Tag: Isaiah

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Ambiance of the future city.

Reading Time: 3 minutes 
“No longer will you need the sun to shine by day, nor the moon to give its light by night, for the Lord your God will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory. Your sun will never set; your moon will not go down. For the Lord will be your everlasting light. Your days of mourning will come to an end.” Isaiah‬ ‭60:19-20‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Isaiah gets to describe some environmental aspects of the future city of God. For the past seventy+ years folks have been describing the future of humanity. It’s been quite the phenomenon to project what people think is a possibility.

Writers and screenwriters, with books and movies have been guessing at it for a long time. Many are dystopian and dark. Some are fantastically modern, with A.I., robots and super utopian possibilities. I think of authors like George Orwell, in his book 1984, written in 1949 describes a horrible version of government and “big brother.” It was so bizarre to experience 1984 and be thankful that most of Orwell’s predictions had not come true.

There’s plenty of hope-filled, peaceful projections as well. Most of these are about everyone being blandly similar in a weird idealistic socialism kind of way. And of course, these rosey projections have all solved our selfishness and greed, hate and murderous nature which magically translates into “fixing” the environment.

Isaiah, hearing this straight from God himself takes a completely different approach. He defines the future, for the people of God, as good as God himself! These couple of verses seem to defy our understanding of even light itself. Isaiah just announces, “you’ll no longer need the sun or the moon!” What? Wow. Way to go God. As Jesus himself said, He is the light of the world, and in Him there is no darkness (literally and metaphysically). This future city, this New Jerusalem – heaven itself, will be absolutely lit by God who is everlasting light. And this is just one aspect of the future for believers. Those who love sunshine and light will be so happy 😁- me with 🤚🏼 raised.

This is a major benefit to those who know God and believe in Jesus! God has a beautiful future planned. Where all sin, all suffering, all pain and all mourning will not exist. You may think it’s impossible, but God created everything we’ve ever seen or experienced in this world. And He created us in perfection with none of the dark shadows and downsides to our existence. Sin, our sin, is what changed all that. With sin permanently removed from the equation – perfection in all things will RESET back to the original plan.

Prayer

Dad,
Life, here on earth, with all of its beauty and splendor must pale in comparison to heaven and the new earth. This is the only the reflection. And life, even living within the confines of the curse, is also a unique and amazing experience. One the angels, who were also created, will never experience. Of course it is filled with horrendous acts of hate and depravity, but it is also filled with tremendous acts of love and goodness. I see both just walking my own neighborhood! In this strange, paradox of mystery it is hard to look outside of my circumstances and daily situations to see you at work redeeming and saving us. However, I know your Word is true and I know that you are trustworthy. Both have been proven and experienced over the past forty-five years since you saved me. Living here and thinking about this future utopia of grace in your presence is hard. Yet, taking just a few moments to clear away all that is happening in my world, and reading Isaiah’s optimistic words I can see the future – and it will be spectacular!

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The Real Housewives of Israel

Reading Time: 2 minutes 
“What sorrow for those who get up early in the morning looking for a drink of alcohol and spend long evenings drinking wine to make themselves flaming drunk. They furnish wine and lovely music at their grand parties— lyre and harp, tambourine and flute— but they never think about the Lord or notice what he is doing.” Isaiah‬ ‭5:11-12‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Holy cow! Did Isaiah get some kind of preview of U.S. reality shows in the 21st century? Was The Real Housewives of Israel or The Bachelor on ancient streaming services?

I grew up in the sixties, basically watching 50’s TV shows and some movies. Here’s what I saw, EVERYONE smoked and everyone drank hard liquor. Now, some of the “family shows” toned down both, but an average American house had a booze cart waiting for the man to get home to knock one down and people were constantly talking about a nightcap. Drinking brandy, bourbon, and cream-based liqueurs were thought to be a sleep aid? And, jokingly having morning margaritas or martinis was so vogue!

