Isaiah 47 - The Tragedy of Babylon

Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans! For you shall no more be called tender and delicate. 2 Take the millstones and grind flour, put off your veil, strip off your robe, uncover your legs, pass through the rivers. 3 Your nakedness shall be uncovered, and your disgrace shall be seen. I will take vengeance, and I will spare no one. 4 Our Redeemer—the Lord of hosts is his name— is the Holy One of Israel. 5 Sit in silence, and go into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans; for you shall no more be called the mistress of kingdoms. 6 I was angry with my people; I profaned my heritage; I gave them into your hand; you showed them no mercy; on the aged you made your yoke exceedingly heavy. 7 You said, “I shall be mistress forever,” so that you did not lay these things to heart or remember their end. 8 Now therefore hear this, you lover of pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me; I shall not sit as a widow or know the loss of children”: 9 These two things shall come to you in a moment, in one day; the loss of children and widowhood shall come upon you in full measure, in spite of your many sorceries and the great power of your enchantments. 10 You felt secure in your wickedness; you said, “No one sees me”; your wisdom and your knowledge led you astray, and you said in your heart, “I am, and there is no one besides me.” 11 But evil shall come upon you, which you will not know how to charm away; disaster shall fall upon you, for which you will not be able to atone; and ruin shall come upon you suddenly, of which you know nothing. 12 Stand fast in your enchantments and your many sorceries, with which you have labored from your youth; perhaps you may be able to succeed; perhaps you may inspire terror. 13 You are wearied with your many counsels; let them stand forth and save you, those who divide the heavens, who gaze at the stars, who at the new moons make known what shall come upon you. 14 Behold, they are like stubble; the fire consumes them; they cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. No coal for warming oneself is this, no fire to sit before! 15 Such to you are those with whom you have labored, who have done business with you from your youth; they wander about, each in his own direction; there is no one to save you. - Isaiah 47:1–15

Sermon Text:

I invite you to open your Bibles this morning as we look at the 47th chapter of Isaiah.

[READ Isaiah 47]

Just a quick word of introduction here: earlier we read Revelation 18 for our New Testament reading. I think the reason is fairly obvious:

In just a quick comparison, in the 15 verses of Isaiah 47, I found 17 strong correlations between the two chapters.

I put them in my notes online for anyone who would like to look at the ones I found.

The passages aren’t identical, and there is no way they both are speaking about the same Babylon that conquered Judah in 587 BC.

But it would be entirely wrong to think the two passages have nothing to do with one another. Of course they are related.

I would even suggest that without the New Testament passage, we might be tempted to think Isaiah’s prophecy was entirely confined to that ancient Babylonian empire.

That when Babylon fell, that was the end of Isaiah’s prophecy.

Were it not for the Revelation to John, Isaiah 47 might just be an interesting footnote in the Bible.

But we can tell that while the prophecy of God’s judgment on the first Babylon was fulfilled in 539 BC, there remains much for us to learn from Isaiah for this simple reason: there will be at least one more Babylon.

There may have been several already; there may yet be several.

But here I must disappoint anyone who thought I would dive into eschatology – I won’t be today.

Although the things in this passage about God will be true on the last day, they are true TODAY.

And I think it will be much more profitable for us all to consider those things about God in this chapter rather than speculating about the things God has not yet fully revealed.

We will have ample time to discuss those other things as we sit with glorified bodies in God’s completed kingdom.

While we sing of His perfect works among men.

In many modern Bibles, there are headers above chapters or sections that the translators use to describe what is in the passage.

These often are helpful if you are trying to quickly find a reference.

Yours may say “The Humiliation of Babylon” or “The Fall of Babylon”.

Even the ancient Geneva Bible has a header for this section: “The destruction of Babylon and the causes wherefore.”

But the New American Standard calls it “Lament for Babylon” – and I think that captures something in this title we might easily overlook in our English translations:

The meter of the poem here marks it off as a song of lament.

I mention these because one of the key differences between Isaiah’s Babylon and John’s is that there is a verse in the Revelation that has no counterpart here in Isaiah:

Rejoice over her, O heaven, and you saints and apostles and prophets, for God has given judgment for you against her!” - Revelation 18:20

Nowhere in Isaiah’s lament is there a call for Judah to rejoice in the fall of Babylon.

