New Laptop On Its Way

Thank you for your patience during my problems with the old laptop that keeps crashing. 

My husband and I selected a new one and ordered it. It's supposed to arrive on Tuesday if this snowy weather doesn't delay it. 

The Book Of Isaiah. Day 178, Found By Those Who Did Not Seek Him

We begin Chapter 65 today and will be comparing our Scripture from the book of Isaiah with a portion of Scripture from the book of Romans.

The Lord says to the people of Isaiah's culture: "I revealed Myself to those who did not ask for Me; I was found by those who did not seek Me. To a nation that did not call on My name, I said, 'Here am I, here am I.'" (Isaiah 65:1) Isaiah's people, of all the people on the earth, should have known the Lord. They should have called upon Him and clung to Him. But here we find the Lord saying that Gentiles will call upon Him more than the people He led out of bondage in Egypt.

We know He is speaking of Gentiles because the Apostle Paul, a Jewish convert to Christianity, quoted this passage of Isaiah when speaking about Gentiles who had come to faith in the one true God through Jesus Christ. "But not all the Israelites accepted the good news...Isaiah boldly says, 'I was found by those who did not seek Me; I revealed Myself to those who did not ask for Me...But concerning Israel He says, 'All day long I have held out My hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.'" (Romans 10:16, 20-21) Paul clearly makes a distinction between Israel and those who "accepted the good news", meaning the believers of Gentile nations.

The Lord points out that He has tried to reason with those He brought out of Egypt---those whom He called by His own name---those who have rejected Him in favor of idols. "All day long I have held out My hands to an obstinate people, who walk in ways not good, pursuing their own imaginations---a people who continually provoke Me to My very face, offering sacrifices in gardens and burning incense on altars of brick; who sit among the graves and spend their nights keeping secret vigil; who eat the flesh of pigs, and whose pots hold broth of impure meat; who say, 'Keep away; don't come near me, for I am too sacred for you!." (Isaiah 65:2-5a)

The list of deeds above is a list of occult practices. They were offering sacrifices and burning incense to pagan deities. They were holding vigils in graveyards at night, hoping to commune with the dead or with evil spirits that were believed to inhabit graveyards. They were living according to their carnal natures: "pursuing their own imaginations". They were disregarding all the Lord's laws. Yet they still thought they were better than people of Gentile nations.

They knew about the Lord but chose not to worship Him. We could compare this to someone in today's world who grew up in church and who knows what the Bible says but chooses to reject the Lord and to live in opposition to Him. That's worse than someone rejecting Him who has heard very little about Him. When Isaiah's people rejected the Lord, they were sinning far more in His eyes than were the Gentiles who knew very little about Him.

The Lord is righteously offended by the refusal of the Israelites to worship Him, for He is the only God who ever did anything for them. He brought them out of Egypt and made them into a great nation. He protected them time and time again from enemies whose military power was far stronger than theirs. Because they are forsaking Him in favor of false gods who never have and never will do anything for them, He says, "Such people are smoke in My nostrils, a fire that keeps burning all day. See, it stands written before Me: I will not keep silent but will pay back in full; I will pay it back into their laps---both your sins and the sins of your ancestors,' says the Lord. 'Because they burned sacrifices on the mountains and defied Me on the hills, I will measure into their laps the full payment for their former deeds.'" (Isaiah 65:5b-7)

The wickedness of the generations who have lived in the Promised Land has reached a tipping point by Isaiah's day. We know from our study of the kings that the northern kingdom fell to Assyria during Isaiah's lifetime and that the southern kingdom fell to Babylon approximately 130 years later. This is because Israelites of generation after generation stopped worshiping the Lord and began worshiping idols, not long after He made them into a nation in the first place. He has pleaded with them through the prophets to repent and they have not done so. He has allowed them to experience various difficulties intended to cause them to ask, "Why are bad things happening to us?", so that they would conclude, "It is because we have turned away from the Lord." But they have not allowed their hardships to cause them to consider their ways. Therefore, He must take more severe action in order to keep their entire race from destroying itself. 

