7.31.09, Isaiah 5:11-14

¹¹ Woe to those who rise early in the morning
to run after their drinks,
who stay up late at night
till they are inflamed with wine.

¹² They have harps and lyres at their banquets,
tambourines and flutes and wine,
but they have no regard for the deeds of the LORD,
no respect for the work of his hands.

¹³ Therefore my people will go into exile
for lack of understanding;
their men of rank will die of hunger
and their masses will be parched with thirst.

¹⁴ Therefore the grave enlarges its appetite
and opens its mouth without limit;
into it will descend their nobles and masses
with all their brawlers and revelers.

First Things First

This is another hard rebuke, because it again speaks against one of the core values of Western civilization: pleasure.  It appears that Isaiah is rebuking those who pursue pleasure with really the harshest terms, that they will be responsible for Israel’s ultimate ruin.  This is very hard for us to take because we value pleasure and recreation, and we naturally wonder if God is calling all of us to a severe, hard, and ultimately unhappy life of work and work and work.

But this is not what God is rebuking in this passage – he doesn’t have a problem with fun and joy and spending time with the ones we love.  The mentality he is addressing is one where pleasure is our FIRST priority, where we wake up for it, and we stay up late for it.  Our thoughts are bent on how we can have fun this weekend or our next vacation, and we ignore the suffering of those around us because we are so distracted and consumed by our pursuit of pleasure.

It is a hard balancing act – to enjoy fun and pleasure, but not to allow it to become our first priority.  Instead, we should realize that there is a time and a moment for us to have fun, but our attention to the things of God should still be a 24/7 affair.

Questions

1. Have you ever found yourself having this mentality, where FUN was really your first priority?

2. How can we practically put fun and recreation into its proper place in our lives?

3. What habits or parts of our lives make it hard to prioritize fun correctly?

7.29.09, Isaiah 5:8-10

⁸ Woe to you who add house to house
and join field to field
till no space is left
and you live alone in the land.

⁹ The LORD Almighty has declared in my hearing:
“Surely the great houses will become desolate,
the fine mansions left without occupants.

¹⁰ A ten-acre vineyard will produce only a bath of wine,
a homer of seed only an ephah of grain.”

You Live Alone

The American dream has always revolved in some way around land and real estate, and has been so for centuries.  This Dream is that you can have valuable land that will provide for you, and is a place all for yourself.  We seal ourselves away from one another behind gates and fences, and God forbid if a person encroaches on this land – in some places, you have the right to shoot them!

And to some degree, it is this mentality that Isaiah addresses here.

The American dream is isolationism, but this is not the way of the Kingdom of God.  Jesus revealed his way when he was on earth, a way of openness and engagement and relationship, not of isolation.  As Christians, are you using your riches and resources and education to isolate yourself from other people?  Are you creating a little island haven for yourself to find rest?…or do you trust that your rest is in God alone, not in any plot of land?

Real estate is also intertwined with money.  Real estate is an investment which is supposed to yield a return.  When we buy real estate, it is supposed to be an asset which gets more and more valuable, yielding us more and more money.  In this way, we have to realize that real estate is not very much different from money.

And so the same care and consideration that we take with money, we need to take with our land and real estate – how is it being used?  Are your hopes wrapped up and around it?  Is your kingdom more important than God’s eternal kingdom?  Let all the riches of your life, money, talents, education, even real estate, give glory back to God, and serve to build up his kingdom rather than your own.

Questions

1. Do you feel like you know your neighbors, at work, at home, at school?  In what ways can you be more involved in the lives of those around you?

2. How do we find rest in God, rather than in things of this earth?

3. In what ways can your choice in housing or real estate be used to serve God’s kingdom and purposes?

Sorry!!

So sorry everyone, I’ve been traveling this entire week with my family and forgot to tell you all.  My apologies!!

I’ll be back on Wednesday though, so a good chance to look at other devotional resources or try to strike off on your own…blessings!

Peter

7.24.09, Isaiah 5:1

The Song of the Vineyard

¹ I will sing for the one I love
a song about his vineyard:
My loved one had a vineyard
on a fertile hillside.

² He dug it up and cleared it of stones
and planted it with the choicest vines.
He built a watchtower in it
and cut out a winepress as well.
Then he looked for a crop of good grapes,
but it yielded only bad fruit.

³ “Now you dwellers in Jerusalem and men of Judah,
judge between me and my vineyard.

⁴ What more could have been done for my vineyard
than I have done for it?
When I looked for good grapes,
why did it yield only bad?

