ISAIAH FOR TODAY
Chapters 23 - 27
CHAPTER 23
We come to chapter 23 and the prophecy concerning Tyre, and
ships of Tarshish. She is "the isle" and merchants had passed
over the sea to replenish. she is connected with sea traffic. She
is a "mart of nations" (verses 1-3). People will be sorely
pained at her destruction (v.5). The iniquity of the spear-head
of this mart of nations, goes back to ancient days. There is
counsel taken against her. It is the Lord who is purposed against
her, and her merchants of princes, and traffickers and honorable
of the earth. She is indeed full of ancient history and noble
kings, but God will stain the pride of her glory and bring to
contempt all her honorable of the earth (verses 6-9). She is the
daughter of Tarshish. This is later than the original Tyre. God
will stretch forth His hand over her, over the sea, He will give
commandment against this great merchant empire, to destroy her
strong hold. The sea trading merchants are to "howl" for the
ships of Tarshish are laid waste (10-14).
Compare this with Revelation 18. Yes, there will be an end-
time Tyre/Tarshish. It will be the last resurrection of the Holy
Roman Empire, now rising in Europe. This mighty power will be the
great trading power of the last days. She will be the desire of
much of the earth in the last days. She will have a great and
ancient woman church guiding her who is situated like an isle in
the sea, waters on both side her dwelling - the city of Rome with
her ancient iniquities - her Babylon Mystery religion. The book
of Revelation reveals it will be the kings of the East beyond the
Euphrates river, to the North and to the East, Russia, China,
India, Pakistan, Japan, who will come against her, to destroy her
glory, pomp, wealth, and ancient honorable ones. Revelation 18
gives you the picture of her destruction and the shock and grief
(that many who became rich and wealthy and strong through her
might and power) and the howling of those who look on to see it
all happen.
The prophecy of the 70 years in verses 15-18, was probably
only for that time, the original fall of Tyre. It is a prophecy
that was fulfilled in history, and will not have a second
fulfilment in the millennium reign of the Kingdom of God on
earth.
CHAPTER 24
It is the time of the day of the Lord. When God shall
directly step in to shake the earth, to bring about great
destruction on those who are destroying the earth. There will be
destruction like never before on this planet since man was
created. It will be as the earth mourning, and the haughty people
will be brought low (verse 1-4).
The earth is defiled and full of sin, because they have
transgressed against the law of the Lord, they have changed the
ordinances of God, and they have broken His true covenant of
life, health, and blessings. The earth is as under a curse, the
inhabitants are desolate and relatively speaking, FEW left
(verses 4-5). It is the time as Jesus said, that if the days were
not cut short by the direct intervention of the Lord, no flesh
would be saved alive (Mt.24:22).
Once more it is the time when the "city of confusion is
broken down" (verse 10). Babylon Mystery and her Empire is
destroyed, Revelation 18. It will be on earth like the shaking of
an olive tree, and as the gleaning grapes when the vintage is
done (verse 13).
It will also be a time of rejoicing for some - certainly the
saints of God will be singing and rejoicing (verses 14-16).
The prophecy slips back to the time of destruction upon the
inhabitants of the earth (verse 17). Isaiah sees it as "The earth
is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved, the earth
is moved exceedingly. The earth shall reel to and fro like a
drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the
transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it; and it shall fall,
and not rise again" (verses 19-20).
Never has the earth experienced anything like what it will
go through at the end time, during the last year or so of the end
of this age. And indeed transgression will have an end, it will
never rise to its height of lawlessness again. The 1,000 years of
the Kingdom of God on earth will come, and sin will never again
reach such heights.
Verse 21 is "come to pass in THAT DAY" - God will punish the
lofty and high-minded and the kings of leaders of the earth. Some
who live through all this, will have to wait for the salvation of
the Lord. It will take some time to bring all the nations under
the rule of God. If you read Isaiah 66 and Zechariah 14, you will
get the scene of a certain time needed to bring all peoples under
the Kingdom of God.
We see clearly the end-time setting of this prophecy of
Isaiah 24, from verse 23. It is the famous "heavenly signs" time,
spoken about in Joel 2 and 3; and by Christ in Matthew 24:29.
Revelation 6 gives the one, two, three, of it all. The sixth seal
of Revelation 6 is the heavenly signs, THEN comes the day of
God's wrath, or "day of the Lord" as in the prophets of old. We
had the Great Tribulation first - the 5th seal. The 7th seal is
the 7 last Trumpets. All of this is explained in many other
prophetic studies on this Website, including the book of
Revelation in "The New Testament Bible Story."
