Friday, August 29, 2014

Further Thoughts on ISIS and the prophet Jonah!

Would you go to ISIS and declare God’s judgment if He asked you to?

The Prophet’s of the Old Testament were a rare breed of character.  They usually were shunned by society and appeared often to be outcasts.  I believe the main reason for this is the message that God asked them to bring.  Israel had been rebelling against God for a long time and the Prophet’s brought God’s message of repent or be destroyed.

Jonah was no exception to this.  He was asked by God to go to Nineveh and express God’s outrage to the people and inform them that He had seen their evil and thus He was going to destroy them.

We all know that Jonah went the other way.  He ignored God, but then God gave him a second chance to go and deliver the message.  When he delivered it the people repented and God relented, satisfied that they had turned from their evil ways.

In our Community Group the other night one of our members, a former Marine, said, “You know, ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) is like Nineveh, I wonder how we would react if God asked us to go the ISIS and call them out about their sin and tell them to repent or be destroyed by God.” It was an interesting thought given that ISIS is in the same area that Nineveh had been.

It also gave a good reminder about how I would feel regarding going to ISIS territory and declaring God’s judgment, it gave me a reference point to know how Jonah must have felt.  If I set foot in ISIS territory and declared their demise I’m pretty confident that I would lose my head at the hands of these criminals.

Jonah felt the same fear, the Ninevites were not a people to be trifled with.  They took great pleasure in killing Jews.  ISIS takes great pleasure in killing Christians, as well as non-violent Muslims.


So, how would you respond if God called you to go to the Middle East and deliver His message of repent or die to the men of ISIS?

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