This is our first Lord’s Day worship service after the re-election of Barack Obama to the presidency. We will be considering the spiritual ramifications of this in some detail in the sermon next Lord’s Day, but a few things must be said now. Next Lord’s Day we will be examining how nations are brought to repentance.
In the meantime, remember that God is in control of absolutely everything. A man proposes, but God disposes. God loves His church and is in the process of bringing that church to her eschatological status of bridal loveliness. This is part of that history-long process. This is not an exception to it. Rest in God’s absolute sovereignty.
Second, it does not follow from this that the results of the election are a blessing for us. No, it is a very hard providence. The hardest thing about it was that we are saddled with a four-year extension of evil rule, and that evil rule was freely chosen by us in a relatively open and free election. I am not talking about the different strategies taken by those who opposed this evil, but rather about the fact that millions of people cast their vote for abortion, for sodomy, for statist piracy, and more. As Pogo put it famously, we have met the enemy, and he is us.
Third, as I mentioned, next week we will be considering how God brings nations to repentance. It begins with the word, and it ends with the rod. If we refuse instruction (Jer. 7:28), the Lord is fully capable of making us desolate (Jer. 7:34). In the meantime, as we believers seek to accomplish this by means of the word, the enemy will respond with counter-measures. They have words too. They limber up their tongues like they were bows of war, stretching them out so that they can shoot their lies (Jer. 9:3).
We have gotten to the point where it can be repentance, or it can be easy, but it can’t be both.