What business does the church, or any individual believer, have in rejoicing over someone’s fall right now?

Tap-dancing on their grave?

Gleeful when a sinner is humiliated in his sin?

Are our hearts so hardened that we cannot find mercy or compassion for those who oppose the good commandment of God?

There will be a day – after God’s final judgment has fallen – where we will rejoice, but today is not the day.

If the Jews, indeed if we, rejoiced in the fall of Babylon, we would prove ourselves NO BETTER than Babylon.

We see it in verse 6 today:

I was angry with my people; I profaned my heritage; I gave them into your hand; you showed them no mercy

“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. - Matthew 5:7

There is no “except” clause there.

“Blessed are the ones who are merciful to the obedient people…”

“Blessed are those who are merciful to other Christians…”

“Blessed are those who are merciful most of the time…”

You get the idea…

The great outworking of all the filth and corruption in the heart of Babylon was that when the Jews were given into their hands, they showed them no mercy.

The graphic atrocities Babylon committed were legendary, but all those evils came from their corrupted hearts that didn’t love the true God.

But are we any better today?

Have we learned of compassion from our Lord?

Have we learned that in loving others, we fulfill much of the Law of God?

Do we ever consider that in loving others, we prove we belong to God?

I get it: everything we are taught from childhood tells us to love our friends and hate our enemies.

But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. - Matthew 5:44–45

My friends, those are not just words for apostles – they are words for you and me.

PRAY for pagans.

PRAY for Caesar (or Trump or Biden or Obama)

That isn’t the mark of a super-Christian – there aren’t any.

That is the mark of a plain old everyday follower of Christ who walks in faith.

Enough of this Christian glee when another sinner falls or fails;

Enough of this Fox News/ MSNBC mentality of political debates.

Enough of winking at the sins of the party we agree with.

Enough!

Jesus didn’t save you to wage a culture war, or to defend Him against His enemies:

He didn’t save you to be more successful in this world than the sons of the Evil One.

Jesus saved you and commissioned you to go find His sheep among all the nations and bring them in.

And He expects you and me to have compassion and mercy even on those who come under God’s temporal judgment for their sin.

You are NOT being disloyal or disobedient to God by showing mercy on those who have been brought low.

To those who have lost everything to their addictions or their lusts or their iniquities.

Be ready, looking for the one who has gone to the far country and squandered what God has given them.

It doesn’t mean to buy a drug addict drugs, or help them do that: where is the love in that?

Some will need to go for a while to that far country until the Spirit of God brings them low.

And then when He brings them back to you, let the love and mercy of God flow through you to them.

On his second missionary journey, Paul came to Corinth and, as often happened, he created controversy.

After eighteen months of preaching and teaching, where even the leader of the synagogue, a man named Crispus, was converted, Paul was arrested and taken before the tribunal, the court.

Paul didn’t even have to open his mouth – the proconsul, Gallio, threw the case out immediately.

After that, the Jews who had lost the case ganged up on the new leader of the synagogue, Sosthenes, and beat him there in the court.

We might be tempted to do a fist pump – “Get him, God!”

But listen to the opening verse from Paul’s first epistle back to this church in Corinth:

Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sosthenes, - 1 Corinthians 1:1

Our brother Sosthenes.

We aren’t told in the Scripture how Sosthenes went from prosecutor and ruler of the Jewish synagogue to travelling companion with Paul for the sake of Christ.

But one thing I am really sure of:

It wasn’t because Paul shunned him or gloated over his victory over Sosthenes.

It wasn’t because the church of Corinth shut their homes to him after his humiliating beating at the hands of the Jews.

I feel really confident in saying it is because some faithful follower of Christ, maybe Paul or Crispus – certainly someone, went and reached out to this broken man and gave him the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Seeing his need more than they held on to his offense against them or against Christ.

And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, 18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. - 1 Peter 1:17–19

There is not a single person who hears me who can rightfully claim the moral high ground over anyone else.

Who here is sinless enough to cast the first stone toward anyone?

We call out sin, yes.

That is the loving thing to do – to help each other escape from entangling sins and to help each other toward loving obedience.

We call each other to repentance – absolutely.

And we should not go a single day without discovering something in our own heart to repent of.

