Tisha b'Av

Today is the 9th of the month of Av, the date on the Hebrew calendar when the first Jewish Temple was destroyed, only to be repeated many years later when the second Temple was destroyed and the Jewish people scattered throughout the world. Many, many other terrible things have happened on this date, but on this date the Jewish people mainly mourn the destruction of both the first and the second Temples on the 9th of Av.

Awhile back, a different year, the Lord gave the following to me, which at that time I sent out. This year, I was prompted to post it again.

Here's the word:

Is it to mourn a city and a Temple?

Or is it to mourn their rejection of their God?

Are we to weep for them?

Or do we weep for God ...who cried to them with such offers of grace and forgiveness, and that so many times, begging them not to go into destruction?

Concerning the destruction of the first Temple, they were foretold:

Thus says the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel:
Behold I will bring upon this city and upon all her towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, BECAUSE they have hardened their necks, THAT they might not hear my words.
Jeremiah 19:15

And many nations shall pass by this city, and they shall say every man to his neighbor, "Why has the Lord done thus to this great city?"
Then they shall answer, "BECAUSE they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God..."
Jeremiah 22:8-9

They lost their city and the first Temple BECAUSE they rejected their God.

Before the destruction of the second Temple they were foretold:

And when he was come near, he beheld the city and WEPT over it, saying:
"If you had known, even you, at least in this your day, the things which pertain unto your peace!
But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days shall come upon you, that your enemies shall cast a trench around you, and compass you around, and keep you in on every side; and shall lay you even with the ground, and your children within you; and they shall not leave in you one stone upon another, BECAUSE you knew not the time of your visitation."
Luke 19:41-44

This was fulfilled in 70 AD when they lost their city and their Temple BECAUSE they rejected his Son - His Son who had spent more than three years healing them, restoring their sight, casting out their demons, raising their dead.
But they rejected him. And that's why, HE said, they would lose their city and their Temple.

Shall we not, therefore, weep for their God who offered them all things and was rejected?

It is not that they were forsaken...

...but that HE was forsaken.

I say to America, and not only to America but to all nations: you are in danger of judgment for the same reason.

Repent, therefore. God does not desire that judgment come upon you, but it is at the doors!

Turn back to Him!