Faithfulness

Written by Myles MacMillan.

“Then the Lord said: “I am making a covenant with you. Before all your people I will do wonders never before done in any nation in all the world. The people you live among will see how awesome is the work that I, the Lord, will do for you. Obey what I command you today. I will drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land where you are going, or they will be a snare among you. Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and cut down their Asherah poles. Do not worship any other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” (NIV) Exodus 34:10-14

A snare is a device used in many cultures to catch animals for food. There are many different types of snares but one of the more simple and common types consists of a loop of wire or rope that is tied to a tree or stake in the ground. The loop of rope is tied with a Poacher's Knot which allows for the loop of rope to tighten freely as something pulls on it. When an animal runs into the snare, the loop tightens and they are unable to free themselves. The reason a snare is so effective is because the harder the animal pulls on the rope to try and get free, the tighter the loop cinches around them.

In Exodus 34, God delivers a message to Moses. This comes after the Israelites had escaped Egyptian slavery and were being led through the desert, waiting to possess the promised land. God warns Moses and the rest of the Israelite nation that when the time came to enter Canaan’s land (which was full of many different nations that did not know or obey God) that they needed to hold fast to God’s commands and obey Him. Exodus 34:2 shows that God did not want the Israelites to adopt the ways of the nations they would be driving out and warns them against it saying that if they “make a treaty” with these people “they will become a snare among you.” Unfortunately, by reading the bible we know the rest of the story and that the Israelites did exactly what God warned them not to do. The imagery of a snare is the perfect description for how these pagan nations caught them and the harder the Israelites tried to escape this snare, the more impossible it seemed to become.

Reading this section of scripture reminded me that things are hardly any different today for Christians. We live in a world of ever-increasing sin and debauchery, where the morals and values of a biblical world-view seem to be eroding from our society more and more each day. This constant barrage of wickedness and acceptance of wickedness by the masses around us carries a danger that we might become numb to certain types of sin and be tempted to join because everyone else is doing it. 2 Timothy 3:1-6 says: “But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people.”

You can’t go part-way into a snare, once you enter, you are caught. This is why the Israelites were warned against a treaty and why we are warned about immersing ourselves in godlessness. As we try to be "in this world but not of this world" we need to remember that we need to be influencers and not those being influenced. We need to be the salt and light to this world we live in and help others see the truth of God’s word instead of compromising on what we know is correct so that we can fit in. Brothers and Sisters, this is a hard thing to do and it is indeed hard work but most things in life that are worth doing are hard and this is no exception. This is the work of staying pure for our God and showing the lost world around us that there is a better way to live. May God bless us all with strength and perseverance as we work towards this goal.

Unexpected delivery || More

Joomla SEF URLs by Artio

We use cookies on our website. Some of them are essential for the operation of the site, while others help us to improve this site and the user experience (tracking cookies). You can decide for yourself whether you want to allow cookies or not. Please note that if you reject them, you may not be able to use all the functionalities of the site.