Don’t go to sleep at night until you find it.

Those weapons God has given? They are to do that very work in each of us:

Tearing down strongholds, casting down Babylonian pride, bringing every single thought under the captivity of Christ.

Our Redeemer is the Holy One!

The holiness of God – Isaiah’s great theme and his great vision.

But if we are rejoicing over someone else’s sin or the judgment they receive for it, I think part of it may be that we don’t really think sin is that odious, that rotten and rotting.

We don’t give thought to the offense every single sin is to the God we claim to love.

Not just our own sins, but the sins of the entire world.

Each and every one is a week-old rotting fish of a stench that despoils this world He created good.

When we shrug off our sins as “little”, we are the offense to the Holy God we serve.

Do you see the judgment on this earth that God meets out to Babylon?

Slavery, shame, humiliation, toil, pain, evil, disaster, and ruin.

Loss and widowhood, and consuming fire.

Sin, although it is always with us, can never be considered a companion.

It is ALWAYS the enemy to your soul.

And a deadly enemy at that.

Who can call themselves a believer who, in this life, seeks the eternal judgment of ANY other person; I don’t care what they’ve done?

Who, in the name of the love of Christ can look at another human being and wish to see them condemned before God into everlasting fire?

William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, once said that were it in his power, he would hang every single believer for an hour over the pit of hell so they can hear the cries of those who are in eternal torment.

No one could be unchanged by that.

Can you look at your enemy, even one who is at the moment an adversary of Jesus Christ and His church –

Can you look at him or her and see them in the throes of agony in hell?

Their unending torment.

Their unheeded cries.

The unremitting, unresting agony.

And if you can do it without shedding a tear, without compassion welling up inside you, without the mercy of Christ breaking our of you like a bomb of love –

if this is not your reaction to that picture, are you any better than Babylon?

Have you proven yourself any more merciful?

Have you proven yourself any more a child of the Father?

The world wants to desensitize you to this.

Love your friends and hate your enemies.

In movies, we cheer when the villain is destroyed.

In books and other works of fiction, the more gruesome the justice, the better.

But this is real life – it’s not fiction.

It’s not a video game where you shoot your enemies.

Real life, and especially real life in Christ, is built on the mercy of God.

All the time, this young Babylon thought they were good, that they would live forever.

Is that the illusion you live under?

I know you probably are aware, but everyone in here will one day die unless the Lord appears first.

And what preparations THIS WEEK have you made for what happens to YOU after you die?

We live most of our lives preparing for the necessities of this life:

Food, shelter, clothing, job, hobbies, recreation, and the like.

But what have you stored away in heaven?

What of ETERNAL weight have you done this week?

Not every week has to be something massive, like a mission journey or leading someone to Christ.

Many weeks will be putting away more modest things:

Understanding of Scripture and obedience to that understanding.

Lifting up a brother who has fallen.

Supporting someone who is doing some work for Christ.

Praying intensely and secretly for someone.

Praying and doing loving things for someone who cannot repay you.

Putting away a worldly distraction so you can give more of this lifetime for God’s glory.

The list goes on.

There is no reason the end of this life should catch any believer by surprise.

If we are spending each day in seeking God’s glory rather than improving our position in this world, the step across from this life to the next is a small one.

It is not a leap into the unknown void;

It is the arrival at our most exciting destination.

It is what we have been living for.

It is what we parented for: to make sure, to the best of our ability, our children are there.

It is what we prayed for.

It is what we worked for.

It is what we have longed for:

For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. 22 If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me. Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell. 23 I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. 24 But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account. - Philippians 1:21–24

Even the life we live in the flesh, we live by faith in the Son of God.

Longing for the day when our faith becomes sight.

Target Date: Sunday6 April 2025

Word Study/ Translation Notes:

4 – Redeemer - gâ˒al, gaw-al’; a prim. root, to redeem (according to the Oriental law of kinship), i.e. to be the next of kin (and as such to buy back a relative’s property, marry his widow, etc.):— × in any wise, × at all, avenger, deliver, (do, perform the part of near, next) kinsfolk (-man), purchase, ransom, redeem (-er), revenger.

