Opened to Just the Right Bible Verse – God’s Forgiveness of our Wrongs

Sometimes when I sit down in a soft chair to settle my world by reading the Bible, I say a quick prayer to the Lord like, “Tell me what I need to hear, Lord”, and open to a page at random.  Today I closed my eyes and thumbed open to Zechariah 1:12-16.  It reads,

Then the angel of the LORD replied, “LORD of hosts, how long will you be without mercy for Jerusalem and the cities of Judah that have felt your anger these seventy years?”

To the angel who spoke with me, the LORD replied favorably, with comforting words.
The angel who spoke with me then said to me, Proclaim: Thus says the LORD of hosts:
I am jealous for Jerusalem
and for Zion intensely jealous.
I am consumed with anger
toward the complacent nations;
When I was only a little angry,
they compounded the disaster.
Therefore, thus says the LORD:
I return to Jerusalem in mercy;
my house will be rebuilt there
and a measuring line will be stretched over Jerusalem.

The first thing that struck me upon reading this was that it seemed to be the precise sequel in the movie to the prequel from last week’s Sunday reading at church.   How likely is that?  I opened at random!

On March 18, 2012, the official reading of the church was 2 Chron 36:14-16, 19-23.  It’s long, so I’ll summarize.

It was the story of God’s reason for imposing The Exile on Israel and Judah.  God reminded his people of all their hundreds of years of disobeying, despite God sending several prophets to lead them towards God...



(Read the rest at Wtness.org)