⁵ Now I will tell you
what I am going to do to my vineyard:
I will take away its hedge,
and it will be destroyed;
I will break down its wall,
and it will be trampled.

⁶ I will make it a wasteland,
neither pruned nor cultivated,
and briers and thorns will grow there.
I will command the clouds
not to rain on it.”

⁷ The vineyard of the LORD Almighty
is the house of Israel,
and the men of Judah
are the garden of his delight.
And he looked for justice, but saw bloodshed;
for righteousness, but heard cries of distress.

The Vineyard

Isaiah uses yet another analogy to try to exhort Israel to repentence: the vineyard.  This particular analogy holds some specific characteristics that we should be aware of:

First, notice the character of love embedded in this passage.  It is a love song that describes God’s relationship with his people.  You see the care that is placed into the vineyard, the choicest vines and the watchtower and the winepress, the fertile soil.  This is an important starting point because it sets up the context of God’s interaction with us, that primarily, it is a loving relationship.

Second, notice the “judgment” that God places upon this vineyard – destroying its protective hedge, its wall, and allowing everything to grow there unchecked.  This is no accident, for this is what we read throughout Scripture, that God’s judgment upon us is not God hammering us over the head…it is God  leaving us alone.  And what we should realize is that nothing is worse than God abandoning us to our own designs.

Lastly, the “vineyard” implies fruit.  That is what a vineyard is for, right?  So what is the fruit that God desired from his vineyard?  Righteousness and justice.  God desires righteousness and justice from his people, and his heart breaks when we abandon these pursuits.  As Christians, and as a church, must learn what it means to bear this fruit, to constantly and actively righteousness and justice.

Questions

1. We read a lot about judgment in Isaiah…and love.  What does it mean that God has “loving judgment”?  What does it look like, opposed to plain old judgment?

2. Let’s say you could do anything you wanted, without any consequence.  What would you find yourself doing, good things… or harmful things?

3. Think about your life, your city and neighborhood, your family, your workplace – what does it mean to pursue righteousness and justice there?

7.22.09, Isaiah 4:2-6

The Branch of the Lord

² In that day the Branch of the LORD will be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the pride and glory of the survivors in Israel. ³ Those who are left in Zion, who remain in Jerusalem, will be called holy, all who are recorded among the living in Jerusalem. ⁴ The Lord will wash away the filth of the women of Zion; he will cleanse the bloodstains from Jerusalem by a spirit of judgment and a spirit of fire. ⁵ Then the LORD will create over all of Mount Zion and over those who assemble there a cloud of smoke by day and a glow of flaming fire by night; over all the glory will be a canopy. ⁶ It will be a shelter and shade from the heat of the day, and a refuge and hiding place from the storm and rain.

Cleansing Fire

Today let’s start with the middle of the passage, where Isaiah writes about God’s “spirit of judgment and spirit of fire”.  I think we can assume that any process that involves a spirit of judgment and a spirit of fire is not a pleasant nor an easy one.  It probably is extremely difficult and those who find themselves in that process just want it to end.

But look at what results from this arduous process: the restoration of Israel, a day described as beautiful and glorious.  Pride and glory will be restored to Israel, and God’s presence will be with the nation, protecting it daily.  This is such a startling and wonderful switch from the descriptions we just read in the previous passage, and all of it results from a spirit of judgement and fire.

Sometimes, the most wonderful things that God wants to do in our lives result from the most difficult circumstances.  So when we find ourselves in the midst of those terrible moments, we have to cast our thought forward, and look towards the great things that God can and will accomplish in us through the pain.

Questions

1. What was the hardest time in your life so far?

2. What do you think God accomplished through those difficulties?  Do you think there was any other way those things could have been accomplished in your life?

3. What is the most difficult situation in your life right now?  What greater thing might God be doing?

7.20.09, Isaiah 3:16

¹⁶ The LORD says,
“The women of Zion are haughty,
walking along with outstretched necks,
flirting with their eyes,
tripping along with mincing steps,
with ornaments jingling on their ankles.

¹⁷ Therefore the Lord will bring sores on the heads of the women of Zion;
the LORD will make their scalps bald.”

¹⁸ In that day the Lord will snatch away their finery: the bangles and headbands and crescent necklaces, ¹⁹ the earrings and bracelets and veils, ²⁰ the headdresses and ankle chains and sashes, the perfume bottles and charms,²¹ the signet rings and nose rings, ²² the fine robes and the capes and cloaks, the purses ²³ and mirrors, and the linen garments and tiaras and shawls.

