Sermon Tone Analysis

Isaiah 30-31

Good evening church.

Welcome, and I’m glad you chose to spend your evening with us tonight, investing in your relationship with the Lord.

Someone suggested to me that when we begin growth groups again that we shake everything up and mix the groups, the leaders, put the people in different places, to create more relationships.

So, I want to remind you that you do get to pick where you land, and if you want to try a different group, do it!

I kinda feel like we do that when we gather on Wednesday nights as we fellowship, and assigning groups is a lot like having assigned seats at a wedding reception.

Who wants to get stuck sitting next to the pastor at a party?

Tonight we are in Isaiah chapter 30.

Remember we are in a section here where God is laying out a series of woes against the southern kingdom of Judah, who has at this point been distracted by other things.

God has taken a back seat in their lives, and this makes them subject to having blessing removed and judgement put in their place.

You guys have heard me say often, that I want to learn the tough lessons from other peoples lives.

I don’t want to suffer, so if I can learn that lesson from watching other people make choices, or take a road that doesn’t lead to life, it leads to death, my hope is that I’ll learn from those observations and not have to repeat painful things God gave me the opportunity to learn through observation rather than experimentation.

Remember that Isaiah is broken up into two major sections the first 39 chapters are part prophecy, part historical.

In fact we are approaching chapters 36-39 about the Assyrian conquest which is largely repeated or very similar to what we read in Kings.

Once we get to chapter 40, the whole of the remainder is prophetic.

Let’s pray - give us understanding of application in our own lives.

Isaiah 30:1

What God is telling me, is not what I want to do.

I have chosen my way, and it is continuing to lead me down a path that is adding sin to sin.

Governed by appetites, governed by flesh, governed by popular opinion.

We need to be very, very careful of this.

Proverbs tells us... Pro 14:12

At this point in Israel’s history, this is not the first time God has given them instruction and they have chosen their own way.

It is not the first time that they have faced a horrific enemy, that God made a way of escape from, but they rejected it, they rejected God, and received the judgement for doing so.

The most valuable thing we can learn from reading the stories about God interacting with Israel, or God interacting with anyone in the Bible, is how to hear to the voice of God and to heed to it, to obey it.

Not weigh it among other opinions as if God was one of your social media friends.

Right now, the context of what we are reading is there is a terrible enemy coming from the East.

The Assyrian armies are coming and they have defeated and destroyed everyone and everything in their path.

The northern kingdom of Israel, the 10 tribes to the north have already fallen into idolatry and they fall to Assyria, the people are driven from the land.

Every village and town in between has fallen, and Assyria really has their eyes on the treasure trove that lays in Egypt.

And historically, we can see that they didn’t stop there, but there was an even more formidable force in norther Africa, were modern day Sudan would be, and the Assyrians with their professional warriors conquered them as well.

Jerusalem is like this little island sitting in the middle and directly in the way, and they know it.

The wise thing to do would be to repent and cry out to the Lord.

The wise thing for America to do would be to repent and to cry out to the Lord.

The wise thing for the church to do would be to repent and to cry out to the name of the Lord.

To reject all that they church has put before God.

We look at the nation of Israel historically and the judgement that God brought on His own people.

What about our own country.

What about all the innocent blood we have on our hands.

Killing our own children, trafficking, abuse, injustice.

How much longer until God judges our land?

God will not allow this to go on without judgement.

Pride will be punished.

Even within the church, there is a self centeredness that is not of God, it is nothing like God, that needs to be corrected.

We don’t want to be rebellious children.

We don’t want to be on a path that seems right to a man, but we want to be fully submitted to God and the Word of God.

That means so radical change needs to happen so we are not adding sin to sin.

Now we know historically this is exactly what happened!

The Assyrians came down the Egyptians came to meet them in battle and who won?

The Assyrians.

So they couldn’t protect them, only God could.

Look at the description here of Egypt (a shadow) it looks like something, but in reality, there is nothing there for you in the way of protection.

Lots of times it is the same way in our lives.

