Isaiah 32-33 A Return To Righteousness Series

Isaiah 32-33

Return to Righteousness

The Coming King Vs. 1-8

Warning Against Complacency Vs. 9-20

Be Gracious to Us Vs. 1-6

Acknowledge His Might Vs. 7-24

Intro:

Have you ever wished you could return something?

Maybe it was a gift that was given to you by a relative

But you can’t return the gift because it would hurt the feelings of person

My mom was notorious for giving gifts that missed the mark

What made it worse is that she took it personal if you didn’t like it

So growing up I was left with gifts that I had no use for

My mom would always ask why I didn’t wear a piece of clothing or use some item she gave me

I became very creative in my excuses

One Christmas she gave my wife a sweater

It was one of those awful sweaters that had a landscape scene on it

Not only that it was bulky and heavy

My mom loved these types of sweaters and wore them all the time

So she naturally thought Jen would like one too

When Jen opened it I just bust out laughing because that was never going to see the light of day

Jen was very nice and thankful but it went to the back of the closet immediately

From that time on whenever Jen couldn’t figure out what to wear I would pull that bad boy out

But what if you could return a bad decision, a wrong relationship, a period of time?

You could wipe it all clean and start fresh

That's what God offers when we return to Him

God is wanting Judah to return to Him and he has a plan

Wickedness is reigning and destruction is on the horizon

Yet there is a remnant of people who remained faithful to the Lord

With those people God will return Judah to righteousness

It will happen by the way of a righteous king and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit

That is what we see Isaiah tell them today

Isaiah 32-33 is a prophecy about the return to righteousness

Even in the midst of all the wickedness God is telling them he is going to return them to righteousness

What a great message of consolation

That no matter how far we stray God works to return us to Him

Read Isaiah 32:1-4

Transition:

We are finishing the seven woes Isaiah is pronounced on Judah

We’ve seen Israel be chastised for going to down to Egypt for help

God wanted to help them for free but they went and paid Egypt for basically nothing

How many times have we paid for help from man without turning to God?

God notices when we put our faith and trust in him

He takes it personally when we look elsewhere for our help

He loves to be approached by his children

Cast all of our cares on him for his burden in light and his yoke is easy

Of course Israel doesn’t listen and Egypt is defeated as is Judah with the exception of Jerusalem

Like the earlier units that begin with a woe oracle, this section contains several messages of hope for the future.

This new period of divine blessing will include righteous rulers who will protect God’s people, the marvelous opening of the eyes of the blind, and the Spirit’s gift of fertility to the land, justice among people, and peace for everyone.

This future time is contrasted with the present period of complacency in Jerusalem that will lead to mourning, no fertility, and no peace.

Such contrasts were intended to cause the heart of the audience to yearn for God’s future kingdom of peace and reject the ways of this present hopeless world.

The Coming King vs. 1-8

vs. 1-2 A righteous king

It is easy to think that the king referred to here is Jesus

Considering how much we have been talking about His Millennial reign

But the king referred to here is actually Hezekiah

We will see him in a couple of weeks but he was a righteous king in the midst of corruption

2 Kings 18:1-5 In the third year of Hoshea son of Elah, king of Israel, Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. 3 And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. 4 He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan). 5 He trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel, so that there was none like him among all the kings of Judah after him, nor among those who were before him.