Day #209

Sermon - Audio
Isaiah 44-48 - Audio
Isaiah 44-48 - Reading

Daily Insights - Please Comment

44

44.2: God claims ownership of his people

44.2: Jeshurun: a poetic name for Israel

44.4: a wonderful contrast with the earlier words of Isaiah 40 where all men are as grass that wilts and is blown away.

44.6-23: The greatness of God compared with the foolishness and weakness of idols.

44.19: the stupidity of people who worship idols

44.23: a call for all creation to celebrate the redemption of God’s people.

44.26: God can be trusted because he has fulfilled his words (he is a God who tells the future and then causes that future to be so we know he has great power).

45

45.1ff: In an unexpected and surprising move God chooses Cyrus to be his anointed one (Hebrew: messiah—this is the only time in the Bible that a foreign ruler is called “messiah”) to free his people from captivity. This choice causes questions and disbelief from some of the people of Israel.

45.4-5: Even though God brings him to power Cyrus will not acknowledge that God is the Lord.

45.6: “I am the Lord, there is no other” throughout Isaiah 45-46 the theme of Yahweh (the LORD in the NIV) as the great and only God and idols as worthless continues.

45.9ff: Some in Israel argue with God about using a foreign king as messiah. God tells them that he is sovereign and they need to bow before his ways in the world.

45.13: “but not for a price or reward” i.e. the people will not pay to be set free from Cyrus, instead God will bear the cost—just as he does by paying the price for our sin.

8 45.15: “God who hides himself”—the God who’s ways (like making Cyrus messiah) we can’t always understand.

45.23: Hints of Philippians 2.10-11 where every knee will bow and confess that Christ is Lord.

46

46.1ff God mocks the idols of Babylon Bel (Marduk—Babylon’s head god) and Nebo (Marduk’s son). He points out that while He carries his people, the gods of Babylon have to be carried by their people.

46.3: a maternal image of God—even though he is our Father, he often acts in ways that reflect the love and care of a mother.

46.12: “Stubborn-hearted”: some of the people refuse to accept God’s plan for rescue, they think it is an inappropriate way to save. We find much the same ins Jesus’ day as some of the Jews rejected the way of salvation and also the Gentiles (1 Corinthians 1.23-25). What was true then, continues today as people reject God’s way of salvation because they don’t like it.

47

God asserts his sovereignty over the nations [ chapters 46–47 ]. The format continues to be a shifting sequence of brief units. The rhetorical mode is a series of declarations from God regarding what he intends to do in the time just ahead, along with statements about his divine power. There is a general focus on nations, and we can discern the following loose (but not strict) division of subjects: God’s superiority to pagan idols (chapter 46); a satiric oracle predicting Babylon’s destruction (chapter 47). -ESVLB-

1-3 = Babylon is seen as a rich young woman being humiliated and brought down to being a slave.

4-7 = The only reason why Babylon conquered Judah/Jerusalem was because God was angry with His people. Now He will bring vengeance on Babylon.

4-11 = Why is this all going to happen? = Pride, Idolatry

"God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble"(Prov 3:34, James 4:6, 1 Peter 5:5)

12-15 = God challenges Babylon to have their wickedness save them.

48

Oracles of deliverance [ chapters 48–49 ]. God continues to speak a series of messages that the prophet reports. The audience is God’s covenant people, who are called by a range of names (Jacob, Israel, Judah, “my servant,” etc.). The messages are predominantly God’s rehearsal of his acts of deliverance, with an undertow of God’s judgment against the wicked and unbelieving. -ESVLB-

1-2 - The first two verses are actually a rebuke to Judah. There is no genuineness found in the things that they do. They don't exalt God through their lives.

3-5 - God gave warning through Israel to Judah. They did not pay attention.

6-8 - God is being very condescending to the people here. He is basically saying that there is no way that they saw His power and might and continued on in their ways.

9 - Mercy is shown for God's own name...for His glory.

10 - We are refined for God's name...for His glory.

"And I will not give My glory to another. Listen to Me, O Jacob, and Israel, My called: I am He, I am the First, I am also the Last. Indeed My hand has laid the foundation of the earth, and My right hand has stretched out the heavens; when I call to them, they stand up together."

"I am the Lord your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you by the way you should go. Oh, that you had heeded My commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea. Your descendants also would have been like the sand, and the offspring of your body like the grains of sand; his name would not have been cut off nor destroyed from before Me.”

Talking this year about "story," I wonder if God is saying to many of us: "Oh, that you had chosen My story and not your own."

20-22 - Despite Israel’s disobedience and unfulfilled potential, the Lord still loves them and will still free them from their captivity in Babylon. His people will declare His name.