By David ReayThursday 1 Sep 2016LifeWords DevotionalsFaithReading Time: 0 minutes
Transcript:
Read Malachi 3:13-15
13 “You have said terrible things about me,” says the Lord.
“But you say, ‘What do you mean? What have we said against you?’
14 “You have said, ‘What’s the use of serving God? What have we gained by obeying his commands or by trying to show the Lord of Heaven’s Armies that we are sorry for our sins? 15 From now on we will call the arrogant blessed. For those who do evil get rich, and those who dare God to punish them suffer no harm.’” (NLT)
Many of us will exclaim from time to time how unfair life can be. Understandable, but in fact we ought to expect unfairness. This world is not as it should be so we can assume unfairness is one by-product of human rebellion against God.
Troubles arise when we go on to accuse God of being unfair. Life may be unfair but God is not. And if we further demand that God end all the unfairness we are asking him to wind up human history. Which he will one day but not just yet.
Our text speaks of a particular type of complaint about the unfairness of life. Serving God doesn’t seem to do a lot of good for us whereas those who defy God seem to have a great time. We can’t deny this seems to be the case at times. And this in itself is part of the unfairness of life.
But three cautions: one is that appearances can be deceiving. Those who seem to be sailing along carefree may have dark secrets that haunt them. Two, is that one day all will be put right, justice will be done. Three, is that serving God in this life is not meant to be a free ticket to all sorts of earthly rewards. True, there are wonderful benefits in serving God, but we serve him not simply for the sake of those benefits but because he is in fact God.
Blessings
David Reay