Seize the Moment – Day 1396

 

Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Friday, January 12.

 

As a child of the Cold War, the fall of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the Berlin Wall, are forever engrained in my mind as the end of a long era of fear. Tyre and Sidon, the two prominent port cities on the Mediterranean Sea, are often used as a word pair to symbolize the region of the Phoenicians, who were not only successful seafaring traders to the north of Israel, but also a major influence of Canaanite idolatry upon the Israelites (1 Kings 11:1-5; 16:31). The fall of this evil people sent a ripple effect throughout the nations, as Isaiah 23:8-12 describes:

 

Who has planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, whose merchants were princes, whose traders were the honored of the earth? The LORD of hosts has planned it, to defile the pride of all beauty, to despise all the honored of the earth. … He has said, “You shall exult no more, O crushed virgin daughter of Sidon. Arise, pass over to Cyprus; even there you will find no rest.”

 

In Matthew 11:21-22, right before Jesus gave His gracious invitation to come to Him and find rest, He denounced the cities that did not repent in response to His miracles, “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles had occurred in Tyre and Sidon which occurred in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. Nevertheless I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you.” Twice, Jesus invoked the Israelite’s collective memory of God’s righteous destruction of Tyre and Sidon. He did so to express the urgency of their need to repent of their sins in response to His miracles.

Seize the moment and respond to Jesus’ urgent plea to find rest for your soul in His easy yoke (Matthew 11:28-30).

 

God bless you!

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YOUTUBE:

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