Daily Devotional for Wednesday May 13, 2020

The United States is at a fork in the road!

(Jonah 3:5-10)

***DAILY PERSONAL PRAYER FOR YOU: Dear Lord, please help us to wake up as a nation before it is too late. We have squandered Your blessings, taken advantage of Your love and grace, and deserve Your wrath. Please oh Lord, be merciful for a few more hours and give your undeserving people one last chance to repent of our sins and turn our hearts and lives back to You. In the name of Jesus I pray...AMEN!

***THE DAILY LIVEPRAYER TV NUGGET: (I wrote these words on 2/26/20, 76 days ago before ONE PERSON had died in this country and life was still “normal.” Nothing had been shut down, nobody had lost their job, we were still going to church. READ THESE WORDS SLOWLY AS I SHARED WHAT HAVE TURNED OUT TO BE VERY PROPHETIC WORDS ON THAT DAY THAT HAVE COME TO PASS!!!) Is the coronavirus God’s warning to the world? What started in a China, exactly how still to be determined, we are a LONG way from this global threat being anything close to a pandemic taking tens of millions of lives around the world. Having said that, God created man to life forever, to never die. He also created man’s environment in perfection. There were no germs, diseases, sicknesses to contend with. When men chose to sin, it not only brought physical and spiritual death into the picture, but destroyed the perfect environment man was living in. So this coronavirus is a byproduct of the fallen state men is living in. Like SARS in 2003, the Ebola virus outbreak 7 years ago, this is the latest strain of a virus that currently there is no known cure for. It clearly is a cause for concern as it is spreading to nations around the world with over 80,000 known cases and over 2,700 deaths. Sadly, it is being used as a political football as all issues end up being at some point. It is NOT a major problem in the United States at this moment, but very easily could be in the coming weeks and months. As in China where it originated, it would preclude all kinds normal daily activities such as children going to school, going to see a movie, attending sporting events, and basic travel. These restrictions would also have a major effect on the economy, even more than we are currently dealing with. For Christians, it would also affect such a basic activity like going to church services. For now, PRAY for the Lord to give gifted medical professionals the wisdom to come up with a vaccine. Pray for world leaders to make wise decisions to restrict the spread of this virus. Pray for the sick to be healed and the family of those who have lost their lives to know God’s strength and comfort in the midst of their loss. Back to the initial question. While the coronavirus is simply a byproduct of our fallen nature like all sicknesses and diseases are, I believe it is also a reminder that we are frail beings, death is imminent for all of us, and we know from Scripture there will come a day when God will judge this fallen world. WE SHOULD ALWAYS SEE SUCH EVENTS AS A REMINDER OF OUR SIN AND REBELLION AND USE THEM AS OPPORTUNITIES TO TURN TO OUR FAITH AND THE LORD EVERY MINUTE OF EVERY DAY!!!

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Will we be like the children of Israel or the people of Nineveh? The United States is at a fork in the road. We will either experience the full wrath and judgment of God like the children of Israel, or we will see God stay His hand of punishment for a season and millions get saved like the people of Nineveh!

In the Old Testament, while the priests of the day sat in their beautiful homes, dressed in the best clothes, eating the most sumptuous food, living like royalty by compromising with the politicians of their day and telling the people things to make them feel good for a few minutes in order to keep the money rolling in (sound familiar?), the prophets lived in caves, dressed in meager clothes, ate cow dung, and were scorned, ridiculed, hated, and dismissed by the masses as fools.

Why? Because the prophet couldn't be bought by the politicians of the day. The prophets called out the priests for their compromise and using God for their own commerce. The prophets had the guts to not care about people being upset with their message, since their only loyalty was to God and the message He gave them to preach. No matter how unpopular their message was, no matter how many times they were beaten, thrown in prison, spat upon, they never wavered.

Sadly, many times in the early history of Israel, they turned their back on God. They engaged in every kind of sin you can name. They forsook God for the false gods and idols of the world. The prophet saw the judgment of God coming. The prophet warned the people of his coming wrath if they didn't repent. There was a remnant, those who refused to bow their knee to baal. However, this remnant was mostly silent.

The masses of the day rejected the warnings of the prophet. As the prophet warned, God's wrath and judgment was poured out on the children of Israel. I have no doubt they were oblivious to what was about to happen. I also have no doubt that as they suffered the judgment of God they remembered the warnings of the prophet that they tuned out and ignored!

The hope for this nation lies in the account of what happened in Nineveh. God sent a very reluctant and rebellious prophet to Nineveh. God had to deal with Jonah in a harsh way before he was willing to deliver God's Word to the people. However, once he was obedient, the people not only heard his warning of God's pending judgment, but they responded!

The Bible tells how they repented of their sins, they turned to the God of Israel, and millions were saved as God stayed His judgment for a season. AMEN! My Bible says God is no respecter of person. If God stayed His hand of judgment on the people of Nineveh, God will stay His hand of judgment on the people of the United States! The key is, will we respond to the warnings from the prophet as the people of Nineveh, or will we respond to the warnings from the prophet as the children of Israel?

I love you and care about you so much! Just like in Israel, there is a remnant, those who are faithful to the Lord and won't bow their knee to baal! Today, the remnant here in the United States must not be silent but rise up! As I have faithfully delivered God's Truth for 21 yrs, every day here at Liveprayer, I can't do this alone. I need you, the remnant, to rise up and help me!

I made the decision nearly 30 yrs ago when I finally answered God’s call on my life, that my only allegiance was to the Lord and His Truth, to see souls saved. I have had numerous opportunities over the years to compromise as so many do in order to raise money. I have had the opportunity over the years to soften the message, not deal with the real issues, so people will feel good instead of being challenged.

Because I have refused to play the games most in large ministries do just to raise money, because I don't play church politics, like the OT prophets, I am scorned, ridiculed, hated, both by the Christian establishment and those who deny God and His Word. But that is OK. In the end, when I take my last breath, like each one of us the only one I have to answer to is God.

When my work is over, I want to proudly bow before our Lord knowing I had run the race, I hadn't compromised, I hadn't sold out, I had been faithful to the Gospel, and the fruit of my labor are the tens of millions of lives impacted for the Lord and the 1.7 million souls we know of who came to know Jesus by faith!

All of that has only been made possible by friends like you, the remnant, who has stood with me in prayer and making the sacrifice to give to enable this ministry to do the work we have been called to. I ask again, "will we respond to the warnings from the prophet as the people of Nineveh, or will we respond to the warnings from the prophet as the children of Israel?"

In His love and service,

Your friend and brother in Christ,

Bill Keller