12Then beware lest thou forget the LORD, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. 13Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God, and serve him, and shalt swear by his name. 14Ye shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the people which are round about you; 15(For the LORD thy God is a jealous God among you) lest the anger of the LORD thy God be kindled against thee, and destroy thee from off the face of the earth. 16Ye shall not tempt the LORD your God, as ye tempted him in Massah. 17Ye shall diligently keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and his testimonies, and his statutes, which he hath commanded thee. 18And thou shalt do that which is right and good in the sight of the LORD: that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest go in and possess the good land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers,
Often times I have come to this very scripture and have felt the same puzzling feeling as some may feel this very moment;
"Wait, how can God be jealous?" There are many scriptures that restate this fact throughout scripture. Nahum 1:2 states... 2 God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth, and is furious; the Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies. Or in Joshua 24:19 it says,
“And Joshua said unto the people, Ye cannot serve the LORD: for he is an holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins.” We often times puzzle at the thought of our God being jealous, after all, to us jealousy is a bad thing. We think about that time in our life where we dealt with peers who were jealous of us, never ceasing to leave us alone, but persistent in trying to uproot our security in whatever it was they were jealous about. Or what about that jealous wife or husband that insists that we spend more time with them; Searching our belongings, or following us wherever we go to make sure no one is taking us away from them. There is a paralleling scripture that speaks about God being likened to a husband in James 4:4-6
"Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. 5 Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy [1]6 But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.
I can relate. There has been countless times where jealousy to me was a bad trait. In the oxford dictionary, to be Jealous means feeling angry or unhappy because somebody you like or love is showing interest in somebody else. Examples given are as follows;
a jealous wife/husband
So, with everything pointing to Jealousy as a horrid trait in someone we usually are dedicated to, such as a spouse, then how can it be a good thing to serve a god who is jealous?
This answer didn't come to me until now. A year ago, as a backsliding lukewarm christian, I departed from the church in search of my purpose. This search led me through many pathways including Hinduism, Buddhism, Hare Krishna, and eventually the conscious community of Baltimore MD, and New Age Ideas and beliefs. I admit, I fell head first. I was captivated by the array of cultural principals and ideologies that I thought fit my own. I was mesmerized by the array of cultural food dishes, and hairstyles, and Afro centrist clothing that made me feel like I belonged. But most of all, the peace I felt I had attained, the daily routine of sun-gazing and meditation felt like I was finally connected to my soul. It wasn't until my husband and I began to follow a group called, "Galighticus, that we seen the dark side to this otherwise earthly bliss. We were being led into the worship of other Gods through Channeling messages, sharing dreams, burning ancestor money, and even obtaining statues of Deities and honoring past lifetimes. We had fallen outside of the grazing meadows of our true shepherd, Jesus Christ. It was then, that God became Our Jealous God. He sought us out in the midst of such darkness and confusion. He led us to see this spiritual leader for who he really was. He began charging his clients over $3000 just to speak to him, and double that amount to go to seminars. God began pointing out the spirit of Greed in his messages of manifestation. We couldn't deny God's internal alarms sounding off in our conscience. But that's not all! God not only made it evident to us what we were taking such delight in and away from him to adore, but he also sent messengers to come and get us. We began meeting people in the truth who were sharing the gospel. The messages they were sharing just so coincidentally matched the messages of Deuteronomy 28 and God's anger towards the worship of other Gods. He did not stop there. He pursued us until we could no longer help but to question all we were learning. In fact, while studying with our dear Hare Krishna brothers and sisters, we read from the Bhagavad Gita itself that "The supreme lord was the only true lord to be worshiped, and to worship him through other deities was false."
That's when we knew we had fallen away from our God. That's when we knew we were outside of the boundaries of his protection and his light. We eagerly began studying scripture. What we found was everything we needed to understand what danger we had gotten ourselves into. But most of all, like Revelations 2:4... We had abandoned our first love.
How could we have went so far in pursuit of peace and happiness, that we forgot about the one who created it? How could we have gotten so mesmerized by the outward appearance of more than one god, that we forgot about 2 Timothy 3:3-8
3 But know this: that in the last days, grievous times will come. 2 For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemers, disobedient to parents,unthankful, unholy, 3 without natural affection, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, not lovers of good, 4 traitors, headstrong, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 holding a form of godliness, but having denied its power. Turn away from these, also. 6 For some of these are people who creep into houses and take captive gullible women loaded down with sins, led away by various lusts, 7 always learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 8 Even as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind, who concerning the faith are rejected.
Jesus himself even stated that many would come in his name with false doctrines that would even deceive his elect, but that he warned us beforehand so that we would not be deceived.
For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.
We were that elect being deceived. We were those sheep being led to the slaughter. I am so grateful that our God, The Great I Am, is a Jealous God. I am so grateful for the mercies of his salvation, for him dying on the cross for us to have grace. I am so grateful for Jesus Christ's mercy and love for us that he would go out of his way to make sure that no one can pluck us from his hands...Like John 10:27-29 says...
It is because of his jealousy for us that he has reached down into the darkness of confusion to draw us back to him. It is because of his husbandry that he has enforced our belonging to him in such a jealous way as to snatch us out of the fire of deceit that leads to death, to a reprobate mind, and eternal life without God,...
