Isaiah 30:1-17.  Today’s reading didn’t seem to have too much confusing stuff.  This message of warning is to the Israelites or at least to the southern kingdom of Judah.  Remember that this part of Isaiah was probably written by Isaiah around 705-701 BC.  Judah was about to be invaded by Assyria and Hezekiah the king of Israel had made an alliance with several local kingdoms including Egypt. There were two problems with this alliance.  First God did not want Judah to trust in human alliances he wanted them to trust him to take care of them.  Second Egypt had a new king or Pharaoh who was busy dealing with internal fighting in Egypt so he was in no position to go out and fight Assyria.

So the people of Judah are the rebellious children, they were making plans that did not come from God, and in fact were directly disobedient to God.  In fact they already had sent leaders to two leading cities in Egypt, Zoan and Hanes.  This plan was going to lead to embarrassment though because Egypt was gong to be of no use to them.  The alliance was a double waste because these ambassadors had to travel through the dangerous southern desert, the Negev.  And the money they were going to use to bribe Egypt to help was going to be wasted when Egypt would not show up for the invasion.  So the whole plan was a dangerous waste in addition to being disobedient.  You may remember from the reading in Joshua that Rahab was the name of the woman who helped the Israelite spies in Jericho.  This is not the same Rahab, in fact this is not even a person.  In those days there was a legend of a great sea monster (think the Kraken if you’ve seen the Pirates of the Caribbean movies).  That animal was named Rahab.  In verse 8 Isaiah describes Rahab with a Hebrew word that means to stop or sit still.  Isaiah used this mythical creature to describe Egypt.  In this case we see that the great monster, Egypt, will do nothing.

In verses 9-11 we see that the Jewish people were pretty prideful, they even told the prophets that they did not want to hear any more about God.  But God is not easily ignored and so Isaiah warned the people that this attitude was going to be a disaster. Like a big brick wall falling suddenly with not a single brick left after it fell.  The people though had their own plan, if they were invaded they would jump on some horses and run.  Ironically God told them that they would run, not on horses but from them when the Assyrians came on horses.  The result would be that some Israelites would be left dead on the hilltops as a reminder of how fierce the Assyrians were.

You know I like it that the Israelites were called rebellious children.  I like it because first it tells me that God bothered to give them instructions.  That shows me that God cares.  Next I like it because God noticed when they disobeyed, again a sign that God cares.  And Third, I like it that they were called children of God.  And guess what, God knew they would be rebellious when He made them his children.  That tells me that God loved them and loves us very much.  Look too at verse 15.  There in the middle of this warning is the solution to their problems.  They just needed to return to God and kick back and watch the action.  They just needed to be quiet and trust.   We need to do the same things today.  We need to do what ever it is that God has asked us to do and not worry so much about how it’s all going to turn out.  Lord help me be still, help me be quiet and listen, help me trust, and when I am going the wrong way help me return to you.  Thank you for caring.  Thank you for noticing our lives and for sending help.  Help me never reject your words in my life. 

Isaiah 29:15-24.  There’s an old saying, “We all have clay feet.”  It’s based on a vision that the prophet Daniel interpreted for a king he worked.  It means we all have limitations, no one is superman.  I seem to be facing that this week as I try to keep up with work and get caught up on my posts.  The last two nights I have been out working late and have just run out of gs to get caught up.  Lame, huh?  So here we are still a day behind.  It’s not the reading that I get behind in but the study to understand some of it.  I hope the study is helping you with the reading.

We are looking at the third “woe” message in this section of Isaiah.  This one’s kind of unique because the others have been to places, a city or a kingdom.  In the earlier predictions in this section we saw the same sort of pattern, cities, kingdoms, or tribes (which were sort of like ‘states” within the kingdom or nations).  There is a place named in this message, Lebanon, the kingdom just north of Israel where modern day Lebanon, but this message is not specifically about Lebanon it is just an example, maybe a contrast.

The warning is to people who think they can hide their actions from God.  “Hey maybe if we do this here God won’t se us, or if we do it at night or when the lights are off or when no body is around”.  Pretty silly, God doesn’t have literal eyes he just knows what is going on everywhere all the time.  The big word for that is omniscience, all knowing.  Verse 16 tells us that this like turning something upside down, like standing on your head.  It’s nonsense.  It’s like a clay pot claiming that the person who made it is like it.  But here is the interesting thing, if we think God doesn’t see or know and he is like us what does that say about us?  In reality it’s us who do not get it, we don’t see and we don’t know.

But there is hope.  There is a time coming when the deaf will hear and the blind will see.  According to verses 18-21 the results of the seeing and hearing will be happiness.  It will be because God is dealing with all of the “stuff” that makes life bad.  Need and unfairness will be dealt with.

Verse 22 starts out, “Therefore”.  There’s an old saying that tells us when we see “therefore” in a sentence we need to ask what it’s there for.  The word is kind of like saying, “because of what you have just read…”  This is a conclusion to the fact that God sees and knows and will deal with stuff.  And remember this is Yahweh (God’s personal name, v. 19 “LORD”) the “Holy one of Israel” (also v. 19.  He is pure and personal in that description), so when he deals with the “stuff” of life we can expect him to be pure and personal.  If that is not enough of a hint about the conclusion God is described as the one who “redeemed” Abraham.  Abraham may be talking about Abraham or he may be used as a symbol for all Israelites.  The Jewish people or Israelites considered Abraham as their ultimate ancestor.  Jacob (which is another name for Israel, see “What’s in a Name”) is also a symbolic way of talking about the people who descended from him.  The word “redeemed” is an interesting one.  It means, rescued, delivered, ransomed, basically we might use the word “saved”.  God “saved” Abraham (either the guy or more likely the Israelites).  A couple of other places that the word is used might help us understand what the Israelites in Judah might have gotten from this message.  Remember it was given at a time when they were facing an invasion by a brutal enemy, the Assyrians.  Also remember they were tempted to put their trust in an alliance with several other kings in the area.  In Job 5:20 Eliphaz, one of Job’s friends, tells Job that when there is a famine God will redeem you from death and when there is a war God will redeem you from the sword.  Under a siege those are the two main things to worry about, starving to death if the siege is long or being slaughtered if the walls fail.  In Psalms 34:22 David (a king well acquainted with war) said that Yahweh redeems the souls of his servants, that nobody who trusts in him will be condemned.  Finally in Psalms 31:5 Daivd tells God that he trusts him with his very existence when he says, “into your hands I commit my spirit, you have redeemed by Yahweh God of truth.”  This one is particularly interesting because it is one of the very last things Jesus said on the cross (Luke 23:46).  That is interesting to me because we think of salvation or deliverance as being from death and yet here Jesus is quoting the first part of Psalms 31:5 even though he is just about to die.  It reminds me of Job’s remark that he had a living redeemer (a different word but the same idea) and would see him even after his “skin is destroyed in my flesh I will see God.”  (Job 19:25-26).

So the conclusion to the people of Jerusalem was that the redeemer of Abraham and Jacob would save them too.  And the result would be the descendants of Abraham, the work of God’s hands (notice the idea of the potter returns here and the idea of God being personal), would honor God, be in awe of him.  Even those who “turned the truth upside down” would see correctly.

The same conclusion applies to us today.  God uses miracles to point to who he is and what he is like.  Our response is to be in awe.  It takes a lot of work to keep denying God’s existence.  We make a lot of excuses because of the mess the world is in.  A mess we made by disobeying God in the first place.  And a mess we continued to make by continually disobeying God.  It would be scary to think that God knows every secret thing that I do except for the fact that God is personally and merciful and wants to forgive, God wants to save.  And it’s not just the Israelites he wants to save, remember Lebanon, it became a beautiful forest in this example.  We need to open our eyes and see and open our ears and hear and give God the credit for what he is doing.  We need to put our faith in God like Abraham did and we will not be condemned.  Then in the end we will stand with Job with our new skin on and when we see our redeemer, Jesus, we will cry out with the angles, “Holy Holy Holy is the LORD God Almighty.”  Lord help me see you today and give you credit today.  Help me not sneak around making my own plans thinking you don’t see what I am doing.  Let me put my life in your hands day to day.  Help me trust and obey.  But most of all help me see so you can receive the honor.  Thank you for being my savior.