Voice of the Kingfisher speaks out …from a different perspective
by Elinor Montgomery
You shall have no Other Gods before Me
February 02, 2011
“You shall have no other gods before Me (Exodus 20:3).” God had just declared in the previous verse that He was the One who had brought Israel out of the land of Egypt. He was the same God who took His people into the Promised Land.
Of the approximately 2,000,000 men, women and children who were taken out of Egypt, only two adult men, along with all the males under 20 years of age at the time of the Exodus and the women and children, actually entered the Land. There were just two of the twelve spies representing each tribe sent into the Land to spy it out, who returned willing to obey God and challenge the enemy to battle within the Land.
Once in the Land, God forbade His people to allow any of the pagan nations who worshiped false gods to remain with them. He gave even a stronger command that they were to kill them all, men, women and children, along with all of their animals, so that not a trace of them would be left to contaminate their relationship with God. God was saying that there was no room in His Land for the idol worshipers of religion, who did not know His truth. In other words, there was no room among God’s people for the enemy of God who was a son of the beast and a Satan worshiper.
Now, God will take spiritual Israel into another wilderness out of a religious world, which would consume His people, if they were to remain within the religion of Christianity and, by so doing, become closely allied to the State. He will break the stronghold of the last empire of Rome upon His people, who have been chained to religion. The Lord will separate His true apostolic church unto Himself, so that only He and His Word will rule over her. Thus, God brought His people of spiritual Israel, who were seeking freedom from religious tyranny, to America.
This was a land to be tamed by the Puritans, whose commission was to spread the gospel of truth. This could not happen if they allowed the people to have other gods in this land alongside of the one true God, so all immigrants were required to swear allegiance to God on the Book of truth before entering this new land of the untamed wilderness. God expected His people to honor their partnership role with Him by subduing the land, tilling the earth and taking authority over the beast (see Genesis 1:28).
“You shall not make for yourself any carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them (Exodus 20:4-5).” So, did we obey this, His second commandment, in this great land? It has been a gift from God for His church to demonstrate His light of liberty to the world.
We never tore down the pagan native totem poles, raised up in mysticism and the worship of pagan gods. Instead of encouraging the natives to know the one true God, we placed them on reserves, marginalized them from society and did not teach them truth. We stole the children from their parents, forcing them into institutions, which harmed the children, instead of helping them to remain within their families. We served neither the natives nor God, and can now see the disaster such treatment brought to these people. We believe that honoring their totem poles honors them as we continue to play the fool before God.
Israel and America broke the first two commandments in a land in which they had God’s commandments as their Law. Both nations chose to have ruler-ship, other than from God, by adopting their own man-made laws in place of God’s Law. Then their peoples developed immoral modes of behavior, totally contrary to the Law of God.
Pornography today fills the airways and homes of America, with the Bible having been removed from the schoolroom as if it were a source of evil, and evil is not only permitted but is taught in the same classrooms as though it were good for the children. Their innocence and former disciplined behavior have been replaced by vulgarity and lack of discipline in a milieu where children are exposed to adult sexual behavior when still in nursery school.
America has become a disgrace to her God and a place suitable for jackals to roam. Her wicked towers of trade with nations in darkness needed to be leveled, for God wanted us separated from the other nations in liberty. How could one do business with governments, such as China, when they neither honor God, nor practice any degree of human rights for either their people or the foreigners in the land? God will use the world trade we have embraced with these countries to allow this nation to be riddled with debt, which will ultimately destroy her.
Israel saw the back hand of God for her iniquity, and now America is going to feel the same strike of His hand. Do not think you can slight God by removing Him from the life of the nation without receiving His wrath. A God who is loving and merciful is also a God of discipline. If His children do not respond to discipline, then that which was intended as a blessing will become a curse. The relationship between spiritual Israel and the Father will cease to exist and what was to be the house of Israel will no longer be part of the family of God, the Father.
With the second giving of the Law, God said He would circumcise the hearts of Israel’s descendants rather than circumcise the nation in the flesh as previously required with the first giving of the Law. The second time, it was, in fact, intended for the spiritual nation. He wanted His people to love the Lord their God with all their hearts and with all their souls, so that they might live. The church was to make her own exodus from the religious world, by coming out from under institutional controls in obedience, faith and truth, choosing to believe the Word of God rather than the lies of Satan (see Deuteronomy 30:6). Hebrewness has nothing to do with this covenant being fulfilled by Jesus and His church.
America, hear this! “See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil, in that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments, His statutes, and His judgments, that you may live and multiply; and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you go to possess. But if your heart turns away so that you do not hear, and are drawn away, and worship other gods and serve them, I announce to you today that you shall surely perish; you shall not prolong your days in the land which you cross over the Jordan to go in and possess. I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live (Deuteronomy 30:15-19).”
The land sworn to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their descendants has not yet been possessed by the descendants of the inheritance. The rainbow covenant made with Noah and passed to Joseph was fulfilled in Jesus and will be complete when the bride, as the restored apostolic church, once again separates from religion to be washed clean and made pure by the Word. After she completes her witness with the Spirit, calling those who can hear to come out of liberalism and the controls of religion to stand only on the solid rock foundation of truth, then Jesus shall raise her up in the cloud, just as He went up in the cloud after the resurrection and His final appearing to His own.
At this time, the final and terrible time of tribulation will come, as God’s judgment falls on a sinning world in darkness and rebellion to the truth. Jesus will return with His blessed saints to rule and reign in the Land. Then and only then will Israel take full possession of the Land as was required by God when He brought the nation out of Egypt.
What Israel failed to do, the church will complete. The church will be blessed with the treasures of heaven and the curse of sin being removed once and for all time. The kingdom will come and God’s will, will be done on earth as it is in heaven. The question is, will you enter the Land or will you be lost in the wilderness of testing, as were the spies who refused to obey God and engage the enemy in battle?
How does one have no other gods before God? One must love truth more than the lie. Eve said, “No” to truth, and in so doing, she rejected the God of truth for the lie. All of mankind is birthed of her sin nature, and by nature hates the truth. Getting rid of the Bible is the fastest way Satan knows for taking the truth away from our children so they will bow down to him, and have another god before God. It is time to stop bowing down to idols and gods in this the land of America ruled by our God, the one and only God of truth.