JUNE 30 READINGS...2 Kings 16:19-20 & 2 Chronicles 28:26-27 & Isaiah 13:1-16:14
I am really hoping you are aware of the incredible words of prophecy you and I are privileged to read in today’s Scripture. Isaiah is given amazing insight, knowledge, and understanding by the Holy Spirit of God. He is given a message for the nations that surround Judah…to the one that would try to conquer them, but wouldn’t, Assyria…to the one that God would use to conquer them and take them captive, Babylon…to those nations that either oppressed or mis-used the people of God, Philistia and Moab. We start with the reigning power at the time that Isaiah wrote this prophecy, Assyria. Assyria had destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel, and threatened to do the same to Judah. Isaiah made it clear that was not God’s plan…and that God Himself would destroy the mighty Assyrian’s…without Judah even having to raise a sword (we will see that God does just that in future readings). The Lord has spoken that the Babylonians would be used to punish Judah…they would destroy Jerusalem, and take the people captive, (that would happen approximately 100 years after Isaiah wrote this). What is even more incredible is the Isaiah tells us that God would raise up the Medes to punish and destroy the Babylonians, and also allow the Jews to return to Judah (this would happen some 200 years after Isaiah wrote this, and it would happen just as he said). Then Isaiah speaks words of prophecy against to nations that continued to oppress and misuse the people of Judah…their cruelty would not go unpunished and God would turn their lands into wastelands. I hope you are encouraged by the prophetic word of God…what it does for me is reminds me that God wrote history before it ever occurred. That being true His word tells me that my future is secure in Jesus Christ…what do I have to fear. I hope you have trusted in Jesus and know the security of the promise of God’s infallible word!
Also, in our readings there is an interesting passage where Isaiah uses God’s judgment against the king of Babylon to give us a glimpse into eternity past. Isaiah14:12-16, though primarily has reference to what God would do to the Babylon’s king…many, including myself, believe it has a secondary, and more expansive truth being revealed. It is an apt description of what happened to a mighty angel named Lucifer in heaven. How he was thrown down to the earth, because of his pride. He said that he would…set his throne above God’s throne…I will sit as lord over the congregations…I will be like the Most High. His pride would bring him down to the grave…to the pits of hell. We need to understand that the original sin against God both in heaven and here on earth were based in pride. Satan fell because he wanted to place himself above God. Adam and Eve fell into sin, because their pride wanted them to be as God. It is no coincidence that the complete rebellion against God that we see in our day, both in the world, and now in the church has at its root, PRIDE. They portray their pride as some type of virtue…but it is sin against God, His creative order, and His Word. Mankind’s pride will never do anything for humanity except destroy it…only in humility and brokenness can we come to God through His Son Jesus. Nothing has changed in human history, and mankind’s approach to God…it’s still all about our pride, and it will still lead to our destruction.
Please share your thoughts from today’s readings. Ask the Holy Spirit to break you and humble you and me before Himself, that He may raise us up in the power of God. Resist the spirit of this age that is lying to you in their reprobate minds, as they try to drag everything that is good and holy into their perversion.
TOMORROW’S READINGS…2 Chronicles 29:3-31:21
コメント