Are You Too Busy For God?

Issues2 – September 2017 – Grace & Truth Magazine

Are You Too Busy For God?

Sometimes we allow things of this world to crowd out time with and for the Lord. We skip our Bible reading, miss church meetings or forget to pray. This is not something new. Let’s consider a lesson from the Word of God. —Editor

In 2 Chronicles 36:21, when the threatened captivity of Judah had actually taken place, it is stated that this was “to fulfill the word of the L ORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her Sabbaths. As long as she lay desolate she kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years” ( NKJV ). It is impossible to overreach God. Selfish Judah, doubtless, reasoned that time would be gained and wealth more rapidly accumulated if the year of rest (Lev. 25:4) were allowed to pass unobserved. They had to learn the truth of the words, “Those who honor Me I will honor, and those who despise Me shall be lightly esteemed” (1 Sam. 2:30).

It has been much the same for many self-seeking children of God since. Time spent waiting on Him has been regarded as time lost. Many are too busy to give Him His portion. Business, pleasure – everything that begins and ends with self – must come first; leaving little or no time for Him. But He invariably balances things at last. Many a saint has spent long, weary months and years on a bed of languishing for the simple reason that the things of God were crowded out and neglected in days of health and vigor.

Yet, blessed be His name, as in the case of His earthly people, the days of captivity have been made to become days of great fruitfulness. It was in their subjection to the Babylonian bondage that Judah learned to hate idols. Never has the nation offended on that ground since. The seasons of the Lord’s chastening, or correction, are not lost times. Afterward they yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those exercised thereby. GT

This article was adapted from Jeremiah by H. A. Ironside, pp.122-123.