“When Nations are to perish in their sins,
'Tis in the Church the leprosy begins.”
God values nothing in a nation apart from His Church, for only regenerate people can rightly glorify God – and those that glorify Him not are useless dross, they render God no revenue of praise. God no longer values a professing Church where His truth is not acknowledged, for God cannot be glorified apart from a knowledge of His truth.
Therefore, when the church in a nation departs from the truth, God has no longer any cause to keep that nation in being. It was the fall of truth in the church in Israel that brought the overthrow of the whole land; God tells us so in Hosea chapter 4. Again when Jerusalem rejected the truth in the time of Christ there was nothing left to them but to be given over to the sword – as they were in 70 A.D. … As one old writer says, “When the gospel of peace removes, eternal peace goes with it, temporal peace flies after it; and whatsoever is safe, profitable, prosperous, takes wings and departs also …” God is not tied to any particular visible church, and will reject those who reject His truth, “Because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee.” The fall of the church is being followed, of necessity, by the fall of the nation, and there is but one hope, but one remedy, that is, that before the day of God's patience becomes the day of His wrath, He will, in mercy, revive His truth.
| This Page Title – Warning to the Churches The Wicket Gate Magazine "A Continuing Witness". Internet Edition number 98 – placed on line September 2012 Magazine web address – www.wicketgate.co.uk |