Longing for Zion in a foreign land

By Pastor Olalekan John Banjo

TEXT: PSALM 137:1-9, 79:1-13

ZION is a place of rest, a place of fulfillment, place of comfort; heaven where God dwells or sealed on earthly Jerusalem; inheritance or possession; everything good promised by God is in Zion. Foreign land—a place alien to Zion; Babylon, a place of lost glory; a place of discomfort; a place of sorrow. Jerusalem was destroyed by Babylon in 597-587 BC, then due to the atrocity of the Israelites which made God to send them into the land of their enemies.

The children of Israel were asked to sing their God’s song in a strange land of captivity, they could not sing because they were making jest of them. In captivity, at 70 year their God was mocked, God is saying go back to what you have being doing right before and start all over so that it will not be required at the wrong place at wrong time In Babylon, in slavery by the rivers of Babylon they cried because they ask them to sing before their small God Ezra 1:1-4 Judah after disobeying God’s several warning messages and taken into slavery, captivity they spent 70 years in the 538 BC, King Cyrus of Judah constructed a year close to the prophesied predicted year, the redemption of the Jew, the Jews to be released and allowed back to their land to serve their God.

Despite the economic value of the Israelite in the Babylon, King Cyrus ordered the release of the Israelite meaning God’s message from the beginning coming to pass after several years at 605 BC. When God gives warning, is for us to heed. The most dreaded thing in this world should be the warning of God because it could do anything.

The Israelites were the chosen ones, they went into captivity all because they heeded not the warning of God. Sorrow of the Jews in Babylon • By the rivers of Babylon (scouting for the inadequate that is scarcity ruling the day) • Weeping • Agony of remembering past comfort • No song writing, no praising nor worshipping as harps were hung • The song of Zion or Zion song which is for worship is turned to mere entertainment • Causing self-pains • They have already lost the beauty of the first temple, the older ones cried bitterly for it but it has gone when they returned from exile. SCAR is never like first flesh Alienation from God to you, AVOID EXILE!

The Gospel Faith Mission International, GOFAMINT

Bariga Assembly, 9, Ajenipa Street, Ladi-Lak, Bariga, Lagos

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