In every age, there are mockers who make fun of God and his creation. You may have heard them at times using their inexperienced, Biblical voices as they tell others how pathetic he is. Their minds float on a sea of unbelief, buoyed by the waves of anger and misconception. They don’t have a lick of scriptural wisdom so they cannot understand God’s desire for the people he created.

They say, how can God treat these people with hate? What the unbelieving folks don’t realize is that we were created for a special purpose. We who repented and believe agree to his conditions in exchange for his eternal care and protection; thus we receive an inheritance of life everlasting.

We will find one of those preaching points in the little book of Joel; 700-800 years before Christ. In this story, God is angry and is going to destroy Israel and all sinners who have rejected him. God is giving instructions to his “Preacher-Man-Joel” to help the people remember just who he is and how he expects them to live. Through all ages of rebellion, God has used natural and unnatural means to get Israel’s attention to bring them to repentance.

Graciously, God’s justice is only carried out in the next book, which is Amos. In Joel, there is a promise of forgiveness but in Amos, the time has been set and destruction cannot be reversed. “For three transgressions, and for four” he will not repeal his wrath. The people have gone too far. Scoffers ask again: Who does God think he is that he can do this? Well, he is the author of all life wanting to have a relationship with us.

Believers agree to his covenant because we know how weak we are and it is impossible to please God in our sinful state. We have to be made like him. That can only happen by asking for forgiveness, repenting and changing our worldly wants. In Genesis 3:10-19 sin caused mankind to fall from grace. From that fall, spiritual conditions were placed on the man and woman. In verse 15 a Messiah is promised; God says that there will always be war between repentant humans and satan. Alone, we are incapable of resisting the devil’s temptation. We do have a way out of our mess; Jesus is the only way, friends. We must believe his truth.