The Book Of Isaiah. Day 177, We Can't Save Ourselves

I managed to get my laptop up and running again. I'm sorry for the issues yesterday. My husband and I have decided to go ahead and buy a new one because this one is old and outdated and low on memory. It's not worth paying to get it worked on anymore and it will help me with the Bible study and other things to be able to stop dealing with computer issues.

We are continuing our look at Chapter 64 today. We closed our last study session with the people acknowledging that they are sinners and with them saying, "How then can we be saved?" These are two very good things: acknowledging the problem of sin and asking how the problem can be solved. We can't solve the problem ourselves, as they conclude in the portion of Scripture below.

"All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away." (Isaiah 64:6) This verse isn't saying that there's no value in good works but that we can't be saved by works. We are unclean ourselves; therefore, our works are unclean too. You may recall from our studies earlier in the Old Testament that there were laws regarding uncleanness. A number of things could render a person unclean, such as particular contagious illnesses and conditions that cause seepage of bodily fluids. Anything that person wore and anything they lay upon or sat upon was rendered unclean because they were unclean. In this same way, because we are unclean due to our sins, all of our works are unclean: "like filthy rags". Salvation is by faith, not by works. The Lord doesn't weigh our good deeds and our bad deeds on a scale to see if our good deeds outweigh our bad deeds. Even at our best, our works are flawed. 

The people of Isaiah's nation have ignored the Lord's commands to repent for a long time. They have not responded correctly to the discipline He has applied so far. This is why the northern kingdom was conquered during Isaiah's lifetime and why the southern kingdom (which took longer to fall into the utter depravity of idolatry) was conquered 130 years later. Here we find the people admitting that they have failed to respond appropriately and that this is why the Lord is not rescuing them from their troubles. "No one calls on Your name or strives to lay hold of you; for You have hidden Your face from us and have given us over to our sins." (Isaiah 64:7) They are not claiming that the Lord caused them to sin or that He wants them to sin. What's happening here is that, because they insisted on going their own way for so long, the Lord is allowing them to have their way. That is because sometimes the only way a person will repent is for the Lord to let them hit rock bottom.

It can be really hard to allow someone we care about to hit rock bottom but sometimes it's the most loving thing to do. Someone I care about was methodically ruining their life in every way. They made one illogical bad decision after another. When they were on the verge of making a particularly big bad decision, there was actually a way I could have stopped them but the Lord very clearly said to my heart, "Don't do it. This decision is going to bring them to rock bottom and that's the way it has to be in order for them to change." So I held back and watched them make the decision and watched the outcome bring them to the brink of losing everything they had. It was a hard thing to do but I knew what the Lord had said. And He was right, because the tough lesson they learned caused them to repent and accept the Lord as their Savior and He turned their life completely around. Who knows how much longer it would have taken if I'd stepped in and prevented their mistake in spite of what the Lord said to me? 

He knows each of us more intimately than anyone else will ever know us. He knows precisely how much pressure it will take for us to face our sinful state and be sorry for it. He knows what method brings each of us to repentance. For some people, all it takes is hearing the Scripture and taking it to heart. For others, it takes facing up to what a mess they've made of their lives by leaving God out of their lives. I'm one of the latter. It took me facing up to what a mess I'd made of my life. It took me acknowledging that I was lost in my sins and that there was nothing I could do to save myself. That's when I turned to the Lord.

Computer Crashed Again

I'm posting this from my phone because the laptop has crashed again. I am thinking I may have to go ahead and get another one. I will update as soon as I can. 

The Book Of Isaiah. Day 176, The God Who Comes To Help

In Chapter 64 we find the people acknowledging their sins and recognizing that they have brought their terrible circumstances upon themselves. I do not believe this acknowledgement happened during the lifetime of Isaiah, or at least not in the northern kingdom which had fallen so far into idolatry and immorality by Isaiah's day that the Lord allowed it to be conquered in the prophet's lifetime. 

