The LORD knew that Isaiah would face the temptation to conform to the unbelieving world around him. Therefore, He spoke to exhort and admonish the prophet to resist conformity and to stand firm on the revelation He had given him. There is a wonderful lesson for us as we embark upon the New Year. We, too, must resist conformity to the world and remain faithful and steadfast in our commitment to the word of God. Stand firm on the word of God is the encouragement that we find in verses 11-15 and 19-20.
Isaiah 8:11-20, Stand Up
God made Isaiah and his sons into a witness for Him. They along with their God-given unique and prophetic names became the living testimony of the veracity of God’s word. Whom has God ordained to be the witnesses for His word in this day and age? This is the question we ponder in our study of Isaiah 8. May the Lord raise up a people to hold up and give testimony to His word for our generation.
Isaiah 9:1-7, Immanuel Has Come
God came down to earth in the person of Jesus. This is the stupendous message of Christmas according to Isaiah. This is the human ruler who is the Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Eternal Father, and the Prince of Peace, who comes to deal with the root problem of all our ills at His first coming, then comes again in the future to bring about the fullness of salvation at His second coming.
Encouragements from the Life of Christ
Isaiah 7:1-25, The Promise of Immanuel
in this three-week Christmas series, we will study the rich prophecy of Immanuel found in Isaiah chapters 7 through 9. In this first installment, we examine the promise of Immanuel given to king Ahaz and to the Jewish people, during a time of impending invasion by the joint forces of Aram and Israel. The king of Judah in this scene stubbornly maintains a disposition of unbelief. Therefore, LORD confronts him of this unbelief with a double sign, one for the immediate deliverance from these two enemies and another for the ultimate deliverance from sin and judgment through the virgin born Immanuel. The God who is able (both omnipotent and omniscient) to deliver us from all our ills calls us to repent and believe in Him. There is a breathtaking deliverance for the soul for all who believe and repent.
1 Thess. 5:8-10, The Wrath of God
The wrath of God is what marks the final seven year period of Daniel 9, also known as the tribulation period. This understanding provides the perspective by which we can understand where the Gentile church fits into the plan and the timeline of God in Daniel 9. God’s wrath is meant for His enemies, not His own people. This is confirmed in Revelation 7 where God seals the Jewish remnant to be protected from the onslaught of His judgments during the tribulation period. God also takes up His church to be removed from the world during this period. The church is removed from the earth before the final 70th heptad. The church belongs to the gap between the 69th and the 70th heptads of Daniel 9. All this means the rapture of the church and the commencement of the day of the Lord are imminent. They can occur anytime. The proper response to this news from 1 Thess. 5:8 is this: Be sober. May the Lord evermore wise us up to be sober-minded, always living in the reality of Jesus’ soon return for rapture.
Daniel 9:27, The Kingdom of God (Part 8): the Destruction of the Antichrist
God is powerful to end all evil in the world. The end of Satan is sealed with the destruction of his greatest and the vilest brainchild on earth, the Antichrist. With the demise of the Antichrist, we are assured all the more that our God has a definite power over the Devil and that he will not prevail over our God. This encourages us to pray, for God is more than able to do that which Satan opposes, to open blind eyes and soften hardened hearts. May the Lord evermore strengthen and empower us to depend on the almighty who vanquished the Devil and his minions. With this in mind, we delve into the final verse of this chapter which reveals the final heptad of years in the timeline of God for the history of the world for this age.
Daniel 9:25-26, The Kingdom of God (Part 7): Messianic Events
God’s timeline precisely pinpoints the time of the presentation of the Messiah as the King (“prince” is just another word for king). This is then followed by His death and other events, including the destruction of Jerusalem. The timeline of the sovereign God is simply amazing. May God persuade every heart to be humbled before His truth, and may they repent, embrace Jesus as the only Savior and Lord, be delivered from their sins, and enter into life eternal in the kingdom of God.