²⁴ Instead of fragrance there will be a stench;
instead of a sash, a rope;
instead of well-dressed hair, baldness;
instead of fine clothing, sackcloth;
instead of beauty, branding.

²⁵ Your men will fall by the sword,
your warriors in battle.

²⁶ The gates of Zion will lament and mourn;
destitute, she will sit on the ground.

Spiritual Blankies

This passage can be a little intimidating for us when we read it, because God’s punishment is so harsh, and so tit-for-tat.  We can get mired in thinking fearfully about God and what he will do to us if we are bad people, and so forth.  We also get into a judgmental frame of mind, judging the people of Israel, or in this case, the women of Zion.  And I think that is an honest response to reading a passage about judgment, which we will do often in Isaiah.

So let me try to re-contextualize this passage for us.  Isaiah is listing all of these accessories and baubles that the women of Zion are wearing – they do so haughtily and pridefully, trying to gain attention for themselves, and this is of course is not godly behavior, trying to make ourselves MORE of something: more beautiful, more attractive, more powerful.

But there is a different way to understand this behavior, that they were trying to be LESS of something: less unattractive, less timid, less powerless.  You see, part of the reason why we gather up all of these little idols is not just to puff ourselves up…but to compensate for our weaknesses and fears, all of the things that they lack.

And this casts the issue in a different light, doesn’t it?  We gather up all these useless things because we feel a little less frail and timid and powerless when we cling to our spiritual safety blankets, whether they be baubles or careers or other people.  So the women of Zion (and we) are worthy of both judgment, and compassion…

The answer to this is the two-fold realization that these baubles don’t add any real value to our lives, and that God bestows a beauty and value that these trinkets never could.  That is the essence and definition of “agape” love, that it is an unconditional love that bestows value upon something.  God doesn’t love us because we are beautiful – God loves us, and that makes us beautiful.

Questions

1. What are your safety blankets, the things you use to compensate for your fears or weaknesses in life?

2. Have you ever had an experience where one of those safety blankets was proven to be useless?

3. What is the difference between being loved because you are valuable, and being loved and becoming valuable?  How does affect your understanding of God’s love for you?

7.17.09, Isaiah 3:16-26

Sorry this is late!  But you know what they say: “Better late than Nebuchadnezzar.”  Who says Christians aren’t funny?

¹⁶ The LORD says,
“The women of Zion are haughty,
walking along with outstretched necks,
flirting with their eyes,
tripping along with mincing steps,
with ornaments jingling on their ankles.

¹⁷ Therefore the Lord will bring sores on the heads of the women of Zion;
the LORD will make their scalps bald.”

¹⁸ In that day the Lord will snatch away their finery: the bangles and headbands and crescent necklaces, ¹⁹ the earrings and bracelets and veils, ²⁰ the headdresses and ankle chains and sashes, the perfume bottles and charms,²¹ the signet rings and nose rings, ²² the fine robes and the capes and cloaks, the purses ²³ and mirrors, and the linen garments and tiaras and shawls.

²⁴ Instead of fragrance there will be a stench;
instead of a sash, a rope;
instead of well-dressed hair, baldness;
instead of fine clothing, sackcloth;
instead of beauty, branding.

²⁵ Your men will fall by the sword,
your warriors in battle.

²⁶ The gates of Zion will lament and mourn;
destitute, she will sit on the ground.

The Women of Zion

Here, the judgments of Isaiah turn to focus on a specific gender, upon the women of Zion.  This is pretty noteworthy, and there are a few things we can take away from this passage:

First, look at the laundry list of beauty accessories that Isaiah categorizes:

“bangles and headbands and crescent necklaces, the earrings and bracelets and veils, the headdresses and ankle chains and sashes, the perfume bottles and charms, the signet rings and nose rings, the fine robes and the capes and cloaks, the purses and mirrors, and the linen garments and tiaras and shawls.”

This may seem excessive, but I think it plays an important purpose in highlighting the bottomless-ness of materialism.  Once you start being materialistic and loving yourself or your possessions, there is no end to that process.  There is no end to the stuff you feel you need to have in order to have the right look, or the complete set.

That is the illusion we tell ourselves: “All I need is this last accessory, and then I’ll be happy!”  But when has that ever been true?  When has that one last object put the stopper on our worldly desires?  When has any object ever made us enduringly happy?  We need to identify this sentiment for what it truly is: futile foolishness.