CHAPTER 25
We start with a song of praise. The saints of the Eternal
shall indeed be singing His praise, knowing all prophecy is about
to be completed and the return of Christ the Messiah is very
close at hand (verse 1-5).
The prophecy goes on to say God will make a feast of fat
things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of
marrow, of wine on the lees well refined (verse 6). It is a
poetic way to describe the start of the Kingdom of God on earth,
and the bounty of life and health and happiness and prosperity,
for all peoples.
The Almighty will destroy the blindness of spiritual truth
that is cast over the vast majority of people. The vail of
deception will be removed eventually from all nations and
peoples. And even death will finally be swallowed up, and God
shall wipe away all tears from all faces, the rebuke - hostility,
that people have towards the people of Israel (all 13 tribes of
them) will be taken away (verses 7-8). The glory of the 1,000
year reign of Christ on earth is given in other studies on this
Website.
The people of Israel will in deed shout out in that day,
"Lo, this is our God, we have waited for Him, and He will save
us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and
rejoice in His salvation" (verse 9).
Everywhere in the prophets of old, that you read about the
coming of the Messiah in power and glory to establish His Kingdom
on earth, you have the people of Israel (all 13 tribes not just
the Jews of Judah) in CAPTIVITY to their enemies, from which the
Messiah, at His coming, DELIVERS THEM! They will indeed sing
aloud what is recorded for us in verse 9.
We are told once more (as we were in chapter 11) that Moab -
Jordan today, will be trodden down, and the prophets words are
chilling, "even as straw is trodden down for the dunghill." The
punishment of Jordan is surely to yet to come. It will basically
cease to exist as we know it today. Certainly the land of Jordan
as also the land of the Palestinians, will belong to Israel, in
the millennium (verses 10-12).
CHAPTER 26
IN THAT DAY, Isaiah says, this song will be sung in the land
of Judah. It is the liberation from captivity for the people of
Israel. They will return to the land of Palestine, the Holy Land,
to Jerusalem, and they will sing the song that is now mentioned
in Isaiah 26. I will let you read it. You may like to read it in
a modern version of the Bible.
We can see that trusting in God is peace and safety (verse
3). The way of the just is uprightness, and the Lord does weigh
the path of the just, He does take note (verse 7). When God's
judgments are in the earth, then the inhabitants can learn true
righteousness (verse 9). Those that love wickedness are often
difficult to admit their folly and sins and to turn away from
wickedness (verse 10). Yet, there will be hope for even the
wicked to turn to the right way of life under God (verse 11).
Those that once had dominion over Israel in the last days, will
be destroyed, and will not know the resurrection to life at the
coming of the Messiah (verse 13-14).
Israel now looks back and sees they were in great affliction
under the heel of their enemies, as in the physical pain that
some women experience in giving birth to children (verses 15-18).
Yet Isaiah says to Israel, "your dead men shall live,
together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, you
that dwell in the dust: for the dew is as the dew of herbs, and
the earth shall cast out the dead" (verse 19).
This is a most interesting verse, within the context we have
it. First, it is a verse in the Old testament that shows the
children of God KNEW a RESURRECTION was to take place at the
coming of the Messiah in glory, at the setting up of the Kingdom
of God on earth. Job was also given this truth, to pass on to all
generations (Job 14). Daniel was also told this truth (Daniel
12). And it is all further expounded upon in Ezekiel 37.
Could it be that Ezekiel 37 and this verse here in Isaiah is
talking about not only the resurrection of the saints of God (as
given in Daniel 12 and through the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians
15 and 1 Thessalonians 4), but is also telling us there will be a
resurrection to PHYSICAL life many Israelites that died in the
Great Tribulation of the end time?
There were SOME people brought back to physical life at the
time of Jesus' resurrection, who obviously lived for a time once
more, then died later again. Lazarus, raised by Jesus, is a good
example of that.
Could it be, some Israelites will be raised to physical
life, when Jesus comes again? This verse in Isaiah and the
passage in Ezekiel 37 may well be telling us this truth. God can
do anything He pleases, nothing is too hard for the Lord, nothing
is impossible to Him who has power over life and death.
The prophecy now moves back in time for a few verses (verses
20-21). The Israelites and the saints are told to enter their
chamber, shut the door, hide away, for a LITTLE MOMENT, until
God's INDIGNATION be overpast. For, "Behold, the Lord comes out
of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their
iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no
more cover her sins" (verses 20-21).
