{"id":5440,"date":"2021-01-10T05:57:01","date_gmt":"2021-01-10T11:57:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nazareneblogs.org\/pastorscott\/?p=5440"},"modified":"2021-01-10T05:57:01","modified_gmt":"2021-01-10T11:57:01","slug":"devotional-on-isaiah-156","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-isaiah-156\/","title":{"rendered":"Devotional on Isaiah"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure style=\"width: 1280px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-IPPHE61hX3U\/X_oyb4ixpJI\/AAAAAAABIKo\/dRM85MonD2kdEAFAi72HIIfxZYexuLoLACPcBGAsYHg\/s1280\/P9042195.JPG\" width=\"1280\" height=\"960\" class=\"size-large\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\"><center>2008 &#8211; Elk in Rocky Mtn Natl Park, CO<\/center><\/figcaption><\/figure><br \/>\nFree will and accountability<br \/>\nIsaiah 47: You&#8217;re acting like the center of the Universe.<br \/>\nGod Almighty hands his chosen people over to Babylon, the powerhouse of that day.  His purpose is to humble Israel and bring this rebellious people back to himself.  However, Babylon goes farther than God intends and now the Lord rebukes Babylon for going too far.  I think there\u2019s a case to be made here for the doctrine of free will.  God gives Babylon the power and position to dominate the region.  Then when Babylon behaves in cruel ways God says they\u2019ve gone too far and that he\u2019ll now knock them off their high horse.  They think they\u2019re the &#8220;center of the universe&#8221; but the real &#8220;Center of the Universe&#8221; is about to put them in their place.  Another thing that comes to mind here is the underlying theme of God&#8217;s love.  God has been stern with Israel, but it\u2019s out of love.  He\u2019s willing to use Babylon to bring them to submission but there\u2019s a limit to how far God wants that to go.  I\u2019m reminded of how in the book of Job that God gives Satan permission to strike Job, but in doing so the Lord also tells him that there\u2019s a limit to how far he can go.  On one hand, therefore, I see here my accountability to God as to what I say and do, even when I\u2019m operating within the providence of God.  On the other hand, I see that God loves me, and when I\u2019m on the receiving end of hardship that he\u2019s set boundaries, not allowing me to be tempted beyond what I can bear.<br \/>\nTake Away: The Lord\u2019s discipline of us is governed by his love for us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Free will and accountability Isaiah 47: You&#8217;re acting like the center of the Universe. God Almighty hands his chosen people over to Babylon, the powerhouse of that day. His purpose is to humble Israel and bring this rebellious people back to himself. However, Babylon goes farther than God intends and now the Lord rebukes Babylon [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1502,7],"tags":[75,131,373,473,626,1065],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5440"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5440"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5440\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15013,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5440\/revisions\/15013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}