But additionally, when you think of it, these bangles and accessories are all little self-idols.  They are used to magnify us, to make us more beautiful and attention-grabbing.  But the goal of a Christian is not to glorify self, but to glorify the one who is truly worthy of glory – God.  This begs a question of us: how much of our lives is devoted to glorifying ourselves, and how much is devoted to glorifying God?  Do we accesorize ourselves in the hope that people will recognize us, or do we place the focus on God alone, hoping that people will recognize the Christ that resides in us?

Questions

1. What was the last material thing that you really pined for and ended up getting?  Were you completely satisfied with the purchase?  Has it ever disappointed you?

2. Is there anything that you are pining for now?  In light of this passage, how might you rethink your desire for it?

3. What in your life is your “bangle”, the thing that brings more attention and glory and honor to yourself?  Is it your career, your looks, your intellect?

4. In what ways can that bangle be used instead to bring more attention to God instead of to self?

7.15.09, Isaiah 3:9-15

⁹ The look on their faces testifies against them;
they parade their sin like Sodom;
they do not hide it.
Woe to them!
They have brought disaster upon themselves.

¹⁰ Tell the righteous it will be well with them,
for they will enjoy the fruit of their deeds.

¹¹ Woe to the wicked! Disaster is upon them!
They will be paid back for what their hands have done.

¹² Youths oppress my people,
women rule over them.
O my people, your guides lead you astray;
they turn you from the path.

¹³ The LORD takes his place in court;
he rises to judge the people.

¹⁴ The LORD enters into judgment
against the elders and leaders of his people:
“It is you who have ruined my vineyard;
the plunder from the poor is in your houses.

¹⁵ What do you mean by crushing my people
and grinding the faces of the poor?”
declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty.

Fruit

Again…some more judgment.  Reading so many pronouncements of judgment can get a little old at times, and seems to reinforce a stereotype that a lot of non-Christians (and Christians) have about faith – that it’s all judgment.  God is so mean, and is just out to get us.  And it is possible to get that kind of vibe when you read certain passages.

But this passages is good reminder that judgment is a kind of RESPONSE.  God’s heart is not to judge without any kind of reason – he does so in response to the evil that we perpetrate.  That is what we read in this passage:

“They have brought disaster upon themselves”

“They will be paid back for what their hands have done”

“It is you who have ruined my vineyard; the plunder of the poor is in your houses”

When we read about judgment, it doesn’t really make sense to say, “Why, God, WHY??”  Because the response is pretty clear – we earned it.  But the better, and more final answer, is that the judgment of God is restorative, is designed to fix, not terminate (remember, this is what we read in the first chapter of Isaiah, in this devotional).

Questions

1. Do you remember a time where you feel like God was judging you?

2. Do you think his judgment came in response to anything you were doing (that you probably shouldn’t have been)?

3. Have you ever realized that a tough situation in your life was really YOUR doing, rather than the fault of another?

7.13.09, Isaiah 3:1-7

Judgment on Jerusalem and Judah

¹ See now, the Lord,
the LORD Almighty,
is about to take from Jerusalem and Judah
both supply and support:
all supplies of food and all supplies of water,

² the hero and warrior,
the judge and prophet,
the soothsayer and elder,

³ the captain of fifty and man of rank,
the counselor, skilled craftsman and clever enchanter.

⁴ I will make boys their officials;
mere children will govern them.

⁵ People will oppress each other—
man against man, neighbor against neighbor.
The young will rise up against the old,
the base against the honorable.

⁶ A man will seize one of his brothers
at his father’s home, and say,
“You have a cloak, you be our leader;
take charge of this heap of ruins!”

⁷ But in that day he will cry out,
“I have no remedy.
I have no food or clothing in my house;
do not make me the leader of the people.”

Topsy Turvy

We are still looking at the judgment upon Israel for their sins – get used to it, because Isaiah is a book of rebuke, and contains quite a bit of judgment!

Here, we see that God’s judgment includes a kind of reversing of orders, that those who naturally have authority will lose it, and instead, the young will rule over them.  Now, in our modern culture of youth empowerment (and idolatry), this sounds like a good thing: taking the power from these rich old farts and putting it into the hands of the young!  Like something you would see in a Pepsi ad… most people would wonder what the problem is!

But this is NOT a positive thing, and not meant as a good development.  Older people are supposed to be in authority because their experience has taught them lessons that mere exuberance and idealism cannot impart.  It is the way that God has intended things to be.  But because our world scoffs at this wisdom, the young rarely respect the old, and the old rarely understand their responsibility to train the young, and both are the worse for it.

