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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nLeviticus 26: 14-16a \u201cThe Lord said, \u201cIf you will not obey my commands, you will be punished. If you refuse to obey my laws and commands and break the covenant I have made with you, I will punish you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We have long realized the Biblical perspective of Israel being God\u2019s designated nation and the Jewish people as being God\u2019s chosen (Deuteronomy 7: 6).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
God established Israel and the people to provide the world with a much needed Savior. The land designated to them was ordained and established by our Creator four-thousand years ago (Genesis 12: 1-3).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For several reasons the Jewish people, in the beginning of Jesus\u2019 existence on earth rejected Him. To think of their Savior being a carpenter from Nazareth, to be born in a stable and His baby bed being an animal feeding trough (manger) was unimaginable to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The coming Messiah must be royalty and a warrior king to organize the armies of Israel to expel the Romans from their land. These expectations were not fulfilled and in their minds; this Jesus could not possibly be their promised Messiah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To add insult to injury, He proclaimed salvation by a faith based belief in Himself as a sacrificial lamb to suffer and bleed for the sins of the world. To simply believe in this Jesus to gain eternal salvation; crucified, resurrected and ascended alive into Heaven was unbelievable to the Jews of the first century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A basic human nature is to resist change. Once we are established, to change requires an effort we usually are not willing to exert. Missionaries have found that those with no belief in a supernatural spiritual Creator God are much easier to convince of the Gospel that those that have already locked on to another religious belief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In their first century Jewish mindsets He must follow the Old Testament rules of the blood sacrifice (Leviticus 17: 11). In reality, He did exactly that. Instead of an animal sacrifice for the remission of sin for individuals (Hebrews 9: 22), He became the living God sacrifice for the sins of all mankind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Throughout the years many Jews have come to realize the truth of the Savior of the world. Jewish Christians and numerous in our world today have turned to the Jesus of the New Testament and regard Him as the true Messiah. We see the tide changing for true understanding but also understand those wheels- of-change turn very slowly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Perhaps it is my fantasy filled mind but I have long thought The United States of America was established (soon to be 250 years ago) to evangelize the world. In such a case, might we consider the USA a God chosen nation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If this thought and assumption on my part is true, has God changed His mind? We have gone so far off the rails it appears we may be the next Sodom and Gomorrah of world history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, once again, \u201cHas God changed His mind?\u201d We know God can change His thinking based on scriptural references. God said He regretted making Saul the first king of Israel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
1 Samuel 15: 11a (ESV) \u201cI regretthat I have made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Before the global cataclysmic flood of Noah, God made another interesting statement. Genesis 6: 6 \u201cAnd it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.\u201d God stated His regret for creating man in this verse. This is a case in which we see if our Creator God becomes disgusted enough with us, we can kiss this earth and our lives goodbye.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At any rate and considering the state of America today and much of the western world, were we once God\u2019s chosen to preach \u201cThis Gospel\u201d to the world? And because of our straying from Him, that status has changed?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We have the technology, the financial ability and the expertise to teach the Kingdom of God to the entire world. We have the communications abilities, the travel abilities and the knowledge (Daniel 12: 4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But our priorities have changed and this was not the will of God. For us to stray off course from His intended purpose for us is an abomination in itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We find the American population drifting farther and farther away from our Creator God. A recent survey concluded that as many as forty-million Americans claim to believe there is no god and that number is continually increasing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We do indeed chase after other gods and that was the reason, in most cases, why Israel was punished in Old Testament history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those gods of materialism and abundance have blinded us to our temporal existence. To contemplate a spiritual eternal existence is not within the grasp of our carnal minds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We are living for the moment and the day. Every day is the first day of the rest of our lives and our focus has degraded to self-aggrandizement rather than the will of our Creator God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Can this change? Of course it can!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
2 Chronicles 7: 14 \u201cIf my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s not too late unless we allow it to be too late!Van Yandell is a retired Industrial Arts teacher, an ordained gospel evangelist and commissioned missionary.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Van Yandell Leviticus 26: 14-16a \u201cThe Lord said, \u201cIf you will not obey my commands, you will be punished. If you refuse to obey my laws and commands and break the covenant… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"9","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyMlwvMTBcL1Zhbi1ZYW5kZWxsLS5qcGc_Zml0PTI1NiUyQzI1NiZzc2w9MSIsInR4dCI6IkhBUyBUSEUgRlVUVVJFIENIQU5HRUQ_IiwidGVtcGxhdGUiOiJoaWdod2F5IiwiZm9udCI6IiIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.x7WVX1FzqjNQPTx8tt64s-S7pmYJNSjt3zb3qcrZW1kMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":26364,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Van-Yandell-.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[9],"tags":[11938],"class_list":["post-57116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","tag-has-the-future-changed"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57116"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57117,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57116\/revisions\/57117"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}