Oh, now it’s wine that pushed on every show or movie, and puttin’ down a bottle because they’re so stressed by life. Even whiskey and shockingly tequila has made a big comeback! Just about every party you see on media has got booze. Are you kidding me? Humans don’t change, we just rotate our ridiculousness. I am positive that God is not into promoting drunkenness, but He does want us to live a full, good life.

Personally, I don’t prescribe booze, “social” or otherwise, I’ll eat my sin in cheeses and carbs thank you. Isaiah hits hard with this whole idea. We can often wake up WITH sorrow, party-hardy all day and night and not once think about God AND not once even notice what He’s doing in the world around us. So we wake up with sorrow and crash on the pillow the same way.

I think we have seriously mis-read the “good life.” The good life is a godly life. The good life is walking with the good God who created us. The God life is the BEST life! Isaiah’s warnings fall on deaf ears, which still happens today. Isaiah tells Israel, God is going to give them a massive time out – a 70 year captivity under another nation. They all had to go cold turkey with no booze and parties for an entire generation. What’s the point?

You want to live like slaves to pleasure, never thinking about God who wants to do life with us, well here ya go Israel. Welcome to captivity. If folks are wondering if the only thing to get out of life is these cycles of pleasure, emptiness and sorrow, then they know nothing about the life wants us to live – all of us. Jesus came to give a FULL LIFE, not a cheap knockoff of some kind of fake scripted reality show.

Prayer

Dad,
Admittedly, I don’t use booze to boost my emotions and I haven’t thrown a party with live flutes in… well, never. However, I do struggle to find and engage in ways to be happy, oftentimes outside of you. I know the life you want me to live and I’m pushing the boundaries of my own fears and serious limitations to be obedient to the purpose you have for me. I’m sure there have been times you put me in a time-out, thankfully not for 70 years though. I want to find joy in you and be fully aware and fully engaged in what you are doing on our planet.

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From fame to furious

Reading Time: 3 minutes 
“Everyone spoke well of him and was amazed by the gracious words that came from his lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?” Then he said, “You will undoubtedly quote me this proverb: ‘Physician, heal yourself’—meaning, ‘Do miracles here in your hometown like those you did in Capernaum.’ But I tell you the truth, no prophet is accepted in his own hometown.” Luke‬ ‭4:22-24‬ ‭NLT‬‬

This curious scene out of Luke is an interesting story about US – our human nature and how consistently enduring and predictable it can be. This little side-bit is full of information about who WE are. Jesus goes home, and goes to his local synagogue. Nazareth may have been small and considered the “armpit” of Jerusalem, but there were a good number of very devout religious men there – enough to qualify for a synagogue.

Jesus goes to the front of the gathering, confidently unrolls the scroll and finds his text – in Isaiah! I’m sure whispers and eye-raised glances bounced around the room at that point. That day was “Isaiah” day, reading from the longest and most complicated Old Testament prophet book in the history of Judaism. There are no coincidences! And, he thinks he’s going to comment and give a Jewish sermon on it? Yeah right.

Luke, in his punchy wit writes, “He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently.” Then Jesus gives his homily…“The Scripture you’ve just heard has been fulfilled this very day!” Whoa.

Questions fill the room, sucking centuries of religious pretense right out of the room! In those stunning moments they began to comment, “Everyone spoke well of him and was amazed by the gracious words that came from his lips.” Then seconds later, someone just had to connect the dots of who and where this young buck came from. So then they mumble into the now religious-free air, “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”

Then Jesus being the truth-teller, breaks their murmurs mid-thought and hijacks their conclusions saying, do you really want to know why I’ve done no miracles here? Of course it’s a lack of faith, but more than that, you guys won’t let ANYONE grow and mature as God intends and expects. You guys got STUCK and you want everyone around you to lower to your level back to AD 00 or BC 700!

Jesus masterfully does a commentary on two other very famous Old Testament spokespersons: Elijah and Elisha. “Ever wonder why these guys did miracles with foreigners and not Israel?” – Jesus hints. He tells them, there were a lot of needy widows in Israel and their were a lot of sick, skin diseased men in Israel. Why didn’t the prophets do any miracles among their own – the Jews?

