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Social injustice in the Old Testament prophets
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To discuss the topic of idolatry, social injustice, and religious ritualism, it is not hard to find out that there are many examples in the Holy Bible that teach people about the Sin of Idolatry, social injustice, and religious ritualism. Some of the prophets who were chosen by God, such as Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jonah, Micah and Hosea, are good examples of those issues. God used those people and their stories to teach other people about His words and His will. First, the sin of idolatry. It is easy to figure out that the word idolatry often shows up in the whole Bible. According to Easton’s 1897 Bible Dictionary, the word of idolatry is explained as the religious worship of idols. The author assumes that the meaning of idolatry in this aspect …show more content…
It was a huge problem in Israel by that time. But God did not allow it to grow, He showed His judgement for not being social justice according to the laws of Moses. It is not hard to find in Ezekiel 16. “As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, your sister Sodom and her daughters never did what you and your daughters have done. Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen (Ezekiel 16: 48-50).” It is a great example that people could see God’s divine judgment. From Moses laws, it is clearly that the better to do is to help, and God did bless those who bless the less fortunate. There is another example in Ruth 2, Boaz blessed Ruth and telling her that “You will listen, my daughter, will you not? Do not go glean in another field, nor go from there, but stay close by my young women (Ruth 2:8).” However, Israel failed in this test, and they suffered God’s punishment because of that. It could be even more obvious during modern time. Sometimes, God set up a tiny goal that He wants His people to achieve. But His followers did not follow Him as His wished. Because of the technology developing so fast, it is easier for nowadays people being not socially. People use social media to contact with each other, when they are ten centimeters from each other. …show more content…
From the beginning of Genesis till the end of Revelations, none could deceive God. God gave people the knowledge, God gave people everything that they need to follow Him and fulfill His command. For example, God gave Moses enough details for rituals that were about to happen in a specific time and location, and even the reason why what was going to happen would take place. God gave His people a chance that to show their obedience to His ways and show those rituals, sacrifice and offering to Him. Instead of following Him, people chose to follow their hearts, which made them became sinners, and became the subject for God’s judgment. But He loved His creations so much, He sent out His only son to the world to wash human being’s sins away. In Hosea 6:6, “For I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings (Hosea 6:6).” God always wants His people to follow Him with their full heart. The only way to God is through His son Jesus. He promised people if they accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, He would bless them. It is such a powerful promise which should passed by
You see, as the story of God develops, we begin to notice that God is not primarily aimed first and foremost at social reform. Now, don’t get me wrong, this is a GOOD THING—however it is not God’s primary goal. Jesus is ushering a kingdom that cannot be shaken and in this kingdom slavery is eradicated. However, first Jesus is working on kingdom people. Before he redeems the whole world and ushers in a new heaven and new earth (Revelation 21) he first is ushering in a new people—Christians…and you see, the social reform this world desperately needs is enacted BY Christians who have first been redeemed
The Exodus of the Israelites is the equivalent to our present day Fourth of July or Bastille Day to the French. Israelite writers discuss the Exodus the most out of any other event in history. The story of the Exodus is one of the most famous stories of the Old Testament. Three of the most significant aspects of the story of Exodus are the call of Moses, the use of plagues as miracles, and the Passover.
“I intend, therefore, to build a temple for the Name of the Lord my God, as the Lord told my father David, when he said, ‘Your son whom I will put on the throne in your place will build the temple for my Name,” (1 Kings 5:5 NIV). After the death of David, around 970 BCE, his son Solomon wanted to expand Jerusalem, the religious capital of the world (Freedman 355). David was dearly loved by God, so much so that God described David as “a man after My own heart.” However, God would not allow David to build Him a Temple because David was a man of war. God had told David that when Solomon became King, he would build a great Temple in the name of the Lord. Also referred to as the Jerusalem Temple and the First Temple, Solomon’s Temple was located on Mount Zion, just north of the city of David (Parrot 498). The rectangular Temple was roughly 165 feet by 84.5 feet in dimensions (Freedman 355). The construction of the Temple dates back to around 10th Century BCE and took about thirty years to complete. Due to the delivering of the Ark of ...
