Title: Man of the Wilderness (Isaiah 40:3)
Content People are sometimes divided into metaphysical people and metaphysical people. or 1. A person who should not exist 2. A person if there is one. 3. It is sometimes divided into people who must be there.
Furthermore, the Bible distinguishes 1. those who are saved and 2. those who are not saved. Among those who are saved, there are those who are greatly written by God, and there are those who live just fine. It is said that many rewards are prepared in the kingdom of heaven, so I hope that we will become saints who are favored by God and used a lot. Considering the words of Matthew 22:14 that many are invited, but few are chosen, today I would like to classify the types of people in the Old Testament. Let's share the Word with the people who have been used by God in mind.
A) People who worshiped gods
In the Old Testament, there were many people who lived together with Baal and enjoyed life. Baal was an idol of rain, fertility, and fertility. Of course, it made me live a life connected with sex. Baal was the god of men. Judges 3:7, And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and forgot the LORD their God, and served the Baals and Asherahs. Of course, they also served female gods. It was Asherah. There was also a goddess of war whose name was Ashtaroth. An idol with the nickname of a naked goddess. He carried nude images of women until the war.
The characteristic of the job was sex. This ghost is still active in modern times. Speaking of modern ills, Hedonism, or Hedonism, Mammonism, or Golden Universalism, and Homo-sexualism, that is, homosexuality. This is just the fact that the god of sex in the Old Testament era, the god of sex, became more active.
B) People who boast of their beauty
When we look at the case of Adam and Eve's sin, it is written in Genesis 3:6 that the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasing to the eye, and that it was a tree desirable to make one wise. It is said that fascination is the main cause of the fall of man. Humans naturally place too much importance on the beauty of their appearance.
Genesis 29:17, it is said that her eyes were soft, and Rachel was beautiful and beautiful. Genesis 37:3, "Joseph was the son of his old age, and Israel loved him more than many of his sons, and he made colored garments for him." Joseph gets the misfortune of being sold into slavery because of his father's unusually colored clothes.
Saul liked David, but 1 Samuel 16:21 says, "So he sent and brought him, and he was red in light, and his eyes were beautiful, and his face was beautiful." - In other words, Saul liked David's appearance more. In the end, Saul's love for his looks changed easily and he treated David like an enemy.
In the Old Testament, there are many people who lived with a preoccupation with their looks, such as Tamar (2 Samuel 13:1) and Absalom (2 Samuel 14:25).
But let's look at what the Old Testament prophesied about Jesus. Isaiah 53:1-12, “He grows up before the Lord, like a tender shoot, like a stem on dry ground, having no form or appearance, that is, there is nothing beautiful in our sight to be admired. He is despised and rejected by men. A man of many afflictions and acquainted with sorrow, as one who hides his face from men, and is despised, and we have no respect for him. He was chastised, beaten by God, and afflicted. He was pierced for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities. His discipline gave us peace, and His wounds we are healed.
The beauty of Jesus was not that of outward appearance or outward appearance. He had the beauty of bursting with the inner longing for soul salvation like living water.
c) Those who went out into the wilderness
However, the people God used were those who went out into the wilderness and were called into the wilderness. Abraham settled in Beersheba. It was in the middle of the wilderness. The Exodus is the entire nation's life in the wilderness. The people of Israel passed through the wilderness when they returned from Babylonian captivity. David fled Saul in the wilderness. Elijah fled Jezebel and stayed in the wilderness of Sinai. Jesus was also tempted in the wilderness and entered his public life. John the Baptist grew up in the wilderness, and Luke 1:8 says that he became a cryer in the wilderness.
1. The wilderness is a place to experience God's preparation. When Abraham was told to sacrifice his only son, Isaac, and went out into the wilderness to kill his son, God had already prepared a lamb to be sacrificed.
2. A place to experience the power of God. Through their life in the wilderness, Israel tasted the experience of water gushing out of the rock. I also experienced that the bitter water of Mara turned into sweet water.
3. There is God's guidance. It is the guidance of the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire. (Exodus 13:21) And the LORD went before them, to lead their way with a pillar of cloud by day, and with a pillar of fire by night to give light to them, so that they went by day and night.
4. There is God's training. Jeremiah 9:7 Thus saith the LORD of hosts, Behold, how shall I deal with my daughter's people, and I will melt them and refine them. Hebrews 12:8, All discipline is what you receive, but if you do not have it, you are an illegitimate son and not a true son.
Ladies and gentlemen, God is training His people in the wilderness.
That's right. In the wilderness there is loneliness, pain, pain, bitterness, and death. But God lets you experience it there. If you go out into the wilderness, you will see this. I see this. I see this.
Who are we? They are the people who went out into the wilderness to experience meeting God by changing pain, sorrow, and loneliness.