3 – spare no one - paga (803b); a prim. root; to meet, encounter, reach:—approach(1), attack(2), attacked(1), came(1), cut him down(1), entreat(2), fall(7), fell(4), happen(1), intercede(2), interceded(1), kill(1), make supplication(1), meet(3), meets(3), met(2), pleaded(1), reached(6), spare(1), strike the mark(1), touched(1), touched and reached(1), urge(1).

Literally: I will not meet a man. Translators wrestle with this verb, which is used both in aggression (attack) or pacification (to strike a treaty). I think the latter is intended here – the Redeemer of verse 4 is not there to make peace, but to avenge His people.

I will not meet thee as a man, with moderation and gentleness, as those men who have not quite put off humanity use to do; but like a lion tearing thee to pieces, to which God in such case compareth himself, as Hos. 5:14; 13:7, 8: compare Hos. 11:4.

to strike a covenant with any one, pactus est (from paciscor), to make peace with him, followed by אֵת. I now consider that two passages in Isaiah should be thus explained, which have been variously treated by interpreters; Isa. 64:4, פָּגַעְתָּ אֶת־שָׂשׂ וְעֹשֵׂה צֶדֶק “thou makest peace with him who rejoiceth to work righteousness,” i.e. thou art in league with the man who loves justice, and thou delightest in him; similar is אִישׁ בְּרִיתְךָ, אִישׁ שְׁלוֹמְךָ. Without אֵת Isa. 47:3, “I will take vengeance וְלֹא אֶפְגַּע אָדָם and will not make peace with any man,” I will grant peace to none till all are destroyed. The signification of strking is referred to that of making peace, as shown by the Latin words pango, paciscor, and also by the Heb. and Arabic שָׂפַק (Isa. 2:6), صفق, سفق and Lat. ferire, percutere fœdus.

Thoughts on the Passage:

For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul? – Mark 8:36-37

1 – virgin daughter – although I find in commentaries few theological reasons for Babylon to be called “virgin”, the following are some possibilities:

1. She would be cut down in her prime. Babylon would not decay away; she would be attacked when at the height of her strength and glory.

2. She would be conquered in the first single attack made upon her. Her walls were not again and again assaulted, but her conquest would be complete by the first fall. Thus, she was not experienced in losing in war nor in recovery from it.

3. Far from being a blushing child, she is presented as a terrible, petulant child of privilege who expected everything to go her way, regardless of her wickedness.

God depicted Babylon here as a rather prissy virgin. The city, representing the kingdom of Babylon, had, like a virgin, thus far not experienced the breaching of her walls by invaders. The Lord summoned her to sit on the ground, rather than on the throne that she preferred to occupy. - Constable

4. The idea of “virgin” prepares us to see her whoredom for what it is, the wickedness and cruelty endemic to her. Passing herself off as chaste, she is, in fact, rotten to the core.

He calls her a virgin because she was adorned and groomed like a virgin, wanting to appear youthful and pass off as a maiden. – Eusebius

And as for your covering, although you had covered your head with gold and precious stones and had adorned yourself with all the other frivolous embellishments, they were stripped away from you. After a great deal of time, you decayed and grew old while ruling as a tyrant over the nations, but you concealed your agedness and decrepitude from view, veiling your gray hairs in a garb of worldliness, so that you were still regarded as a tender and delicate virgin. Now, listen, you who are put to shame, because you are fated to bare the gray hairs on your head and to show your agedness to everyone. - Eusebius

4 – Our Redeemer – God is our Avenger, our Redeemer. It is He who comes for us.

Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: “For your sake I send to Babylon and bring them all down as fugitives, even the Chaldeans, in the ships in which they rejoice. - Isaiah 43:14

It is not the church who should be feared – it is God Himself.

We are weak; we may be easily dismissed. But our God reigns and executes terrible judgment.

What in this world do you love? I can assure you on the Scripture, it will be taken away.

Husbands and wives; parents and children. Houses and treasure and land. Health and hobbies; knowledge and reason; money and jewels – it all will be taken away from you, or you from it.

Is it any wonder Jesus told us to lay up for ourselves treasure in heaven?

6 – I was angry – Yes, God delivered His people to calamity and trial, even to a pruning down to a remnant, at the hand of Babylon; but He still cares for and watches over His people.

It used to be a familiar trope that an unruly child be sent off to military school. But although the parents were angry, this correction comes out of abundant love from our God.

