Harbinger

The scenery passing by the car window, the words in the book I was reading aloud to my husband as he drove, and the news flash on the radio all converged in a maelstrom of conflict. Beauty and chaos. Defiant power and judgment.  Israel. America.

Merciful God.

We were driving from South Carolina to Vermont. I had brought along the book The Harbinger by Joseph Cahn, to help pass some of the seventeen hours in the car. Although impatient with the author’s repetitive narration, I was fascinated with the case he made for the warning of judgment on America. The chilling connection between the words of Isaiah 9:10 and the events of 9/11 were difficult to dismiss.

Linking bricks, hewn stone, sycamore trees and cypresses to Ground Zero and America’s foundations, Cahn couches the voice of a prophet in the form of a fictional narrative.

What if it’s true? What if God is really begging us to turn back NOW?

As Cahn asserts, we have lost sight of where our favor comes from. A people so deceived we don’t even recognize that the very words proclaimed from the nation’s capital as a show of our country’s strength are actually God’s words of judgment against Israel and possibly America’s defiance.

Superimposed on the scene in the car was the one outside. The rolling hills and white-fence horse pastures of the Virginia countryside, all topped with sunshine and fluffy clouds, showcased a land blessed with peace and beauty and favor. It was difficult to imagine it otherwise.

I took a break from reading and turned on the radio just in time to hear the announcement of the Supreme Court’s decision on Obamacare.  As upset as I was with Justice Roberts, I had to agree with his statement: “It’s not our job to protect the people from their political choices.”

No. We will all reap the consequences individually and collectively of our choices.

 Our choice to hand over our lives to the government control.

Our choice to remove all vestiges of God from public places.

Our choice of whether or not to “humble ourselves and pray, and turn from our wicked ways so that God would hear from heaven and forgive our sin and heal our land.’—2 Chronicles 7:14

We passed a lone billboard on the edge of a field. Its message simple: “You will meet God.”

One way or another, regardless of which choice we make.

I powered down my Nook and shut off the radio. What did these past moments of sobering reflection mean to me? 

As a child of God, I have been given the responsibility to be a bearer of truth, but so often have remained silent in the noise of the mockers, cowered in fear of loss of favor.

 God has equipped me, as well as all his children, to proclaim his glory, why should I fear?

We may live in times of encroaching darkness, but “the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”—John 1:5 

May those of us who walk with God, rouse ourselves, shake off our lethargy, and take up our appointed positions in such a time as this.