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Alliance With the Enemies Of God It is sad but it is true all too often people of today don’t give enough thought of whom they make friends with. God has given us plenty of warning concerning having “Alliance with the enemies of God”. Over and over you will find God warning His chosen people; the children of Israel to be careful with whom they made a covenant. I will only give a couple of illustrations: Ex 23:32 “Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.” Judg. 2:2 “And ye shall make no league with the inhabitants of this land; ye shall throw down their altars: but ye have not obeyed my voice: why have ye done this?” Surely we don’t think that God gave these commandments without a reason. We believe that every commandment that God has given to mankind was for the good of man; let us examine a few of God’s motives for giving such commandments! God explains His reason for not having a covenant with people other than their own in Exodus 23: 33: “They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.” We notice that God declared that these people would cause the children of Israel to “sin against Him”. We know that this did occur because many times the children of Israel did take up with the people of the land and they DID sin against God. That is the very reason that God told them not to even allow those who worshipped idols to dwell in their land. We know that not all of God’s children were evil people who only had their minds set on doing evil but they were “snared” into doing the same thing as those who dwelt among them. The Christian today must remember that Jesus said in John 15:19 that we are not of this world; therefore, we should not act as the world acts. Another reason we should not make “alliance with the enemies of God” is that it could lead us to begin to serve other gods” Deut. 7:4 “ For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods: so will the anger of the LORD be kindled against you, and destroy thee suddenly.” Let us remember that anything that we serve can become a god to us. This verse also gives a grave warning as it informs us that the “anger of the Lord” will be “kindled against us”! I cannot believe that anyone actually desires to have God’s anger against them because as Moses wrote here it will “destroy us.” The destruction will not just be in our lifetime here on earth but it will be eternally. Let us give serious consideration when we are choosing our friends and with those whom we take up allegiance. There is no excuse for ignorance because God’s Word has given us many warnings concerning the kind of friends we choose. The apostle Peter informed his readers since they were aware of the dangers of making friends with the wicked to be careful unless they be “led away” and take up the error of the wicked: 2 Pet. 3:17 Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own stedfastness. The real danger lies in the fact that we would lose our “steadfastness”. This can lead to all sorts of sin; many have been allured to forsake the assembly of the saints because of a “wicked” friendship. Friends let us be aware that just forsaking one of the services can lead to forsaking every assembly. The apostle Paul also gave a stern warning about the company we keep: 1 Cor 15:33 “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.” There is no difficulty in this writing; he who frequents the company of bad or corrupt men will soon be as they are. When you decide to take up company with any group or any person I suggest that you carefully look at them and make a decision and ask yourself “Do I want to become one of them” or “Do I want to be like they are”? If your answer is no it is time to move on and look elsewhere. Don’t be like a banana [I.e. one of the bunch]. Brethren, it does make a difference who we take alliance with. Let us take caution before joining any group or choosing our friends!
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