If the teachers thus abuse His children, He will not and does not hold them blameless.

No one on the earth is the HAND of God’s wrath, the one who delivers that vengeance that belongs to Him alone. People may be used, but they are no more than tools. When we take vengeance to ourselves, whether believers or unbelievers, we sin greatly against God.

When we see someone receiving the recompense of their sin, we should feel compassion and fear, not victory and glee.

6 – you showed them no mercy – We sin grievously against God when we fail to show mercy to those under His judgment.

To the Prodigal, we must never shout the Law nor chide the wayward. We call and welcome – only the gospel and the truth of it can save and convert a soul.

7 – I shall be mistress forever… - If God so chastises and disciplines His beloved, how much fear should His enemies have? In the end everyone falls, no matter how powerful for a season – and then the judgment.

8 - Then I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues; 5 for her sins are heaped high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. 6 Pay her back as she herself has paid back others, and repay her double for her deeds; mix a double portion for her in the cup she mixed. 7 As she glorified herself and lived in luxury, so give her a like measure of torment and mourning, since in her heart she says, ‘I sit as a queen, I am no widow, and mourning I shall never see.’ 8 For this reason her plagues will come in a single day, death and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for mighty is the Lord God who has judged her.” - Revelation 18:4–8

10 – You felt secure in your wickedness – Often the security people rely on is that no one will see our evil thoughts and hidden deeds.

Or we comfort ourselves by not considering the day when we stand before the holy God.

10 – “I am, and there is no one besides me.” – This is the declaration of the wicked fool, the atheist who believes only in themselves and in the things they can accomplish.

…I will build bigger barns…

13 – who gaze at the stars – those who seek guidance in the stars cannot compare to the One who made the stars by the power of His word.

14 – no fire to sit before – The fire of God’s holy anger is not warmth but consuming fire, melting and purifying, testing and destroying, in His judgment.

Isaiah 47

Revelation 18

1 – Babylon brought down

2 – Babylon is fallen

2 – Grinds will a millstone

21 – The angel threw the millstone into the sea

3 – She is stripped

16-17 – Babylon is stripped

4 – God rescues His people from her

4-5 – God calls His people out of her

5 – She loses her position as Mistress

3, 9 – She is no longer mistress

6 – She showed no mercy

24 – The blood of the saints and martyrs is in her

7, 8 – “I shall be mistress forever”

7 – “I sit as a queen”

8 – she is a lover of pleasures

3, 7 – She loved pleasures

9 – destruction in a moment

8, 10, 17, 19 – In a single hour, destruction

9 – Loss of children and husband

7 – she is a mourning widow

9, 12 – great sorceries

23 – All nations deceived by her sorcery

10 – Self-reliance

7 – Trusted in her power

11 – her charms will be useless

12-14 – all the splendors are lost

12 – She is not called from her sin, but judged

6 – she is paid back double

14 – She will be utterly burned

8, 9 – her lovers weep over her burning

15 – Her trading partners will desert her

15-19 – The merchants remain far off concerned for themselves

15 – Salvation will be beyond her

8 – she will not be saved

What is the Good News of this passage – Where is Jesus Christ? (if you can’t answer this question, are you finished?)

Teachings:

The great sin of Babylon mentioned here is that they failed to have compassion on the people God had given into their hands.

Power, wealth, and dominion were given them by the only true God, but they used it to enrich themselves and increase their fame.

The punishment God inflicted on His people was just and right, but they were never outside His care and His love. Babylon considered what they had been given as something they deserved rather than a gift of God’s grace.

God is not impressed with our prestige or power

Babylon didn’t please God because they were not His.

What do we learn about God/ Jesus/ Holy Spirit?

Applications:

For the Christian:

For the Backslidden:

For the Unconverted:

Primary Preaching Point:

Building Points:

[on even numbered page]

MORNING PRAYER:

Adoration:

Almighty God and everlasting King.

Confession:

Forgive us our pride, and the loathsome lengths to which we will go to support our fleshly vanity.

Thanksgiving:

In You we find our only hope, both in this life and in eternity joined with Christ Jesus.

Petition:

We beg that You subdue the power of our sins by Your Holy Spirit.

Intercession: (also beyond our local)

We pray that Your peace would reign anew on the earth: