DAY 236 Read Ezekiel 29:1-16; 30:1-19; 2 Kings 25; 2 Chronicles 36:17-21; Jeremiah 52.
Today's reading: The persistent sins of God's people, despite repeated appeals for reformation and warnings of disaster, finally brought about their ruin. Beautiful Jerusalem was utterly broken up.
Memory gem: "How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become a widow!" (Lamentations 1:1).
Thought for today:
Over in England a man owned a great python. He had captured it when it was just a tiny snake in the jungle. And, as the snake grew into a large serpent, twelve to fifteen feet long, with power enough to crush a man in its coils, he demonstrated his power over it in public exhibitions. He had trained it to wrap itself around his body until nothing of the man showed except a part of his face. He would give the command: "Wind!" And the snake would wind itself around and around his body. Then he would give the command: "Unwind!" and the snake would unwind itself from his body. It obeyed him implicitly.
Someone remonstrated with him, "Someday that snake will fail to unwind itself, and will crush you to death."
But he only laughed. "I have had him ever since he was a baby. I can make him mind me. I am the master, and he must obey."
But there came a night when the man commanded the snake to wind about his body. It obeyed. And then he commanded it to unwind. The spectators saw a strange motion like a great wave over the snake--the man's eyes began to bulge--and people heard a dull, snapping sound as of bones breaking.
The snake had turned back to the law of the jungle. He had sensed the good meal that the thing he was wrapped around would make. The snake was still a snake--it had not changed.
And so it is with sin, friends--any sin!
NOTE: Evil Merodach (2 Kings 25:27 and elsewhere) is called Amel-Marduk in secular history. He was the son and successor of Nebuchadnezzar.
Today's reading: The persistent sins of God's people, despite repeated appeals for reformation and warnings of disaster, finally brought about their ruin. Beautiful Jerusalem was utterly broken up.
Memory gem: "How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become a widow!" (Lamentations 1:1).
Thought for today:
Over in England a man owned a great python. He had captured it when it was just a tiny snake in the jungle. And, as the snake grew into a large serpent, twelve to fifteen feet long, with power enough to crush a man in its coils, he demonstrated his power over it in public exhibitions. He had trained it to wrap itself around his body until nothing of the man showed except a part of his face. He would give the command: "Wind!" And the snake would wind itself around and around his body. Then he would give the command: "Unwind!" and the snake would unwind itself from his body. It obeyed him implicitly.
Someone remonstrated with him, "Someday that snake will fail to unwind itself, and will crush you to death."
But he only laughed. "I have had him ever since he was a baby. I can make him mind me. I am the master, and he must obey."
But there came a night when the man commanded the snake to wind about his body. It obeyed. And then he commanded it to unwind. The spectators saw a strange motion like a great wave over the snake--the man's eyes began to bulge--and people heard a dull, snapping sound as of bones breaking.
The snake had turned back to the law of the jungle. He had sensed the good meal that the thing he was wrapped around would make. The snake was still a snake--it had not changed.
And so it is with sin, friends--any sin!
NOTE: Evil Merodach (2 Kings 25:27 and elsewhere) is called Amel-Marduk in secular history. He was the son and successor of Nebuchadnezzar.
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