The Daily Fountain Daily Devotional of the Church Of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) 3 April 2020 – TOPIC: GUILTY OF BLOOD

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DATE: FRIDAY, APRIL 03, 2020
TOPIC: GUILTY OF BLOOD
READ: MATTHEW 23:29-38 (NKJV)

29. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous,
30. “and say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’
31. “Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.
32. “Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ [guilt.]
33. “Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell?
34. “Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: [some] of them you will kill and crucify, and [some] of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city,
35. “that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.
36. “Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.
37. ” O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under [her] wings, but you were not willing!
38. “See! Your house is left to you desolate;

THE MESSAGE:

The Scribes and Pharisees pretended to honour the Prophets of old who stood for righteousness and preached against the sins of Israel. These religious leaders honoured the martyred prophets by decorating their tombs; unfortunately they possessed the same spirit and character as those who had murdered the Prophets of God. They reverenced Abraham, Moses and Jeremiah but rejected the prophets who were living. They even rejected God’s Son, Jesus, who is the greatest Prophet. They schemed to murder Jesus and actually killed Him, proving that they were sons of those who murdered the prophets (verses 27 and 34). By this they made themselves hypocrites and guilty of blood as their forefathers.

Many religious leaders and followers today are guilty of the same sin. They appear to worship God by all forms of religious ceremonies. They condemn past and present sins in the government, family and the society at large, but are guilty of the same hypocritical lifestyles: Immorality, idolatry, murder, embezzlement, etc. This brings the guilt of those sins of blood of the forefathers to the present generation. We should demonstrate total repentance and separation from the sins of our forefathers who did not know God.

PRAYER: Lord deliver me from hypocritical lifestyles.