the parent sets the rules and guidelines in place for the child and the child has to now operate according to the rules. The child always has the option to go to the parent for help and guidance but for the child to grow up, the child must *take responsibility* but always remain within the framework provided by the parent or guardian.

A loving parent-child relationship is where responsibility is given, allowing the child to discover and grow and guidance provided. A loving relationship is not one in which there is constant interference and overbearing from the parent.

God created us and gave us the responsibility to take care of His creation. Creation has been created in such a way that creation naturally follows the directive of man. If we had understood this equation and stayed in this wonderful relationship with God, we would have developed and matured. Creation too would have developed along with us and truly we would have had the Shalom of God, here on earth.  

Do you see friends, what is happening with humanity? We have rejected our Guardian, our Creator. We have told Him that He does not exist and we will not be subject to His authority over us. What is the result? We have crashed.

Going back to the analogy of the parent-child relationship, when the child rebels and rejects the rules and guidelines set in place by the parent and does whatever the child wants to do, what will happen? There will be a disaster, there will be a fall, there will be a crash.

Just because the child rejected the authority of the parent, and the child is experiencing the pain of a crash, the child does not become, ‘not the child’ of the parent. The child will always be the child of the parent but a rebellious and authority rejecting child.  

What does the parent do to an authority rejecting child, who is going through the pain of a crash, who was told very clearly would happen if the child chooses to reject the rules of the parent? The parent reaches out and calls the child to come back to him and to his/her first place in the relationship with the parent of being subject to the authority of the parent.

This is what God is doing in reaching out to His rebellious children. He is saying, “you have rejected me, you have gone away from me, you have done everything which was told you not to do and you are now having to bear the consequences of your rebellion, which was told you would experience if you would reject God but you are still My child. Come back to me and I will restore everything to where it was in the beginning”.  

The sad reality is, man is still rejecting God. In this chapter, we will see the consequences of our rebellion, which is happening and is further going to happen, for man has chosen not to come back to God.  

God does not want anything given in _Luke 21_ to take place but these events will happen for the Lord knows that man will continue to rebel and will not return to God.  

*Thought to ponder*

The church has to be those who carry the message of God’s heart to rebellious people.  

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