It may not be a physical battle, it may be a spiritual one.

Where God puts His finger on something in our lives that we know is wrong, we know is sin, and we say, no God.

I don’t want to change that, or I don’t want to acknowledge that what I am doing is not honoring you, so I’m going to do this other thing instead…and we are adding sin to sin…and consequences to come.

This just feels right, look out!

Jesus instructed us to deny ourselves.

We are going to have an opportunity to do that together as a church in January, I’ll share more with you about on Sunday morning.

Hoping the Lord uses it to put some things in order.

So God is telling Judah to repent and turn to Him, and they say, I don’t want to hear that, I want to try this other way.

The truth is offensive to me, so I will go my own way, seek my own counsel, I know if I ask enough people, someone will tell me what I want to hear,…you don’t have to look far for that today, someone will surely agree with you.

This all reminded me of Jehoshaphat, you guys may remember he was a King of Judah before this time.

Currently, they are under the rule of Hezekiah, who was probably the best king they ever had, to be followed by Manasseh his son who was probably the worst.

We will see that Hezekiah basically works to rescue them, before we get to chapter 40,...

But in a previous time, when they had ongoing skirmishes with Syria, Jehoshaphat goes to the king of the north and says we should unite against our enemy, maybe lets ask God.

You can turn there if you’d like, I’ll read it to you, out of 1 Kings 22:4

This has become the nation that we live in, sadly it applies to much of the church in America as well.

I know what the Bible says about this, I know what God says about this, but I want to do this instead, or yeah but, I think this, or I feel this way.

This is exactly what Isaiah is dealing with here!

But it didn’t end in Judah back in the day. 2 Tim 4:3-4

Let’s continue in our chapter with verse 4, Isa 30:4-5

Those that they turned to in Egypt looked at Judah with shame, because there was no profit in a relationship with them, there was nothing that Judah could do for them.

No in my Bible there is a little note at the bottom of the page explaining this name to literally mean Rahab Sits Idle…meaning that they brought their treasure, they placed their faith in a people and it was all in vain, Egypt did nothing for them, but just sat by and watched.

Rahab is a name, but it also is the Hebrew word for pride, and that gives additional application here.

They are saying, OK, we want religion, but not the right things, not the truthful things, we want prophets and advisers that will tell us the things that we want to hear that agree with the way that we feel.

Truth being irrelevant.

So He gives them this warning… Isa 30:12-14

Total destruction comes from turning away from the Lord, but even in this pronouncement of judgement…in the middle of this woe, God says let me remind you, this is not my desire for you.

I’m not angry and unwilling to hear your repentance and once again embrace you…look at it, verse 15

Stop justifying your sin, and allowing compromise in your life turn to me, return to me and rest.

No more chaos, no more crazy, confidence shall be your strength because it is no longer in you, but in the Lord and there is peace there, only there.

But you would not… You see the enemy all around and all you have to do is turn to me.

Can God save when the odds and the circumstances say it’s too late?

Of course He can, and He does.

One angel does as they come in and 185,000 of the Assyrians are wiped out in a single night.

Why? Repentance, they finally, finally did.

But how much suffering, death, and misery did they incur before they finally did?

If you know the history of Israel.

You know Israel falls, all except for Jerusalem.

They fall away again, about 140 years later the Babylonians come in and take them into captivity where they remain for 70 years.

And they come back into the land and begin to rebuild.

I talked about this at a men’s breakfast not long ago.

And I bring it up again because this occurred after these events.

They come back and they have rebuilt the wall, but they are filled once again with compromise and doing certain things that they aren’t supposed to be doing.

I’m going to be in chapter 9, but I want to start with some background from chapter 8. Neh 8:1

What is interesting to me, is clearly, God is looking for a generation that will hear His voice and obey.

When you look at the timeline in Isaiah.

This battle with the Assyrians happens, about 140 years later they are taken captive by the Babylonians for 70 years before they begin to come back into the land.

So a little over 200 years, 2020, or 30 I didn’t do the math, but where does that put us on God’s patience calendar?