The southern kingdom enjoyed some spiritual revivals during the 130 years it lasted after the fall of the northern kingdom, but it too eventually descended into so much idolatry and immorality that it was conquered as well. Many scholars think the people's acknowledgement of their sin, as related to us here in Isaiah, occurred after they had been conquered and taken into captivity.

We find the people longing for deliverance from their enemies. As is often the case when we find ourselves in unpleasant circumstances, they had asked themselves, "Why is this happening to us? Why did the Lord not prevent this from happening?" And, again as is often the case, they concluded that they have only themselves to blame. We bring a lot of the hardships of this life upon ourselves by getting outside of the will of God, like the people of Isaiah's time did, don't we? I confess I have made some terrible messes at times by either doing the opposite of God's will or by stepping ahead of Him to get something that is His will but is at the wrong time.

Having gotten out of the Lord's will but having turned back to Him when their hardships caused them to face their wrongdoings, the people cry out to Him for help. "Oh, that You would rend the heavens and come down, as the mountains would tremble before You! As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil, come down to make Your name known to Your enemies and cause the nations to quake before You!" (Isaiah 64:1-2)

As we've mentioned before, references to "the nations" are references to the Gentiles. Gentile nations were heathen nations in those days. That is not the case for many Gentile nations in our own times, but it was certainly the case in Isaiah's day, although there were some Gentiles from other nations who had converted to Judaism. But the worship of the God of Abraham was not the national religion of any Gentile nation during Bible times.

These heathen nations were the "enemies" of God because they rejected Him. They rejected Him and they hated the descendants of Abraham---the people called by the Lord's name. In today's passage we find the descendants of Abraham calling upon God to fight against their enemies---and His.

The Lord fought against their enemies in the past, such as when He delivered them from Egypt and such as when He defeated the heathen nations of the Promised Land in order to place the Israelites there. The people think back on those times when He acted mightily on their behalf. "For when You did awesome things that we did not expect, You came down, and the mountains trembled before You. Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides You, who acts on behalf of those who wait for Him." (Isaiah 64:3-4) The Gentiles believed in other gods but no other gods ever proved their existence. No other gods performed signs and wonders. No other gods miraculously saved those who called upon them. Only the God of Israel ever did any of those things because He is the only God there is.

This God---this only God---is a righteous and holy God. He does not reward sin. Although we cannot live perfectly sinless lives in these frail mortal bodies, the Lord knows our hearts. He knows who loves Him and who feels bad for their sins (and who quickly repents of them) and He knows those who not only make sin their lifestyle but who actively enjoy living in opposition to Him (because they do not really care about Him). When so many of the people of the northern and southern kingdoms forsook Him in favor of useless pagan deities, this was a form of deliberate sin and a purposeful change of lifestyle. The Lord could not reward unrepentant sin. He had to discipline them for their own good, which is why He did not deliver them from their enemies, as we see them recognizing below.

"You come to the help of those who gladly do right, who remember Your ways. But when we continued to sin against them, You were angry. How then can we be saved?" (Isaiah 64:5) They stopped gladly doing right. They did not care to remember His righteous ways. They did not repent when He pointed out to them, time and time again, that they were going down the wrong path. Eventually the situation reached a tipping point and the Lord had to take action in ways He would have preferred not to take action, but He had to allow such dire circumstances to befall them that they would consider their actions and repent of them.

Our portion of text today ends with them asking, "How then can we be saved?" We are going to talk about this question in more depth in our next study session. But, thanks be to God, there is a way to be saved! The God who comes to help has made a way for us to be saved.

The Book Of Isaiah Day 175, The Redeemer From Of Old

In Chapter 63 we have been studying a portion of Scripture in which Isaiah's people think back on the days of old when their nation was prosperous and mighty. It is believed by many scholars that the thoughts of the people are those which took place after they had been conquered and taken captive. They have been asking themselves, "Why is this happening to us? Why did the Lord not protect us from our enemies as He did in times past?" 

