Balancing the scales

God spoke through Obadiah a Wword of warning in the shortest book of the Bible. He warned the Edomites: "For the day of the Lord is near against all the nations. As you have done, it shyall be done to yu; your deeds shall return on your own head."

Or, as we say in Blond, La., what goes around comes around. What you do comes back to you. The sweetness of revenge isn't only served cold. Sometimes it it is handed out delightfully warm, as in served quickly before the memory runs away away.

"Your deeds shall return on your own head," God says.

For every sin, every mistake, every battle or war, God remembers. He forgets the forgiven. In this case, God remembers Edom's blatant attack against his chosen people. Edom made the incredibly horrific decision to back Babylon.

How, you might ask, does this apply to our own lives?

First, trust God instead of chariots. Trust God when things are going poorly.

Second, the Edomites should have turned to God. Their mistake was an obvious one. Who you gonna call? God says, let me have your prayers. I'll handle it.

But in their lowest moments, they backed the wrong horse. God is letting these people know that even in the moment of Israel's greatest despair, as Babylon pilages and takes away His people to this new land, there is hope. But the hope is not in the hands of man. God is telling his people that not only is there hope, but that God will do unto others as they have done unto Israel.

Will that take away the sting? Actually, no. They still are taken away. They still have 70 years of captivity to go. But there will come a day when captivity is no more.Eve

"Those who have been saved shall go up to Mount Zion to rule Mount Esau; and the kingdom shall be the Lord's."

I'm not sure that makes you estatic as you're being dragged in chains, but four years or so at least, it takes some of the sting away. Smile? Maybe. Laugh? Probably not. But in the end I sort of see a hidden but knowing grin on the faces of those Israelites. Every dog will have its day. Every d-o-g, now turned around backwards to spell g-o-d will have its day as well.

When the day begins poorly, G-o-d will have his day.
When the coffee is spilled and the day isn't going well,  G-o-d will have his day.
When the car won't crank, the mist falls on you and the car. G-o-d will have his day.
The tally is G-o-d one, everything else zero. The scales don't ever balance, but they don't have to. Believers have a tremendous ace in the hole. God's one is so much greater than everyone's one. In other words, G-o-d's one isn't balanced by m-y one. The scale isn't blanced at that point. But here's the key: Trust in Jehovah. The balance of the scales is out of whack, but that's okay, too. God is wonderful. His one is worth many of ours.

G-o-d will have his day. It's called the day of the Lord for a special reason. His day. Not our day.

Heard anything of the Edomites lately?

Didn't think so.