THE PUNISHMENT OF NATIONS -- Devotional for November 6, from "Good Seeds"

The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all nations that forget God (Psalm 9:17)

At this writing our nation is recoiling from the news of two separate incidents of senseless shootings of our own people by our own people within our own borders during peace time! Add to these the proliferation of suicide, poverty, broken homes, and now the failing economy and fractured government, of our nation, and we see what happens to a people who once knew their Maker, but now think they know better! A few years ago, just following a devastating hurricane, the daughter of Billy Graham was asked a question that would fit just as well our current circumstances: “How could God let something like this happen?” She gave this profound response: “I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are – but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. Being the gentleman that He is, I believe He has done just what we have asked. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?” We can’t have it both ways: once we’ve bidden God good riddance, He’s gone. But I haven’t rejected Him and, it’s my guess, neither have you! Today’s verse speaks of two human entities: individuals, “the wicked;” and large people groups, “all nations.” Just as people can only enter heaven one at a time, through the turnstile of faith in Jesus Christ, so they are condemned to hell one at a time, following each one’s rejection of whatever light of God’s truth he has received (see Romans 2:11-15). It isn’t nations, but individuals, that are damned or redeemed. When Abraham challenged God, “Will you indeed punish the righteous with the wicked?” (Genesis 18:23), the answer came in God’s sparing of Lot and his daughters from heaven’s firefall upon Sodom. Speaking of the Great Tribulation that will someday come upon the earth, Paul said, “God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Thessalonians 5:9). The Bible clearly teaches that a separation will be made between people who have sought the salvation, and therefore the protection, of God through Jesus Christ, and people who have chosen to take their chances on their own. But regarding nations, since they will not be punished in the next world for their sins, it must be that they are punished in this. If Israel was not exempt, why should America be? That ancient favored nation drifted far from God, and paid the awful price. Now a modern one so profoundly blest by Him is following that same path of the prodigal son. Are we not now eating the pods and feeling the pains that come from going astray? Ben Stein said, “I only hope we find God again before it is too late!”