Isaiah 29:13-14 Therefore the Lord said: “Inasmuch as these people draw near with their mouths And honor Me with their lips, But have removed their hearts far from Me, And their fear toward Me is taught by the commandment of men, Therefore, behold, I will again do a marvelous work among this people, A marvelous work and a wonder; For the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, And the understanding of their prudent men shall be hidden.”
An ancient story is told of a King of Spain who was to visit a poor country village. Upon hearing of his plan to visit them, the people seemed excited to offer a great celebration that would show their adoration and love for their king. But the villagers didn’t have much to offer.
In the midst of their quandary someone proposed that, since so many villagers made their own wines, they might each choose his best wine, and combine them in a barrel to present to the king as a gift from the village. So they did, each wine-maker bringing a flagon with which to fill the barrel. Then, they anxiously awaited the arrival of their sovereign.
When the King arrived, he was ceremoniously presented with a silver cup and invited to draw wine from the barrel. As he filled his silver chalice, he was surprised when he tasted only water. Where was the wine? Each villager had reasoned, “I’ll withhold my best wine and give water. There will be so many cups of excellent wine poured into the barrel that mine will never be missed.”
Here was a town full of people whose private greed completely overcame their public enthusiasm. The indictment of Isaiah the prophet suited them perfectly: “these people draw near with their mouths and honor Me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from Me..”
Yet our God looks at the heart, and He knows well when we are going through the motions of showing love and admiration for him, without any truth or sincerity.
Hypocrisy is a serious offense to our God. He would rather we honestly withhold then pretend to be generous. How often do we act publicly to be seen by men in a certain light, while in fact, our motive is self-seeking? So God will have to do another marvellous work to expose our hypocrisy, because of His love for us, for He knows when our “wine” is really “water”. But wouldn’t we rather offer our very best wine right from the start?
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[worthy_plugins_devotion_single_body]Over the past few weeks, we’ve begun a series of devotions based on the Exodus wanderings of the Children of Israel, and their tragic mistakes which we can learn from and avoid. One powerful influence common to their failures was fear.
For the past two weeks we have examined lessons from the OT account of Israel’s Exodus from Egypt in hope of avoiding the errors and attitudes of the children of Israel. This week we will draw connections between the Exodus and the prophecies in the book of Revelation.
For the past two weeks we’ve been building life lessons derived from the Exodus wanderings and from Paul’s exhortations to the church in Corinth. Notice carefully that Paul says, “these were written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages have come”…
…that is, written for us today! – admonitions from Paul to learn lessons from the history of the children of Israel.
Paul exhorts the church at Corinth about grumbling and complaining. He reminds the believers of the judgments that befell the 10 spies who brought a bad report of the land – and were struck down by a plague, and terrible fate of Korah and those aligned with him that came against Moses and Aaron and were swallowed up by the ground under them.
Here we have a stark word. Here we see the Lord testing Israel: “He gave you manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never known, to humble and test you so that in the end it might go well with you.” [Deuteronomy 8:16]. Yet Paul says that they put Him to the test. A great irony occurs when God is testing us, and we despise His discipline, thereby testing Him.
The Apostle Paul continues his warning to the Corinthians against idolatry by referring to Israel’s celebration/worship of the golden calf. Aaron’s proclamation, “These are your gods (plural) O Israel” could be one of the earliest declarations mixing the worship of the true and living God, YHVH, with idols. This is called “syncretism”. Dictionary.com defines it: ” the attempted reconciliation or union of different or opposing principles, practices, or parties, as in philosophy or religion.”
The Apostle Paul’s admonition in 1 Corinthians 10:6 against desiring evil as they did, would seem to point to the obvious sins – lying, stealing, adultery, fornication, etc. – and following their deliverance from slavery, many of the children of Israel were certainly guilty of some of these. But this passage in Numbers describes a type of sin we don’t normally consider: it was simply their desire for the foods they ate in Egypt.