The conclusion they will reach in our next chapter is that their troubles have come upon them because they have sinned against the Lord. We know that they did not reach this conclusion during Isaiah's day, for in his day the sins of the people of the northern kingdom reached such a tipping point that they were conquered during the prophet's lifetime. Following Isaiah's lifetime, the southern kingdom eventually descended into the same type of idolatry and immorality as the northern kingdom, sins for which the Lord allowed them to be conquered also. For these reasons I agree with the scholars who believe that the thoughts relayed to us by Isaiah are of a prophetic nature; he foresees the people's distress and he hears the thoughts they will think in those days.

Today we conclude our look at Chapter 63. Due to their distress, the people (of whom a majority fell into idolatry prior to their defeat) begin calling upon the Lord again. "Look down from heaven and see, from Your lofty throne, holy and glorious. Where are Your zeal and Your might? Your tenderness and compassion are withheld from us." (Isaiah 63:16)

They have indeed done wrong but they know that the Lord is a merciful and forgiving God. They know that the Lord has the right to be angry with them but they also know that He has a right to be angry with their enemies who are so severely oppressing them. They ask Him to remember the zeal He had for Israel in times past. They ask Him to think back on the ways He mightily defended them for the sake of His holy name. Of all the people in the world, they alone are known by the name of the Lord and they alone are referred to time and time again in the Scriptures as His "inheritance". They know that He promised never to make an end of them as a people. They know that He promised David his lineage would never end. I believe they are calling upon the Lord not because they are righteous but because He is. They are calling upon Him not because they have kept their end of the covenant but because He has kept His side of the bargain.

"But You are our Father, though Abraham does not know us or Israel acknowledge us; You, Lord, are our Father, our Redeemer from of old is Your name." (Isaiah 63:16) Abraham, who was a "friend of God" (James 2:23) would not recognize them as his descendants, spiritually speaking, for they have erred so much from the faith. I believe that the reference to "Israel" is a reference to Jacob (whose name the Lord changed to Israel) and not a reference to the nation. Jacob would find it difficult to claim them as his descendants because their faith differs so much from his own. Abraham and Jacob would be reluctant to acknowledge them as kinsmen but the Lord, who called Israel His "firstborn son" (Exodus 4:22) never breaks His word and the people are counting on Him to still claim them as His own. 

They say something next that reminds me of something I said to my parents several times when I was a small child. "Why, Lord, do You make us wander from Your ways and harden our hearts so that we do not revere You?" (Isaiah 63:17a) The word "make" would be more properly translated as "allow", such as, "Why do You allow us to wander from Your ways?" In other words, they are saying, "Why didn't You stop us?" There were several times as a child when my parents warned me not to do something but I did it anyway, with unfortunate results, and I petulantly whined to them, "Why did you let me do it?" Just as my parents sometimes let me do something they knew wasn't going to work out, in order to teach me a lesson, the Lord gave us the free will to disobey His instructions so we would learn a lesson. When we deliberately disobey the Lord, we cannot expect good results. The outcome of our poor decisions is intended to teach us to more closely follow His instructions so we don't find ourselves in unpleasant circumstances nearly as often. While it's true that bad things happen in this world even when we are walking on the right paths, it's also true that we bring a great deal of unnecessary troubles upon ourselves through sin.

Chapter 63 concludes with the people asking the Lord to defend His inheritance against their heathen enemies. This will show the whole world that He alone is God. By restoring the fortunes of Israel, He will be proclaiming to the world that He keeps His promises (in spite of man's inconsistent obedience) and that there is no other God. "Return for the sake of Your servants, the tribes that are Your inheritance. For a little while Your people possessed Your holy place, but now our enemies have trampled down Your sanctuary. We are yours from of old; but You have not ruled over them, they have not been called by Your name." (Isaiah 63:17b-19)

The Book Of Isaiah. Day 174, Recalling The Days Of Old

In Thursday's study we talked about how the Lord brought the descendants of Jacob out of Egypt and settled them in the Promised Land and made them into a nation. But in time they drifted away from Him into idolatry, so He allowed them to be conquered and taken captive. While held in foreign lands, they thought back upon the days of old, and that is what we will be talking about today.

