Background: Israel involved in idolatry, injustice, and in essence has broken their covenant with God. This results in consequences, submission to BAbylonian rule. The leadership, Zedekiah and others, will pay with their lives, however God made provision for the people.
8 "You shall also say to this people, 'Thus says the LORD, "Behold,I set before you the way of life and the way of death>.
9 "He who dwells in this city will die by the sword and by famine and by pestilence; but he who goes out and falls away to the Chaldeans who are besieging you will live, and he will have his own life as booty.
10 "For I have set My face against this city for harm and not for good," declares the LORD. "It will be given into the hand of the king of Babylon and he will burn it with fire."'
Jesus Christ prayed for Christians to be in the world but not of it (John 17). God has also set before us as well as the whole world the way of life (through Jesus Christ, John 14:6) and the way of death (the ways of the world=sin ==>death Romans 6:23, 5:12).
Because of our sinfulness, this world will pass away. Revelations and Jesus' prophecies about the end times discuss this matter. Unlike the Israelites, we don't have to surrender to a threatning army and worry about their intentions toward us. Many of us are not even under a "besieging" pressure. We have the opportunity to turn to Christ, and in doing so, we get more than our temporal lives as booty, but we get the power of God in our lives through the Holy Spirit and an eternal salvation that nothing on earth or in all of creation can take away.
Life or death. Eternal or temporal.
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