God of All

Today we end the day with God's Word to us. And we also end the latter half of the prophecies of Isaiah. I'm finishing chapter 66 today, starting with verse 15. Please don't miss out by not reading it yourself. Let God speak to you. This is especially relevant to me this week:

I will set a sign among them, and I will send some of those who survive to the nations--to Tarshish, to the Libyans and Lydians (famous as archers), to Tubal and Greece, and to the distant islands that have not heard of my fame or seen my glory. They will proclaim my glory among the nations. (v. 19)

In my current message series at One Life I'm speaking about Christ and World Religions--how do they relate? How should we approach differences of religion? Are there many paths to God? How could Jesus be the only way? This is one of many statements from God in the Bible that show that he has never been interested in just one nation. It was never just about Israel. It has never been just about the USA. God is the God of all nations. He loves every people group and wants them to know him.

Here he promises to send some of us--those who have seen the signs of God's love and grace in our lives and been changed--to take the word of his salvation to people of other nations and even remote islands that have never heard of him. This is far from the common idea that it's presumptuous to take our beliefs to other cultures and try to teach them about God and his Son, Jesus Christ. There is only one God and he wants to be known by all and to enter a relationship with every man, woman and child across this vast globe. And that requires us to be his messengers, his ambassadors, his representatives--though always with gentleness and respect (1 Peter 3:15).

Funny how he specifically mentions wanting to be known by the Libyans. I would guess that there aren't a lot of Americans very interested in taking the Good News of Jesus to Libya these days. I would venture that a lot of us would be rather apathetic to their standing with God. But God isn't. He loves them and wants them to know the truth about who he is and what he has done for them. Perhaps we could at least begin to pray for them?

Father, please open my heart to those nations and cultures and other groups of people that I tend to think little of. Please lay on my heart a burden of love for them so that I will pray for them and maybe even be used by you in some way to share with some of them the hope that I have found in you through Jesus. Amen!

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