So I have read through chapters 26-28 for a second week, and there is a lot to unpack.
Chapter 26
The first verse that caught my eye, because of the many ways the different versions put it, was verse 11. Let me find one that is like in my paper Bible:
(MKJV) Jehovah, Your hand is lifted up, they will not see; but they shall see and be ashamed for their envy toward Your people. Yes, the fire of Your enemies shall devour them.
But see, this verse was just talking about how great Israel's God was- and how THEY weren't paying attention. But several other versions, including the ESV, work it like this:
Isa 26:11 O LORD, your hand is lifted up, but they do not see it. Let them see your zeal for your people, and be ashamed. Let the fire for your adversaries consume them.
The fire, reserved for Israel's enemies, is going to end up burning the Jews who won't recognize God- a common theme in these chapters. And why is God so angry? Among other reasons, there's a particularly 'delightful' one on their failing to bring Him to the world:
Isa 26:17 Like a pregnant woman who writhes and cries out in her pangs when she is near to giving birth, so were we because of you, O LORD;
Isa 26:18 we were pregnant, we writhed, but we have given birth to wind. We have accomplished no deliverance in the earth, and the inhabitants of the world have not fallen.
Martin paraphrase: We thought we were giving birth, but only farted. As a result, the deliverance of the world from hell was NOT accomplished by them. Which put me in mind of a complaint Jesus gave to the Pharisees:
Mat 23:15 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.
Robertson's Word Pictures points out that, in Jesus' day there were two kinds of proselytes: Those "of the gate", who for good motives recognized the Hebrew God and would become circumcised Jews, and "a very small percentage" that became members of the Pharisee party. Again, God dividing between Jews in spirit and Jews of blood.
The chapter closes in an echo of Revelation 12, with God making a place of safety for His people before the others are destroyed:
Isa 26:20 Come, my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourselves for a little while until the fury has passed by.
Isa 26:21 For behold, the LORD is coming out from his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity, and the earth will disclose the blood shed on it, and will no more cover its slain.
Rev 12:5 She gave birth to a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne,
Rev 12:6 and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which she is to be nourished for 1,260 days.
Chapter 27
I love Isaiah's description of Satan:
Isa 27:1 In that day the LORD with his hard and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea.
Again, an echo of Revelation 12:
Rev 12:9 And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world--he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
And again, a promise for deliverance for Egypt and Assyria:
Isa 27:12 In that day from the river Euphrates to the Brook of Egypt the LORD will thresh out the grain, and you will be gleaned one by one, O people of Israel.
Isa 27:13 And in that day a great trumpet will be blown, and those who were lost in the land of Assyria and those who were driven out to the land of Egypt will come and worship the LORD on the holy mountain at Jerusalem.
Chapter 28
This monumental chapter brings home the accusation against the Jews who won't recognize Messiah, giving them a new, derisive name:
Isa 28:1 Ah, the proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim, and the fading flower of its glorious beauty, which is on the head of the rich valley of those overcome with wine!
"The drunkards of Ephraim"- they are drunk on the 'strong delusion' God gave them for rejecting Him. This is the delusion that made the Pharisees believe that Jesus cast out demons by the 'power of Beelzebub", and continues to blind both Jew and Gentile even now. This is the 'logic' that tells this "tolerant, inclusive" world that Christians are bigots and their message is offensive in the public square. But, back to this chapter. If it was not plain who these drunkards were in Isaiah's day, he fleshes it out:
Isa 28:7 These also reel with wine and stagger with strong drink; the priest and the prophet reel with strong drink, they are swallowed by wine, they stagger with strong drink, they reel in vision, they stumble in giving judgment.
So it is the religious leaders who are accused; but the people for the most part are no better, because they have not learned anything from God;
Isa 28:9 "To whom will he teach knowledge, and to whom will he explain the message? Those who are weaned from the milk, those taken from the breast?
Isa 28:10 For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little."
The author of Hebrews made this same point: people who should be out in the world teaching are "sitting in the pews", listening week after week and doing nothing with it. In fact, the mere sitting and listening wearies them:
Isa 28:11 For by people of strange lips and with a foreign tongue the LORD will speak to this people,
Isa 28:12 to whom he has said, "This is rest; give rest to the weary; and this is repose"; yet they would not hear.
Isa 28:13 And the word of the LORD will be to them precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little, that they may go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.
God is explaining how the Antichrist will take them in- it is so much easier to listen and not THINK. They won't look into the truth of the Word (as I'm trying to share with you), and eventually it leads to this:
Isa 28:15 Because you have said, "We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol we have an agreement, when the overwhelming whip passes through it will not come to us, for we have made lies our refuge, and in falsehood we have taken shelter";
Isa 28:16 therefore thus says the Lord GOD, "Behold, I am the one who has laid as a foundation in Zion, a stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation: 'Whoever believes will not be in haste.'
Isa 28:17 And I will make justice the line, and righteousness the plumb line; and hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, and waters will overwhelm the shelter."
Isa 28:18 Then your covenant with death will be annulled, and your agreement with Sheol will not stand; when the overwhelming scourge passes through, you will be beaten down by it.
I need to step-by-step this: This is the prophecy of Daniel 9:27- the covenant with Antichrist that will end with him declaring himself god in the Temple. Those who choose to follow Christ, the 'tested stone', will escape this self-condemnation; for the others, look at the next verse, and in its chilling implications see how bad it will get:
Isa 28:19 As often as it passeth through, it shall take you; for morning by morning shall it pass through, by day and by night; and it shall be sheer terror to understand the message.
God is desperately trying to wake them- and us- up to the fact that sin will not go on forever:
Isa 28:23 Open your ears, and listen to me! Pay attention, and hear me!
Isa 28:24 Does a farmer go on plowing every day so he can plant? Does he continue to break up the soil and make furrows in the ground?
Isa 28:25 When he has smoothed its surface, doesn't he scatter black cumin seed and plant cumin? Doesn't he plant wild wheat in rows? Doesn't he put barley in its own area and winter wheat at its borders?
I looked up 'black cumin', in other translations called 'fitch' and 'dill', and now sometimes known as Roman coriander or black poppy. Not only is this a spice, but also one of those 'wonder foods' that has tremendous curative properties, modern studies going so far as investigating it as a cancer preventative. What then this passage is saying is that eventually, God is going to make everything right. For now, He is still plowing the soil, but that won't go on forever. And not everyone is going to be brought to that final good field the same way:
Isa 28:26 God will guide him in judgment, and his God will teach him.
Isa 28:27 Black cumin isn't threshed with a sledge, and wagon wheels aren't rolled over cumin. Black cumin is beaten with a rod and cumin with a stick.
Isa 28:28 Grain is ground into flour, but the grinding eventually stops. It will be threshed. The wheels of his cart will roll over it, but his horses won't crush it.
So here's what you need from this: God is patient, but won't wait forever. At some point, He's either going to get the good seed He wants from you, or you're going to be crushed with the chaff. If you drink the 'wine of Ephraim' long enough, you're going to 'stumble in vision' and be judged.
