A Heavenly Citizenship
Commentary for the February 14, 2026, Sabbath School Lesson
"Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised." Job 1:21
All too often in this world, great power comes with great arrogance. The wealthy forget that childbirth for the poor and the powerful is the same. Pain and blood are the lot of both child and mother, and the child is dependent upon the adults that surround it, for it has nothing to sustain it, and the child of rich and poor alike would wallow in misery and filth if left to its own devices. Some children grow up to understand how much they owe to others for life and the advantages that brought them to adulthood and model those same behaviors to their own children. While on the other hand, others grow up with a sense of entitlement to advantage where anything not immediately claimed by others is theirs by right, and even those things that can be wrested from others because they do not have the strength to prevent such appropriation are theirs as well. Such a person may spend their entire life grasping for what others hold, avaricious desire ruling out any factual basis in need.
History is replete with both types of people. The first type is may even be murdered by the second type because their charity and compassion condemn the latter for their greed and cruelty and the rage of the powerful burns hotly, especially when others point out the differences between saint and sinner. The power of the sinner is challenged when humanity is drawn to the compassionate, leaving the haughty surrounded only by sycophants. If they cannot compel the people to abandon the saint and return to worship their own venality, they will imprison and even kill the saint as they did with John the Baptist, the apostles Paul and Peter, and the prophet Isaiah. This they have continued to do to the present. A man will strike a woman to the ground and when another man assists her to her feet, will murder that compassionate person for daring to ameliorate the trauma caused by the evil man's act. Disavowing their responsibility for such a bloody act, they will blame the saint for causing his own death, asserting the claimed right of every oppressor to make their account the official version, and devil take the one who does not accept it.
John the Baptist challenged wicked King Herod Antipas for stealing his brother Philip's wife, Herodias. For speaking truth to power, she had John beheaded. Paul and Peter both denied the divinity of the Roman Caesars and were executed by Nero for their temerity. The prophet Isaiah rebuked King Manasseh, son of Hezekiah for his unbridled wickedness and murders that had filled Jerusalem with innocent blood from one end to the other. Manasseh had him sawn in two in a hollow tree trunk where he had been hiding from the evil king's wrath. The prophet Habakkuk cried out to God asking why he was indifferent to such evil. The saints have suffered so much at the hands of the wicked that this has become a common lament, even an excuse for denying the existence of God. But God revealed that he was doing something about the problem. Ironically, when Habakkuk learned whom God was calling up to deal with the evil in Jerusalem, he asked how he could use such people who were even worse than the Jews? The prophet decided it is better to keep silent and let God deal with evil than to try to call up an immediate response to evil.
The wicked believe that they alone have the right to ride upon the high places of the earth, and all must do obeisance to them. They claim godlike ownership of everything. The Pharoah who claimed the right to enslave all the Israelites in Egypt lived as a god on the largesse that had been accumulated when the Israelite slave, Joseph, centuries before, used a seven-year famine to transfer the ownership of all the land in Egypt, save that owned by the priests, to Pharoah. He felt untouchable when he drove those Israelites to build his treasure cities and they cried out under his oppression. Eventually, God brought forth Moses to deliver the people. But Moses had been raised in Pharoah's palace and was taught that killing those who oppose you is the answer, and he acted accordingly when he killed his first Egyptian. However, he learned that violence only produces a violent response from those who are used to prevailing against all opposition. Decades later he had learned that God is deliverer and the oppressed need only be still to see his deliverance. (Exodus 14:14) Pharoah and his host seeking to recapture the escaped slaves and going forth as a mighty army, met death and defeat instead, not from the Israelites, but from God who will not be gainsaid.
Later another ruler, also feeling himself omnipotent, arose to rule over Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar became God's special project, and four Jewish boys were instrumental in his education. He dreamed of a statue with a head of gold, chest and arms of sliver, belly of brass, and legs of iron. (Daniel 2) While no one could show him the import of the dream, Daniel and his three friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego prayed to God, and Daniel was able to decode the statue for the king. He revealed that the head of gold represented Babylon and Nebuchadnezzar and each of the remaining metals represented lesser kingdoms to follow. The king understood Daniel's interpretation to be correct and rewarded him. However, he was unwilling to admit that any other kingdom would eventually follow Babylon. To further that point of view, he constructed a statue all of gold and demanded that all bow down before the statue to demonstrate acceptance of the official view regarding his kingship and the future of Babylon. (Daniel 3) Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused. The king, in a rage over their obdurance, sought to burn them alive. When they were delivered unharmed from the fire, he was forced to admit that there was a power greater than his, and he spared their lives.
But not everyone is spared the martyr's death then or now. John the Revelator speaks of these when the fifth seal is opened in (Revelation 6:9-11) as martyred souls under the altar in heaven crying out for God to take vengeance on their behalf. But God tells them that there are more yet to be martyred before the end. The mighty of the earth have long opposed the Kingdom of God, beginning with Cain who slew his brother Abel and continuing to the present with every innocent gunned down in our streets or imprisoned in our hellish, modern dungeons where torture and mental and physical abuse abound. We read of conditions before the Noahic flood where every thought of humanity was only evil all the time. (Genesis 6:5) And Jesus told his disciples it will be like Noah's day again before he returns. (Matthew 24:37-39) Not only will evil be unrestrained, but people will be living their lives as though everything is normal despite it being anything but.
Some have opined that the United States has a significant part to play in all of this. Among these are those who think that part is to establish some kind of holy kingdom for God, an empire of crusader knights conquering the world for Christ. But God has not called us to seek wealth and power in this world. We are to leave as we came, with nothing. But despite billions having died through the centuries with no one able to take anything with them beyond death's door, many, even among those who profess to follow Christ nonetheless grasp all the power and wealth they can, even claiming they are doing it for God. But while they are busy grabbing at the golden ring on the carousel ride of life, oblivious to the fact that the ride will eventually end, they will discover that the gold is only brass. All whom they have trampled in the process will be a chain of witnesses against them on that day when our deeds bear fruit for either the joy of eternal life or the finality of death.
As a nation, the United States has a higher percentage of its population in prison than almost every other country. We have honored the strong preying upon the weak for so long, it has become a way of life with people living in fear of those who would take what they have, even their lives. But that fear is not only the fear of common robbers and thieves. We have come to feel the fear that other nations have been feeling for a long time, the fear that even their government, taken over by oligarchs, will take the lives of the innocent and call it justified. Evil stalks the earth and goes unpunished as the powerful prey upon the weak with kidnapping, murder, rape, and pedophilia. The crimes against children are the most unconscionable of all. And instead of justice for those victimized, the law has been bent toward vengeance against those who dare to speak truth to power. As John revealed, the number of those to be martyred in our streets is not yet full. When it is, God will speak, and as John also said, the powerful will beg for the mountains and the rocks to fall upon them and hide them from the face of God. (Revelation 6:15-17)
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