Visions of Isaiah (7)
Notes
Transcript
3 Catagories of People
Non Christians, Nominal Christians, and True believing Christians.
Too often what passes for Christianity today is a life legislated by the good example of Jesus and frightened by the threat of divine punishment
The message today is about those who cloth themselves in Christianity, but their heart isn’t following their mouth.
Today we are going to be reading God’s message to Ahaz through Isaiah, but I want to give you insight into who Ahaz is.
Ahaz was twenty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. And he did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord, as his father David had done,
but he walked in the ways of the kings of Israel. He even made metal images for the Baals,
and he made offerings in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom and burned his sons as an offering, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel.
And he sacrificed and made offerings on the high places and on the hills and under every green tree.
In reality Ahaz professed following the God of Israel, but followed the flavor of the month.
The measure of who we serve usually comes out when life comes against us. This week has proven useful in that matter as I watch Christians scramble and fill with fear because they worry about who will lead our nation. I have heard many who swear they follow God speak of fear and trouble. The issue is that if we are truly following God than it doesn’t matter who leads the nation because God is still on the thrown.
In Isaiah chapter 7 we will be wrestling with Ahaz’s belief in God, but we aren’t just wrestling with Ahaz’s belief because these verses, if headed, will cause you to wrestle with your own belief of
Who is God?
The year is 730BC and Bully of that time was the Assyrian Empire. They were shrewd and they they took torture to new levels. They were the country everyone was afraid of. Now I don’t know who you voted for, but this seems to be the picture painted for whatever side you oppose. People have painted Trump as a bully on the court and people have painted the democratic party has the bully who will cheat and twist their way to victory. Either way Ahaz was facing a giant who threatened to take them down just as our country faces a team of giants who threaten to dismantle Christian values.
Now Israel and Syria are on the boarder of Judah, above them in fact, and the Assyrians have lined up against their boarder in order to afflict them with fear. Israel and Syriah reach out to Judah and ask for Help. Ahaz denies them assistance.
Israel and Syria gather their armies and make a plan to over take Judah and King Ahaz. Their plan was to put in a king who would bend to the will of both Israel and Syriah thus giving them the help they desired. Not to get too political, but does this remind you of what some people’s plans are for the future of our country?
This brings us to our text this morning. This morning Isaiah isn’t painting a picture but rather he is telling us a story so it needs to be read as such. But remember that the core issue Isaiah is dealing with unbelief.
In the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, Rezin the king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah the king of Israel came up to Jerusalem to wage war against it, but could not yet mount an attack against it.
When the house of David was told, “Syria is in league with Ephraim,” the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.
Now I want you to notice the fear Ahaz and Judah are experiencing. Isaiah’s words isn’t just a vision worth painting, but it displayes the depth of fear Judah is experiencing. As I page through facebook this same shaking is taking place within the context of the upcoming elections. Christians are over run with fear at the possibility of a democratic country. I have recieved many messages filled with fear and questioning the prophecies that Trump was going to win and I believe God has a message for his people:
Who do you put your trust in? Why are you continually trusting those in a political office who seek only what is good for themselves. Don’t you serve a God who above them? Don’t you serve a God who built this very nation you are in fear of losing? Do you serve God or country? I reign above all. I command the Earth and the seas and all the reside in them. I give order. Put your trust in me and you shall not be shaken. Put your trust in me and my ways and you will not be let down. I held Stephen as his opposers thought they were taking his life. I breathed life into his nostrals when he took his last Earthly breath and now I hold him in my hands and reside with him in my Kingdom. Do not live like this is your last life, but live as though it is temporary. You don’t cling to food which is here today and rotten tomorrow. You throw it away and search from something fresh. I have given you life beyond this rotting world. It wil parish and die, but the Kingdom of God will last forever. Put your trust in me. I will protect your Spirit Says the Lord. I will protect your Spirit and you will reside with me in victory.
You may not be worried about the election, but we all run into those times where we feel as though our stomach is going to pop out our throats. Our hearts are going to pump out of our chest or we are paralyzed in fear. The root of this fear isn’t the issue that we believe faces us the issue with out fear is that it shows the true condition of our heart and our ability to believe that God can and will supply for our current situation. AND knowing that the WAY he supplies is what we need.
And the Lord said to Isaiah, “Go out to meet Ahaz, you and Shear-jashub your son, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the Washer’s Field.
Why is the place important? Ahaz is at a place where he is checking his water supply. Judah didn’t have a water source so that means their water was pipped in from somewhere else. Ahaz is taking a census of their resources. How many times have we been in a place of fear or dread that we began to check our own resources. We pull extra money from our bank account so we have cash on hand. We filled up our oil tank and a few kerosene containers. We run to walmart and buy all the Toilet paper and hand sanitizer in the isle can hold. We check our freezers and our gun cabinet to make sure we have food and ammo. People laugh and make meme’s of the stock piles people build, but this is what we do when we perceive disaster to hit us. We prepare, but we don’t consult. We don’t seek God first. God what would you have me to do? Ahaz didn’t consult either, but God sent Isaiah
And say to him, ‘Be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering stumps of firebrands, at the fierce anger of Rezin and Syria and the son of Remaliah.
Be careful, Be quiet, do not fear, and let not your heart become faint.
God is speaking to Ahaz’s emotions. Sure be careful. The bible tell us everywhere not to be wreckless. We shouldn’t just put all caution to the wind, but we don’t need to be over cautious either. Then he speaks to all the voices in Ahaz’s head. Be quiet and not fear.
Some of us need to stop speaking and listen. We fear because we talk too much or we listen to other people talk too much. Be quiet and allow God to work, listen for his voice. and don’t let your heart spiral you into depression.
And then notice the sarcasm God uses. People ask me why I am sarcastic—well it’s because my father/creator is sarcastic and I am made in his image.
He states Rezin is angry and Syria and the son of Remaliah. We already know the kings name is Pekah as its’ found in v 2, but God is saying don’t be afraid of what’s his name? ya know that guys son. He is so insignificant he isn’t worth mentioning or remembering.
Then after dismissing the fear he lets us know that he knows why we fear.
Because Syria, with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah, has devised evil against you, saying,
“Let us go up against Judah and terrify it, and let us conquer it for ourselves, and set up the son of Tabeel as king in the midst of it,”
thus says the Lord God: “ ‘It shall not stand, and it shall not come to pass.
Listen the thing yo fear it shall not come to pass. They can clamour all they desire, but it shall not over take you. Most times the very thing you are afraid of doesn’t happen and if it does it usually isn’t as bad as you made it out to be. I always asky myself: What’s the worst that can happen? someone kill me—then what I am in heave? Is that so bad? Is it something worth being terrified over.
Even this election: Both candidates are good for Christianity.
Trump will give us 4 more years of ease
Biden will strip us of our rights and bring upon persecution to those who believe in Jesus. If notice persecution isn’t a bad thing for Christianity. Believers multiply in times of persecution. Usually those who fear being persecuted for their faith don’t have a strong faith to begin with.
For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin. And within sixty-five years Ephraim will be shattered from being a people.
And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.’ ”
I love this: If you are not firm in faith-you are not firm at all. You’re rations don’t matter, your army doesn’t matter. I made food fall from heaven and I did with one man what an entire nation couldn’t do. Faith is what matters. If you don’t have faith you have nothing.
The only thing that will get us through any trouble is faith. It’s the only weapon that fights fear. Faith. It’s the only thing we should be taking census of because faith is all that matters.