"Then His people recalled the days of old, the days of Moses and his people---where is He who brought them through the sea, with the shepherd of His flock?" (Isaiah 63:11a) It's important to note that although the Lord allowed them to be conquered and taken captive, they are still "His people". He did not allow these calamities so He could make an end of them as a nation; He allowed hardship in order to bring them back to Himself---in order to cause them to recall the days of old and to repent of their waywardness.

We continue looking at the thoughts they pondered. "Where is He who set His Holy Spirit among them, who sent His glorious arm of power to be at Moses' right hand, who divided the waters before them, to gain for Himself everlasting renown, who led them through the depths?" (Isaiah 63:11b-13a) They are asking, "Where is God? Is He still with us? Why did He not rescue us from our enemies as He rescued Moses and the group that came out of Egypt?"

It is wise to ask ourselves "why" when hardships befall us, for the answer is sometimes that we brought the hardships upon ourselves through sin. This is not always the case but this should be our first consideration. Have we strayed from the right path? Have our thoughts or actions become displeasing to the Lord? Submitting ourselves to the Lord in prayer, asking Him to reveal to us anything that is displeasing about our life, is the first and best thing to do. David set a wonderful example for us when he prayed to the Lord, "Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." (Psalm 139:23-24) 

We don't always recognize it when we've drifted into a wrong attitude or when we've begun to compromise with the world. These things can happen so gradually that, in the busyness of everyday life, we don't notice them until troubles bring us up short and we ask ourselves, "Why is this happening?" The thing to do is take this question to God and ask, "Why is this happening? Are my thoughts or actions offensive to you? I submit myself to You so that You may reveal to me anything for which I need to repent."

As Isaiah's people consider their defeat at the hands of their enemies, they think back on the times when the Lord gave them miraculous deliverances from their enemies. Their ancestors were rescued from defeat and capture in the days of old. "Like a horse in open country, they did not stumble; like cattle that go down to the plain, they were given rest by the Spirit of the Lord. This is how You guided Your people to make for Yourself a glorious name." (Isaiah 63:13b-14)

The people weren't sinless while the Lord guided them through the wilderness. When we studied that era we found many of them grumbling against the Lord. But they didn't have the same advantages as the people of Isaiah's day and beyond. They couldn't yet look back on the way the Lord led them and provided for them through those years, feeding them every day, making sure their clothes and shoes didn't wear out, defeating the tribes of Canaan and setting them up in their place, making them into a nation that their neighbors feared because their God fought so mightily for them. Much of this was still in the future during the time of Moses. But in Isaiah's day the name of the Lord was recognized throughout the known world because of what He had done for Israel. The Lord would never have allowed Isaiah's nation to fall if the people had continued to revere His name in the sight of their enemies.

Instead the majority of them had begun to revere the names of false gods---the names of gods that the tribes of Canaan had worshiped---gods that had been unable to protect their worshipers from Israel and from Israel's God in the days of old. They had begun to worship the false gods of the people with whom they traded, such as the Phoenicians. Many of them had even sacrificed their children in abominable rituals to pagan deities. The Lord could not overlook such things. If He had overlooked such things, His great name would have fallen into disrepute and then how could anyone have been saved? The entire world would have erroneously concluded that He was just like any other god, that He was unrighteous, that He was very much like carnal mankind. For the sake of His holy name He could not allow this to happen. For the sake of human souls He could not allow this to happen. He had to discipline the people of Isaiah's nation in order to show them and the whole world that He alone is God and that He is a righteous and holy God.