8. Man’s Provocations of the Lord God! Psalm 78:58-72

Text: “For they provoked Him to anger with their high places, and moved Him to jealousy with their graven images.”

Psalm 78:58.

          “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.  Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in Heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me; and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love Me, and keep My commandments.”

Exodus 20:3-6.

Good morning, Commandment-honouring Christian!  For you, and for me, God’s Ten Commandments are as totally relevant today, as in the day the Lord God Almighty, Jehovah, gave them to Moses on Mount Sinai.  (Exodus Chapter 20.)

Dictionary Definition: Commandment – (noun) a command; a religious rule for living by especially one of the Ten Commandments… (The Chambers Dictionary, page 330)

The first and Second Commandments – written as my secondary text above, are increasingly being, and have been, totally disobeyed by once ‘Christian’ nations now, for almost a century; a century when Britain and America in particular, have fallen down into a quagmire of filthy behaviour and gross and vile sin against our Holy Lord God.  Fact!

In spite of the Lord God’s clear warnings of what has happened to nations - even nations historically favoured by Him - when they provoke Him to righteous anger; Britain and America in particular have continued on in bare-faced provocation of an Almighty Lord God Who must punish all sin, and stamp out all evil.  The state of our nations is an open shame; a clear violation of God’s righteous standards; a sure provocation of His Holy wrath. Fact!

“As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: there is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.  They are all gone out of the way they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.  Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: their feet are swift to shed blood: destruction and misery are in their ways: and the way of peace they have not known: there is no fear of God before their eyes.” (Romans 3:10-18)

Be honest, Commandment-honouring Christian!  Is this not a close description of how far our, once Christian, nations have fallen from God’s Sovereign grace and blessings?  A brief viewing or listening to a daily News bulletin will immediately confirm what I have written above – there is very little fear of Jehovah God on the streets of our once great Christian cities; heathen religions now dominate media outlets; heathen images and shrines are erected where anti-Christians can worship their pagan deities, in once Christian buildings! 

We are constantly being encouraged to join in the worship of ‘Mary, Queen of Heaven’!  A recent Sports gathering in Birmingham produced a mechanical image of a bull that was being adored and worshipped by a circle of would-be angels!  Shame on us all! Shame on all who would dare provoke the Holy Lord God Jehovah! Provoke Him not! He will not be mocked!

Verse 58. “And moved Him to jealousy with their graven images. This was but one more step; they manufactured symbols of the invisible God, for they lusted after something tangible and viable to which they could show reverence. This also is the crying sin of modern times.  Do we not hear and see superstition abounding? Images, pictures, crucifixes, and a host of visible things are had in religious honour, and worst of all men now-a-days worship what they eat, and call that God which passes into their belly, and thence into baser places still.

“Surely the Lord is very patient, or He would visit the earth for this worst and basest idolatry. He is a jealous God and abhors to see Himself dishonoured by any form of representation which can come from man’s hands.” (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 342)

So many sound Christians today, come to me complaining that ‘they could not darken a local church door anymore’!  When asked ‘why’, the cause is clear: too much humanism; too much idolatry; too much legalism; too much self-righteousness; too much said from pulpits that has no Scriptural authority to say it; too much false love, and not enough of God’s written truth; too much superficially preached, and to perpetual ‘babes in Christ’; and too many modern versions of the Bible containing a watered down, erroneous, translation!

Can you relate to any of these modernist, legalist, ‘churchianity’ complaints, Reader?

Verse 59. “And greatly abhorred Israel. If Dagon sit aloft in any soul, the ark of God is not there.  Where the Lord dwells, no image of jealousy will be tolerated.  A visible church will soon become a visible curse if idols be set up in it, and then the pruning knife will remove it as a dead branch from the vine.” (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 342)

Consequences of Open Apostasy: How can regenerate, Bible-believing Christians pray for nations that are clearly provoking God’s Holiness and firmly under His judgement?  This is the consequence of open national apostasy. Nations MUST repent and turn back to God. Our nations have no strength, and our national glory is given into the enemy’s hands.

Verse 61. “And delivered His strength into captivity, and His glory into the enemy’s hand. This was a fearful downfall for the favoured nation, and it was followed by dire judgements of the most appalling nature. When God is gone, all is gone. No calamity can equal the withdrawal of the Divine Presence from a people. O Israel, how art thou brought low! Who shall help thee now that thy God has left thee?” (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 342)

Thought: God’s ‘Thou shalt nots’ are His blue-print for Christ’s true Commandment-honouring servants. We shall be blessed by following His Way, in Christ, forever. Rejoice, obedient Christian, and come out from among ‘hireling’ shepherds.