Justification is the work of God where the moral rightness of Jesus is given to the sinner, so the sinner is declared by God as being morally right under the Law. This moral rightness is not earned or kept by any effort of the saved. Justification is an immediate event with the result being never-ending life. It is based completely and only upon Jesus' sacrifice on the cross ("and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to moral rightness; for by His wounds you were healed.") and is received by faith alone ("For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast."). No works are necessary at all to get Justification. Otherwise, it is not a gift ("For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is everlasting life in Christ Jesus our Lord."). Therefore, we are justified by faith ("Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.").
For instance, Leviticus 25:35 states, “’if your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, and he shall live with you” (ESV). As a Christian, a person is called to help those who are struggling, and speaks of giving everything a person has to help those around him or her. According to the Jacob Riis film, citizens turned a blind eye to all those suffering, without a home or food. It also states in Proverbs 22:2, “…the rich and the poor meet together; the Lord is the maker of them all” (ESV). God created everyone on the Earth, and did not create one group to feel superior over another. The last passage that represents the other half is Proverbs 28:6, “ Better is poor man who walks in his integrity than a rich man who is crooked in his ways” (ESV). A man can be as poor as can be, but wealth does not make you better in the eyes of God.
The Western church is described as being smaller in land mass, and less diverse (Shields, & Butzu, 2007, p. 103). The Eastern church is described as being quite vast, and full of different types of people (each with their own languages and customs that had an effect on the development of their worship styles and methods). Further we discover that the West had celebrated a time of peace (Christianity was legal, so there was a significant decrease in martyrdom), conversely the Eastern church was geographically located closely to an Islamic population, which meant it had a large military in comparison to the West. I should also point out that there was a shift in this time-period of the church providing what can be described as a governmental role, so in a very practical way being a bishop in the East could mean sending troops to defend members of your church (Shields, & Butzu, 2007, p. 103).
The redemption that mostly played out in the New Testament in a part of the New Covenant found in Jeremiah 31:33, “‘or this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” This covenant is also known as the permanent covenant, because God promised to write it on our hearts, and because God laid out His plans for the coming of Christ. The coming of Jesus was prophesied early in the Bible, and according to Williams Rainey Harper in his journal, Micah 5 told of the coming of Christ. The journal states, “A cornerstone shall be established in Zion; and out of Bethlehem from the line of David shall come a righteous ruler, who shall lead Judah against the Assyrians.” These verses in Micah also solidify the prophecy made by Nathan in 2 Samuel 7. Jesus is the Son of God, and He is from the lineage of David, He was born to atone for the sins of mankind. When Jesus first came to earth, and was declared to be the Son of God people did not believe Him. The Resurrection of Jesus and the Hope of Immortality states, “…significance for believers or for all men is considered to depend logically upon the similarity of Jesus to other men and is weakened in the degree in which he is considered unique as the Son of God, the second person in the Trinity.” While it is sometimes hard to understand, God fulfilled the New Covenant. Jesus died on a cross, so we are forgiven our sins. His blood was the price of our sins. The most well known Bible verse John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” His death promised us an eternal
Sanctification is the process of being made Holy. In the process of being made holy, the life of the believer is changing. The believer begins to slowly and painfully (mentally, Romans 12:2) go from living of the flesh, to living a life of the spirit. The process of being made Holy comes at the work of justification, the works of Jesus Christ. We can only produce what is Holy, by allowing what is Holy (Jesus Christ) to change our lives (1 Corinthians 1:30) salvation, than after salvation God immediately begins to work to change our lives so that we can represent Him. Looking into the Old Testament and New Testament, we can see the major emphasis on the works of sanctification on the God's children lives.
In Judaism, God is seen as having a contractual relationship with the Jewish people where they must obey his holy laws in return for their status of the chosen people. God rewards or punishes Jewish people based on whether they obey or disobey his will. In parts of the Old Testament, however, God does show mercy or forgiveness, and in later interpretations God’s laws such as the Ten Commandments are followed not only out of loyalty to God but also because of their high moral character.