Can you feel the tension building in this quiet little synagogue in the small, dusty city of Nazareth? Big pause here as they followed their stale, self-righteousness breadcrumbs to a finger-pointing conclusion.

I knew that Naaman wasn’t Jewish, but I had no idea the Sidon widow wasn’t either. Did you? OUCH!

Obviously, they got the point, the civil and religious leaders in old Israel sucked all the faith out the country, and right out of the people they were leading! One moment they were all having a nice pleasant day in the tabernacle, the next moment they’re foaming at the mouth with arrogant-anger, grabbing pitch forks and torches – “When they heard this, the people in the synagogue were furious. Jumping up, they mobbed him and forced him to the edge of the hill on which the town was built. They intended to push him over the cliff, but he passed right through the crowd and went on his way.” I think once Jesus was safely out of town, he stopped at the city border and dusted off his sandals, signifying he wouldn’t be returning home again.

PRAYER:

Dad,
Wow, I love it when Jesus interprets and does a great commentary on the Old Testament, pointing out things I never knew or ever saw! This really challenges my own beliefs and faith as well as in leading others. Am I sucking faith out of the air with others in my community? I want to believe and not put any restraints or restrictions on a move of your Spirit. In fact, I want to be for more faith, not less! Help me in my own lack of faith and help our leaders in their faith as well.

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Oh death, really, where is your sting?

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Isaiah 38:10-20

“But what could I say? For he himself sent this sickness. Now I will walk humbly throughout my years because of this anguish I have felt. Lord, your discipline is good, for it leads to life and health. You restore my health and allow me to live! Yes, this anguish was good for me, for you have rescued me from death and forgiven all my sins.”

‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭38:15-17‬ ‭NLT‬‬

What do you do when you KNOW you’re going to die? Not think, but know. Isaiah told Hezekiah, get your stuff together because you ARE going to die! Then, God changed his mind… and added 15 years to his life! “Go back to Hezekiah and tell him, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of your ancestor David, says: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears. I will add fifteen years to your life, and I will rescue you and this city from the king of Assyria.” Hezekiah wrote these words of realty and humility AFTER he got better. But, it really shook him up. Isaiah loved his king and was heartbroken when Hezekiah finally did pass.

We had a pastor friend just die of Covid last week. I’m still processing the loss, the grief and sadness for his wife, three children and the church he pastored. I reflected on the five stages of grief and found someone who added four stages of hope after grieving. So denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance are the grief stages. But waiting, wailing, weaving and worshipping are the hope stages.

Death, with it’s finality and processes, is hard to experience. Yet, it is also so clarifying, so pure in its ability to face the ultimate letting go. What really matters on your death bed? I’ve been with several who were dying and have been with some upon their departure. In a good, honorable, prepared for eternity death – there is only love. There is only a desire to be surrounded by those you love and those who have loved you well. It’s not just family, it’s also very close friends.

Being with the dying and upon death is as intimate as being in the birthing experience with a mom. It is holy. Time and all earthly, temporary things lose focus, and the pure moments of love are all that exists. There is no time. There is no worry. There is really no fear. It is as though the universe pauses all natural senses and you become part of a calm, quiet void – a transition. It’s so palpable, so real. You almost feel envious and a desire to be pulled along with them as they make their journey, leaving the body and releasing soul and spirit to go on, go over. For the believer it is miraculous and truly a journey of light.

There is NOTHING to fear at that moment! Fear and death and it’s grip on us, lose their hold. There is no sting, no pain, no worry. The living, fear because of loss or the undone or the unknown. But those who are prepared to die, do not fear any of those things.

Hezekiah was there at the edge and God brought him back for another round of life. But he was different because of the experience. He was humbled and more grateful. He saw his place, his station, his purpose in life and lived more in his last 15 years than he had done previous.