Isaiah 8: 11-22….The prophet suffers opposition!

For the LORD spoke thus to me with his strong hand upon me, and warned me not to walk in the way of this people, saying: “Do not call conspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy, and do not fear what they fear, nor be in dread. Comment: It is so important to follow what God says and not be led by societal theories of life. It must have been hard for Isaiah when the vast majority of the people were seeking to walk independently of God. But the LORD of hosts, him you shall honor as holy. Let him be your fear, and let him be your dread. And he will become a sanctuary and a stone of offense and a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And many shall stumble on it. They shall fall and be broken; they shall be snared and taken.” Comment: The gentle Jesus meek and mild of the old children’s hymn needs to be realized as not week and namby-pamby! When God, whose love is steadfast and enduring, needs to deal with rebellion and disobedience He can be like an unmovable Rock over which people will stumble, fall and be broken! Bind up the testimony; seal the teaching among my disciples. I will wait for the LORD, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in him. Behold, I and the children whom the LORD has given me are signs and portents in Israel from the LORD of hosts, who dwells on Mount Zion. Comment: The binding up refers to the way that Isaiah had been told to have witnesses sign and date his prophecy so that later on skeptics couldn’t claim that it was written after the Assyrian invasion. Wise! And when they say to you, “Inquire of the mediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter,” should not a people inquire of their God? Should they inquire of the dead on behalf of the living? To the teaching and to the testimony! If they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn. They will pass through the land, greatly distressed and hungry. And when they are hungry, they will be enraged and will speak contemptuously against their king and their God, and turn their faces upward. And they will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish. And they will be thrust into thick darkness. Comment: People will seek to get their answers from the strangest places (which are forbidden by God). The first underlined ‘they’ refers to the alternate people to whom the masses turn, and the dawn mentioned there refers to the coming of light, which isn’t found in the mumbling of the mediums and necromancers! The second underlined ‘they’ refers to the people who overcome by the invaders are hungry and rebellious and unreasonably angry. If only they had listened to the prophecy and repented they well might have have escaped as Nineveh did when they listened to Jonah!

Proverbs 8 33/34 – Hear instruction and be wise, and do not neglect it. Blessed is the one who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting beside my doors.

Prayer: Please help me to learn well the lessons which Isaiah teaches here!