Wednesday Bible Study: Drive-by Isaiah part 9

 

This week we start in chapter 29, with a passage that would seem a bit odd if you don't dig in:

Isa 29:1  Ah, Ariel, Ariel, the city where David encamped! Add year to year; let the feasts run their round.
Isa 29:2  Yet I will distress Ariel, and there shall be moaning and lamentation, and she shall be to me like an Ariel.
Isa 29:3  And I will encamp against you all around, and will besiege you with towers and I will raise siegeworks against you.

A lot of "Ariel"s there.  Obviously, Ariel is another name for Jerusalem, but what does it then mean that "she shall be to me LIKE an Ariel"?  The commentators explain it this way:  Ariel is not only Jerusalem, but as the city of the Temple, it is also the location of the altar of God.  On this altar in the End Days- for as we'll see, this is an end days passage- God is going to sacrifice in His wrath the last of evil Israel.  But, it is not the END of Israel:

Isa 29:5  But the multitude of your foreign foes shall be like small dust, and the multitude of the ruthless like passing chaff. And in an instant, suddenly,
Isa 29:6  you will be visited by the LORD of hosts with thunder and with earthquake and great noise, with whirlwind and tempest, and the flame of a devouring fire.
Isa 29:7  And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, all that fight against her and her stronghold and distress her, shall be like a dream, a vision of the night.

We're going to see in a couple chapters where this passage has a near and far meaning.  But right now, we have to think of modern Israel- and ourselves...

Isa 29:9  Astonish yourselves and be astonished; blind yourselves and be blind! Be drunk, but not with wine; stagger, but not with strong drink!
Isa 29:10  For the LORD has poured out upon you a spirit of deep sleep, and has closed your eyes (the prophets), and covered your heads (the seers).
Isa 29:11  And the vision of all this has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed. When men give it to one who can read, saying, "Read this," he says, "I cannot, for it is sealed."
Isa 29:12  And when they give the book to one who cannot read, saying, "Read this," he says, "I cannot read."
Isa 29:13  And the Lord said: "Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men,
Isa 29:14  therefore, behold, I will again do wonderful things with this people, with wonder upon wonder; and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden."

Is this not us?  Church attendance in the US alone (never mind Europe) only reaches 50% of professing Christians if you include "once a month or so"; 38% say every week, and even that just equals how many open their Bible "Once a month or more".  Coincidence, you say?  Bring our current "woke culture" to mind when I show you this next passage:

Isa 29:20  For the ruthless shall come to nothing and the scoffer cease, and all who watch to do evil shall be cut off,
Isa 29:21  who by a word make a man out to be an offender, and lay a snare for him who reproves in the gate, and with an empty plea turn aside him who is in the right. 

 

In Chapter 30, the prophet again turns to his own time, and the alliance that some in Judah were trying to make with Egypt.  I love the name he gives to Egypt herein:

Isa 30:7  Egypt's help is worthless and empty; therefore I have called her "Rahab who sits still."

"Rahab" meaning, the "open mouth (of the crocodile)".  All bark, no bite.

But then it's back to the day of promise, starting with a command to get it all down:

Isa 30:8  And now, go, write it before them on a tablet and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come as a witness forever.
Isa 30:9  For they are a rebellious people, lying children, children unwilling to hear the instruction of the LORD;
Isa 30:10  who say to the seers, "Do not see," and to the prophets, "Do not prophesy to us what is right; speak to us smooth things, prophesy illusions,
Isa 30:11  leave the way, turn aside from the path, let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel." 

But God wants it preserved, so that when they are condemned, they understand the charges.  And for those who listen:

Isa 30:18  Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.
Isa 30:19  For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. 

Isa 30:20  And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher.
Isa 30:21  And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, "This is the way, walk in it," when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.


This is the guidance Christ and the Saints of the Church will give to the survivors of Armageddon in the 1,000 year reign of Christ.  Before the chapter ends, though, Isaiah returns to the final battle- and in a way that is most curious:

Isa 30:30  And the LORD will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst and storm and hailstones.
Isa 30:31  The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the LORD, when he strikes with his rod.
Isa 30:32  And every stroke of the appointed staff that the LORD lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them.
Isa 30:33  For a burning place has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, its pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the LORD, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it. 

 

So obviously, this was not about an Assyria of his day, but a "future Assyria"- the same as will later by John be called "Babylon".  The most evil of nations led by their 'king' the antichrist- and you notice that hell is specially prepared for him.   But as I just read this morning in Revelation, not only him;

Rev 14:9  And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, "If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand,
Rev 14:10  he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.
Rev 14:11  And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name." 

One thing I have tried to point out is we can believe these End Days prophecies because the near-term ones came true.  From chapter 31 I want to show you an example of that to close the week.  Once again, I point out our last clear point of reference date was about 708 BC.  That is when Isaiah prophesied:

Isa 31:8  "And the Assyrian shall fall by a sword, not of man; and a sword, not of man, shall devour him; and he shall flee from the sword, and his young men shall be put to forced labor.
Isa 31:9  His rock shall pass away in terror, and his officers desert the standard in panic," declares the LORD, whose fire is in Zion, and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.

You might ask yourself, "A sword not of man?"  Let's move foreward to 681 BC, and see how this was fulfilled:

2Ch 32:20  Then Hezekiah the king and Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, prayed because of this and cried to heaven.
2Ch 32:21  And the LORD sent an angel, who cut off all the mighty warriors and commanders and officers in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned with shame of face to his own land. And when he came into the house of his god, some of his own sons struck him down there with the sword.
2Ch 32:22  So the LORD saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib king of Assyria and from the hand of all his enemies, and he provided for them on every side.

2Ki 19:33  By the way that he came, by the same he shall return, and he shall not come into this city, declares the LORD.
2Ki 19:34  For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David."
2Ki 19:35  And that night the angel of the LORD went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when people arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies.
2Ki 19:36  Then Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and went home and lived at Nineveh.
2Ki 19:37  And as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, Adrammelech and Sharezer, his sons, struck him down with the sword and escaped into the land of Ararat. And Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place. 

 

185,000 cut down, by a sword not of man.  And we know the when for certain by the following assassination of Sennacherib by his sons.  And Isaiah told them it would happen some two decades before it happened.