December 4, 2014
Isaiah,
Chapter 8, verse 5-7:
The Choice: The Lord or Assyria. 5Again
the LORD spoke to me: 6Because this
people has rejected the waters
of Shiloah that flow gently, And melts with fear at the display of Rezin
and Remaliah’s son, 7Therefore
the Lord is bringing up against them the waters of the River, great and mighty,
the king of Assyria and all his glory.
Isaiah here is admonishing the people that if they give in to fear
and seek the aid of neighboring kings they are making a choice. The choice is the Lord or Assyria. Isaiah encouraged them to have courage and
trust in God rather than men. The people
repeated the same error as in the time of Moses for they lacked courage failing
to trust in God. Like Moses when he was on Mount Ararat receiving the Ten
Commandments the people made a graven image to protect them. Ultimately King Ahaz and Israel lacked
courage and sought the aid of the strong warrior nation of Assyria which
resulted in their ultimate failure.
We must learn from this verse to put our trust solely in God and mark
our actions and thoughts with total confidence in the power of God.
Isaiah in the previous chapter had strived to get King Ahaz to make an act of faith in God's power: "Ask a sign of the Lord your God." However, the king refused; for he preferred to seek salvation in human aid, the prophet made this prediction: "Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Emmanuel"[1](Is 7:13-14). Courage requires us to have the vision of Christ for: “For Where there is no vision, the people perish.” (Proverbs 29:18).
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