WE SHALL NOT DIE - Reading With the People of God #17Намуна

Warning!

On the heels of the magnificent news that there would one day come a Messiah to deliver God’s people, a new message of judgment comes upon the house of Jacob. Good News and Bad News; as a prophet of the Lord, this is a continued call on Isaiah. He preaches hope, sharing visions of God’s deliverance, and then has to warn the people of their sinful ways and the judgment for their actions. Reading the encounters of the Israelites, don’t we often think that we would do things differently? Yet, that is what their judgment was about: arrogance; thinking that they knew better when the truth was that it was God who enabled them.

Like the children of Israel, we, too, can think more of ourselves than we should. We get overconfident, self-reliant, and lose sight of how our sin was covered by the righteousness provided for us. The Israelites were no different. They struggled with remaining humble before God and putting Him first.

More consequences, more unrepentance (not just telling God that they are sorry, but truly turning to follow Him fully), more warnings…the cycle continued far beyond Isaiah’s ministry until God finally fulfilled the prophecy and sent the Messiah.

Now we can relate to the New Testament people, and we think that if we encountered Jesus, God in the flesh, face to face, we (and they) would be different. Oh, friends, today we read the horrible truth, that even walking with Jesus, the people were fickle. turned on Jesus, remained arrogant; thinking they knew more about who and how God would send the prophesied Deliverer than God!

We really are no different. We can encounter God, read history in the form of God’s very Word, have the Holy Spirit dwell in us, and still fall into the same trap of sin. In order to be different, we must keep returning to God; throw off those things in our life that keep us from making God number one in our lives. We must believe and ALLOW Jesus to change everything in our lives for HIS glory.

What can we do today, and every day, to give God first place in our lives and heed the warning we have been given?

Primer contributed by Gaylyn Mott, Christ follower, musician, teacher, yarn artist, member of Cornerstone Community Church of Chowchilla