The world has a way of doing this, reversing God’s wisdom and replacing it with its latest fashionable (and changable) morality.  And it has a way of making it sound so plausible so that we feel foolish for feeling any other way.  Be wary of this, and resist it.  Trust what God has said, what he has taught, and remember that the reason we don’t trust the wisdom of the world, no matter how plausible, is because “the world” is made up of a bunch of sinful and foolish people who are so short-lived, and have no idea what they’re doing while they’re here.

Questions

1. What is one issue or situation where you see a conflict between what the world feels is right, and what God feels is right?

2. What makes the world’s position on this issue so convincing to you?

3. What wisdom do you see in the way that God views that situation or issue?

4. Living out our biblical convictions gracefully is very hard – what helps us balance these in our lives?

7.10.09, Isaiah 2:6-22

The Day of the Lord

⁶ You have abandoned your people,
the house of Jacob.
They are full of superstitions from the East;
they practice divination like the Philistines
and clasp hands with pagans.

⁷ Their land is full of silver and gold;
there is no end to their treasures.
Their land is full of horses;
there is no end to their chariots.

⁸ Their land is full of idols;
they bow down to the work of their hands,
to what their fingers have made.

⁹ So man will be brought low
and mankind humbled—
do not forgive them.

¹⁰ Go into the rocks,
hide in the ground
from dread of the LORD
and the splendor of his majesty!

¹¹ The eyes of the arrogant man will be humbled
and the pride of men brought low;
the LORD alone will be exalted in that day.

¹² The LORD Almighty has a day in store
for all the proud and lofty,
for all that is exalted
(and they will be humbled),

¹³ for all the cedars of Lebanon, tall and lofty,
and all the oaks of Bashan,

¹⁴ for all the towering mountains
and all the high hills,

¹⁵ for every lofty tower
and every fortified wall,

¹⁶ for every trading ship
and every stately vessel.

¹⁷ The arrogance of man will be brought low
and the pride of men humbled;
the LORD alone will be exalted in that day,

¹⁸ and the idols will totally disappear.

¹⁹ Men will flee to caves in the rocks
and to holes in the ground
from dread of the LORD
and the splendor of his majesty,
when he rises to shake the earth.

²⁰ In that day men will throw away
to the rodents and bats
their idols of silver and idols of gold,
which they made to worship.

²¹ They will flee to caverns in the rocks
and to the overhanging crags
from dread of the LORD
and the splendor of his majesty,
when he rises to shake the earth.

²² Stop trusting in man,
who has but a breath in his nostrils.
Of what account is he?

The Splendor of His Majesty

Just one more note about this passage before we move on.  We read here how calamity and retribution will fall on the arrogant and the proud.  But as stereotypically common as this appears, there is one very notable aspect to this retribution: it says that men will run to caves and holes in the ground “from dread of the Lord and the splendor of his majesty.”

This highlights a very simple fact, that God is awesome and terribly holy.  I don’t use that word “terribly” in a negative way, but instead to underscore how fearful his presence would be.  You read this over and over again in Scripture, with Moses meeting God, later in Isaiah’s encounter with God, some of the disciples’ reactions when they catch a glimpse of the fullness of Christ.  God’s presence, in its unadulterated and revealed form, would make us fall down in fear, even ask for death.

But it doesn’t.

Intead, many of us conceive of God’s presence as a warm, safe place that we are invited to, like the Jesus we see in the gospels, wrapping his arms around the shoulders of children, and dining with those considered sinners.  What happened here?  Which conception is correct, the holy and terrible God, or the warm arms of our Father God?

They both are.  I know that sounds crazy, but it’s not.  And the reason it is possible, why it is not a logical impossibility, is the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  When Christ died and took our sins, our state changed – when the eyes of God look over us, He no longer sees a sinner, but someone washed clean by incredibly precious blood.  He sees people who have paid their debt (or had their debt paid by another), and so…he sees his children.

So this passage serves as a dual revelation: yes, the incredible holiness of the presence of God, something that we overlook all too often.  But also the fundamental transformation that occurred with Jesus’ ministry on the cross, that wrath was turned into acceptance.  So much changed after those three days.

Questions

1. Why is it important to still remember God’s terrible holiness and splendor?  What positive effects could that have?

2. When you think about God, and how he views you, which do you tend to focus on more, his holiness or his acceptance?  Why?

3. It is good to strive for a type of balance in our conception of God, his holy character, and his divine mercy.  How can we balance these two understandings?