All throughout the Old Testament there is a cycle: sin - judgement - cry/prayer - deliverance - reject God again. Think about it. It is almost in any Bible story that you have ever been told. Even in creation, Adam and Eve sinned, God brought judgment, they both cried out in shame and despair, God delivered them and removed them from the garden, only for their son Cain to reject God by killing his brother Abel and the cycle begins again. Think about the story of Jonah and the big fish. Jonah ran away and did the opposite of what God had sent him to do, then he got swallowed by a fish. Jonah realised what he had done and he cried out to God, God delivers him and he gets spat back out of the fish. He does what God tells him to do and the cycle continues. Just like we disobey our parents, the people of Israel disobeyed God. Then they would bring judgment upon themselves and get themselves into trouble, they would cry out for deliverance. God saves them once again and they are happy with God and themselves, then they disobey again.
This is a hard question. How can one come to grips with what the Bible seems to teach and with the desire in our hearts? Does not the Bible teach that Jesus is a loving God that wants all to go to heaven? How can a loving God send anyone to hell? If Christ indeed sends some to hell how can we say He is loving? These are all great question and ones that are hard to answer but there is an answer. God does everything He does, for a reason (Romans 8:28), and God does want all to come to Him (John 1:12; Romans 3:10).
Throughout the New Testament readers can also observe the culture and laws given to the Jewish people. Most of the New Testament refers to Jesus adulthood and there is no recollection of his birth. In the New Testament, there was talk about his ministry and gathering of disciples. There wasn’t really any use of pathos within the bible until the Gospel of Mark. In this passage Jesus was asked which commandment was the most important and that people have to love God first before they can show any love towards other people. This passage explains the need to love and how it affects the world’s problem when people do not reconcile to God. No peace will be found if everyone is rebelling against God.
Some argue that God allows the destruction of countries to occur out of hate towards mankind. This argument possesses some truth. However, God warrants the downfall of nations not because of His hate of people, but because of His intolerance towards their sinful actions. If God allowed nations to continue on in their iniquities without any kind of repercussions, then no one would fear Him. People would embrace sin and reject the Lord. God maintains His supremacy over man through punishment of the wicked. Nevertheless, God does not always destroy the unrighteous immediately and without warning. The Old Testament records a profuse amount of situations in which the Lord sends a messenger to admonish sinful nations and to alert them of the impending condemnation. Whether or not they accepted the warning and turned...
Even though God saw people as evil, he wanted to show his grace. He wanted to separate certain people in the world as His chosen people. “He wanted a chosen people: 1. To whom He might entrust the Holy Scriptures. 2. To be His witness to the other nations. 3. Through whom the promised Messiah could come” (Mears 47). This covenant is made between God and Abram. This covenant marks the beginning history of Israel, God’s chosen people.
There are five aspects of covenant. For the purposes of this paper I am going to be referring to primarily the new covenant that is offered us through Jesus. The first aspect is the parties involved. There are two parties: God and the elect. Unlike the old covenant, the elect goes beyond the Jews. It also includes the gentile, or non-Jew in all the nations. This is one aspect of covenant that has helped shape my worldview. I have spoken to people who believe that God only selects a few privileged people to be saved, and condemns the rest to eternal punishment in hell. I now wholeheartedly believe this to be completely false, and even a heresy. In John 3:16 God uses the phrase “panta ta ethne” which means “all the nations.” There are other places in scripture, for example, when Paul says in Romans 1:16, “I am not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes…” He clearly says ‘everyone who believes’ not leaving anyone out. There are places in scripture, such as Ephesians 1:11 that talk about things which are predestined for believers. This verse is commonly taken out of context by those who believe in predestination. He has indeed planned out things He wants those in covenant relationship to accomplish for His kingdom once we accept Jesus and make Him Lord of our life. He does not, however, make the choice beforehand to save some, and damn some to hell! God created us in His image, therefore we have also been given the gift of free will to choose to love Him or love the world. This is the depraved condition of mankind in our fallen state.