Once more we are taken back to the start of the day of the
Lord, the day of God's wrath, the time of the 7th seal of the
book of Revelation, when the 7 last trumpets will sound, and all
the things remaining to happen in the book of Revelation will
come to pass, and so again Isaiah chapters 23-27.
CHAPTER 27
It is in that time frame, the last days of the time of the
end of this age, that God will punish the "leviathan" the
piercing serpent, the crooked serpent, to slay the dragon that is
in the sea. This is all somewhat symbolic language to tell us
what we read about in Revelation 20, the chaining up of the Great
Dragon, the Devil, the Serpent, who is indeed a crooked serpent.
I cannot see anything in the blue sea of this earth that needs to
be deal with in this manner when the Messiah comes. I do not
think any specific sea creature that influences mankind in any
negative way, hence this must be symbolic of Satan the Devil, the
crooked deceptive serpent of old. He will be, at the coming of
Christ, chained up so he can deceive the people of the earth no
more until the thousand years are finished, then as Revelation 20
explains he will be allowed to be free from his chains and for a
short time, deceive some once more, before the final resurrection
of the Great White Throne Judgment.
Again, this long prophecy of "in that day" continues in
verse 2. God tells people to take hold of His strength, and to
make peace with Him, and so peace will come (verse 5). Those that
are left alive of Israel, Jacob, or resurrected as it may be,
will take root and will blossom and bud once more, and fill the
face of the earth again. God will not have punished Israel as He
punished her enemies, her enemies will be deal with even harder
than the punishment Israel was given (verses 7-8). The purging of
Israel was to free them from their sins, and when done all the
pagan altars of false religion will be smashed and crushed to
powder (verse 9). The thought of the prophet now goes back in
time to the reason as to why God needed to punish Israel, and the
kind of punishment it will be. The defended city shall not stand,
it will be like a wilderness, where animals roam around. Israel
had to be punished in this end time for she had become a people
of no understanding. Yes, our people of the Western world and the
Jews of the State of Israel, have forgotten out God, we no longer
have correct understanding of how to live according to God's word
the Bible. Our nations were founded upon the Bible, but we have
closed the book up, we have turned our back to the Eternal God.
We are led and governed by leaders who no longer lead by the
instruction of the Bible. We have lost our way, we make sure that
"religion" - the Bible - is kept separate from the state. We
allow all kinds of "strange" religions to flurish in our
countries. We allow evolution to be taught in schools but you
cannot teach creation by God in our schools (unless it is a
"church" school). Abortion on demand is still practiced daily,
even under the governing of Presidents and Primeminsters that go
to church and carry a Bible under their arm on Sunday morning.
Legalization of same sex marriage is becoming law in most Western
nations. On and on I could go about our sins. They are reaching
higher and higher, and one day God will say, enough is enough,
this is a people of no understanding. Punishment must be given,
no more mercy will be shown (verses 10-11).
Yet, God will not forget us. Only for a time will He show no
mercy. When we have learnt the hard way, when we have cried, when
we have come to see our horrible sins, as we are in the gutter on
our backs, thinking all is lost, that it is the end our nations,
we shall be rescued in that day, at the coming of Christ.
"And it shall come to pass IN THAT DAY, that the Lord shall beat
off from the channel of the river unto the stream of egypt, and
you shall be GATHERED ONE BY ONE, O you children of Israel. And
it shall come to pass IN THAT DAY, that the GREAT TRUMPET shall
be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish in the
land of Assyria (Germany/Europe Beast), and the outcasts in the
land of Egypt, and shall WORSHIP the Lord in the holy mount at
Jerusalem" (verses 12-13).
There it is, at the time of the end of this age, when the
LAST GREAT TRUMPET is blown, the 7th trumpet of the book of
Revelation, when Jesus comes again, when the saints of God are
resurrected, to meet Christ in the clouds of the air (1 Thes.4
and Zech.14), to come to Jerusalem, to fight and destroy the
armies of this earth at Armageddon, then at that time, God will
deliver, one by one, as in Ezekiel 34 and 36, the literal
children of Israel, and bring them back to Jerusalem and the
Promised Land. They will be gathered from the four points of the
earth as Isaiah already told us about in his beautiful chapter
11.
So it is written and so it shall come to pass.
..................
To be continued
Entered on this Website Pentecost Day - June 2008
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