September 26th - God Has No Employees

“I have also called you by your name; I have given you a title of honor though you have not known Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other; Besides Me there is no God. I will gird you, though you have not known Me; that men may know from the rising to the setting of the sun that there is no one besides Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other. The One forming light and creating darkness, causing well-being and creating evil; I am the LORD who does all these. Drip down, O heavens, from above, and let the clouds pour down righteousness; Let the earth open up and salvation bear fruit, and righteousness spring up with it. I, the LORD, have created it.” (Isaiah 45:4-9)

Some churches are business enterprises similar to secular ones. They sell a product - salvation. The wages and benefits of its member employees are eternal bliss in heaven and escape from eternal torture in hell. 

However, salvation is not for sale! It is God's free gift to humans. Churches should announce this good news that GOD will save humanity, even the most wicked, by the sacrifice of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

King Manasseh of Israel, one of the most wicked men the world has ever seen...

"...caused his sons to pass through the fire in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom; he practiced soothsaying, used witchcraft and sorcery, and consulted mediums and spiritists…Manasseh seduced Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to do more evil than the nations whom the LORD had destroyed before the children of Israel" (2 Chronicles 33:6-9)

Surely this sorry excuse for a King, and similar wicked men like Hitler, will not end up saved. Surely they will dwell eternally in the hell…right? 

Well, no, actually Manasseh was saved when he "humbled himself" before God.

“In his distress he sought the favor of the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his ancestors. And when he prayed to Him, the Lord was moved by his entreaty and listened to his plea; so He brought him back to Jerusalem and to his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord is God.” (2 Chronicles 33:12-13)

Like wicked King Manasseh, every knee will be humbled and will bow before God, and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord at the consummation of God's plan, which unfolds before the Great White Throne of Revelation 20:11. It is saving sinners, not condemning them, which brings glory to God the Father.

“For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall give praise to God….of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. " (Romans 14:11; Philippians 2:10-11)

Even those entering the lake of fire, the second death, will be raised up and given eternal life in the New Heaven and New Earth. Jesus declared...

"And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which He hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it (humanity) up again at the last day...And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish (stay dead); neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand." (John 6:39; 10:28)

And Paul told the church...

"I am entreating, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, pleadings, thanksgiving be made for all humanity, for kings and all those being in a superior station, that we may be leading a mild and quiet life in all devoutness and gravity, for this is ideal and welcome in the sight of our Saviour, God, Who WILLS THAT ALL HUMANITY BE SAVED AND COME INTO A REALIZATION OF THE TRUTH. For there is one God, and one Mediator of God and mankind, a Man, Christ Jesus, Who is giving Himself a correspondent Ransom FOR ALL (the testimony in its own eras), for which I was appointed a herald and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the nations in knowledge and truth. I am intending, then, that men pray in every place, lifting up benign hands, apart from anger and reasoning." (1 Timothy 2:1-11)