Many times my wife and I sit at our breakfast table and ponder the outcome of current news and happenings. Generally, there is alarming and tumultuous chaos, and it is not just rampant in our neck of the woods, but it tends to darken every horizon where one might look. Just when it looks like things have slowed down a bit, and things look a bit better, the TV screen comes alive with the foreboding news, “Tragedy in your town” or “Raging killer takes the lives of innocent people.” This, to us, harks back to the prophetic pronouncements of utter doom and destruction that await the ungodly of Earth at the end of time. While this portends tragedy and suffering like none on Earth before, for the ungodly, it also points to the faithful before the throne of eternal God who await the most wonderful words to ever fall upon mortal ear, ”Come ye blessed of my Father.”
It is not uncommon to hear folks reminiscing of the “Good old days,” but from what I’ve been able to discern, one of the best things about the good old days is that they’re gone. Brother E.C. McKenzie asks the insightful question, “Don’t you long for the ‘good old days’ when Uncle Sam lived within his income and without most of yours?” Doubtless, most of us can relate to that pointed question. Time comes, and time goes, but apparently it does not change much with its movement. The prophet Micah spoke of the distressing times when he wrote of the waywardness of Israel.
Woe is me! For I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grapegleanings of the vintage: There is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the first ripe fruit. The good omen is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net. That they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the Prince asketh, and the Judge asketh for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire: so they wrap it up. The best of them is a brier: the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge: the day of the watchmen and thy visitation cometh; now shall be their perplexity. Trust ye not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide: keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in the bosom. For the son dishonoreth the father, the daughter riseth up against her mother, the daughter in law against her mother in law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house. (Micah 7:1-6)
Did you notice how Micah said the Prince, the Judge and the great men would be doing their evil work? Read it again! “That they may do evil with both hands” (verse 3). These people were not content to just ‘dabble’ around with sin, but they grabbed it with both hands earnestly! They exhibited no intention of turning loose! They were trying to ensure that they didn’t let it slip form their grasp. Many years ago, a delinquent brother told me that his house was divided because his wife would not turn from her denominational background to accept the truth. That, he said is like one of my hands being tied behind my back. I reminded him that there is one thing worse than that! You have left your first love and joined your wife in wrong doing! This brother had quit holding on to truth with one hand, as he had done before, and was now clinging to wrongdoing with both hands! The Bible says, “for it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them” (2 Peter 2:21).
“And that servant, which knew his Lord’s Will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to His Will, shall be beaten with many stripes” (Luke 12:47). These unwise ones are holding on to nothing with both hands! How pitiful!
