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Watcha Gonna Do When He Comes And Deals With You Series
Contributed by Thomas Swope on Apr 25, 2013 (message contributor)
Summary: A study of the book of Isaiah chapter 47
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Isaiah 47: 1 – 15
Watcha Gonna Do When He Comes And Deals With You
1 “Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; Sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans! For you shall no more be called tender and delicate. 2 Take the millstones and grind meal. Remove your veil, take off the skirt, uncover the thigh, pass through the rivers. 3 Your nakedness shall be uncovered, yes, your shame will be seen; I will take vengeance, and I will not arbitrate with a man.” 4 As for our Redeemer, the LORD of hosts is His name, The Holy One of Israel. 5 “Sit in silence, and go into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans; For you shall no longer be called The Lady of Kingdoms. 6 I was angry with My people; I have profaned My inheritance, and given them into your hand. You showed them no mercy; On the elderly you laid your yoke very heavily. 7 And you said, ‘I shall be a lady forever,’ so that you did not take these things to heart, nor remember the latter end of them. 8 “Therefore hear this now, you who are given to pleasures, who dwell securely, who say in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me; I shall not sit as a widow, nor shall I know the loss of children’; 9 But these two things shall come to you in a moment, in one day: The loss of children, and widowhood. They shall come upon you in their fullness because of the multitude of your sorceries, for the great abundance of your enchantments. 10 “For you have trusted in your wickedness; You have said, ‘No one sees me’; Your wisdom and your knowledge have warped you; And you have said in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me.’ 11 Therefore evil shall come upon you; You shall not know from where it arises. And trouble shall fall upon you; You will not be able to put it off. And desolation shall come upon you suddenly, which you shall not know. 12 “Stand now with your enchantments and the multitude of your sorceries, In which you have labored from your youth—Perhaps you will be able to profit, perhaps you will prevail. 13 You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels; Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators stand up and save you from what shall come upon you. 14 Behold, they shall be as stubble, the fire shall burn them; They shall not deliver themselves From the power of the flame; It shall not be a coal to be warmed by, nor a fire to sit before! 15 Thus shall they be to you with whom you have labored, your merchants from your youth; They shall wander each one to his quarter. No one shall save you.
I enjoy watching the History Channel. I am amazed at Nazi Germany. You may wonder why? Have you ever thought about how a bunch of evil killers manipulate a whole country and gain power almost over the entire globe? You see how they are so sneaky that the betray one another and yet the country somewhat obeys and follows rules. These sons of Satan put to death millions of people. Then you have Stalin of Russia who is also personally responsible for killing around 25 million. And as the ages move forward other beasts gain power over a kingdom or country and follow the same murderous pursuits.
In our studies of the book of Isaiah what evil country do you think was brutally causing trouble? – Babylon. So, if salvation is to triumph, and if righteousness is to be exalted, and if God’s people are to be glorious in what we read in our last study of chapter 46 verse 12-13 then it can only come about through the destruction of evil and of idolatry, and from Isaiah’s religious viewpoint that means the destruction of Babylon. Until Babylon is dealt with the Servant is restrained.
We should note at once that this destruction of Babylon is not attributed to Cyrus as the one being ‘the servant’. We can only find such an idea there if we read it into the passage. Even though he conquered Babylon, he used this as one of his headquarters. When you see the Greeks under Alexander The Great take over, he also used this city as his capital.
Babylon’s destruction is partly related to her ill-treatment of God’s people. Because she has ill-treated God’s people, God will ill-treat her. Indeed He will destroy her. But even that is not given as the main reason for God’s destruction of Babylon.
What is to happen is seen as God’s judgment on something which is the epitome of evil, just as it was in chapters 13-14. It is because our Heavenly Father Adoni Yahweh is the Redeemer of His people (verse 4), and as such must deal with the continuous menace of Babylon. It will occur because to Isaiah Babylon is more than just a city. It is because it is an idea. It represents Babel which came into existence as recorded in the book of Genesis 11, “Now the whole earth had one language and one speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there. 3 Then they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. 4 And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.” 5 But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. 6 And the LORD said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. 7 Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” 8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city. 9 Therefore its name is called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.”