SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/1/2013
8:20 PM
My Worship Time Focus: The Lord will restore His People
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Isaiah
11:1-16
Message
of the verses: We will be looking at
the entire eleventh chapter of Isaiah in today’s SD. As mentioned in earlier SD’s there are times
when reading the OT prophets that they go back and forth talking about the
present time that they live in to the future, and at times they are talking
about the near future or the time of when the Lord Jesus Christ comes to earth,
or in the case we are looking at today things that will happen in the 1000 year
reign of Jesus Christ on Planet Earth which is still in the future.
The Lord will Restore His People
(Isaiah 11:1-16): “1 ¶ Then a shoot will spring from the stem of
Jesse, And a branch from his roots will bear fruit. 2 The Spirit of the LORD will rest on Him, The
spirit of wisdom and understanding, The spirit of counsel and strength, The
spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD. 3
And He will delight in the fear of the LORD, And He will not judge by
what His eyes see, Nor make a decision by what His ears hear; 4 But with righteousness He will judge the
poor, And decide with fairness for the afflicted of the earth; And He will
strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, And with the breath of His lips He
will slay the wicked. 5 Also
righteousness will be the belt about His loins, And faithfulness the belt about
His waist. 6 And the wolf will dwell
with the lamb, And the leopard will lie down with the young goat, And the calf
and the young lion and the fatling together; And a little boy will lead them.
7 Also the cow and the bear will graze,
Their young will lie down together, And the lion will eat straw like the ox.
8 The nursing child will play by the
hole of the cobra, And the weaned child will put his hand on the viper’s den.
9 They will not hurt or destroy in all
My holy mountain, For the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD As
the waters cover the sea.
“10 ¶
Then in that day The nations will resort to the root of Jesse, Who will
stand as a signal for the peoples; And His resting place will be glorious.
11 Then it will happen on that day that
the Lord Will again recover the second time with His hand The remnant of His
people, who will remain, From Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam, Shinar,
Hamath, And from the islands of the sea. 12
And He will lift up a standard for the nations And assemble the banished
ones of Israel, And will gather the dispersed of Judah From the four corners of
the earth. 13 Then the jealousy of
Ephraim will depart, And those who harass Judah will be cut off; Ephraim will
not be jealous of Judah, And Judah will not harass Ephraim. 14 They will swoop down on the slopes of the Philistines
on the west; Together they will plunder the sons of the east; They will possess
Edom and Moab, And the sons of Ammon will be subject to them. 15 And the LORD will utterly destroy The tongue
of the Sea of Egypt; And He will wave His hand over the River With His
scorching wind; And He will strike it into seven streams And make men walk over
dry-shod. 16 And there will be a highway
from Assyria For the remnant of His people who will be left, Just as there was
for Israel In the day that they came up out of the land of Egypt.”
In the first nine verses of chapter
eleven Isaiah changes from what he was talking about in chapter ten and verses
33-34 where he was talking about proud trees that God would cut down. He now speaks of a tender shoot that comes
from a stump that for all the world looks like it is dead. He speaks of the Messiah in His glorious
kingdom and some of the things that will go on there like children playing
around a snake’s nest, a snake that in our life time if it would bite us we may
surely die, but not in the 1000 year reign of Jesus Christ on this earth. In a short time after Isaiah writes his book
the end of David’s dynasty would end, but God would keep his children safe, as
a remnant will come from Jews who go into captivity and the line of David would
continue even after the exile, and Christ would be born from that remnant.
During the Millennial Kingdom sin
will be taken care of right away, not like what we see happening around the
world today. His kingdom will again will
involve a newly restored creation, for after the tribulation period the earth
will be in very bad shape. As we look at
chapters 40-48 of Ezekiel we will see that the land around Jerusalem will be
much larger than it is today, so we can presume that the entire earth will be
restored. “18 For I consider that the sufferings of this
present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be
revealed to us. 19 For the anxious
longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God.
20 For the creation was subjected to
futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself also will be set
free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the
children of God. 22 For we know that the
whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.
23 And not only this, but also we
ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan
within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of
our body. 24 For in hope we have been
saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already
sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do
not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.” (Romans 8:18-25)
Verses 10-16 speaks of the nucleus of
the kingdom being those Jews that will be gathered from around the world to
return to Jerusalem and to Israel. There
was a partial fulfillment of this prophecy when the Assyrians allowed some of
the Jews to return to Israel, and even more so when many of the Jews who were
living in Babylon returned to Jerusalem and the surrounding towns, but the ultimate
fulfillment will be at the end of the age when Messiah will regathers His people. I also think that a partial fulfillment of
this prophecy came in May of 1948 when Israel was declared to be a nation and
there was only one name for this nation and not two like that began at the end
of King Solomon’s reign.
We will see Isaiah use the image of
a highway more times in his writing, for it seems to be one of his favorite images. He talks about restoring the ground so that a
highway can be used to have the people return to Jerusalem.
Isaiah was commissioned to speak to
a hard hearted people, but he sees that one day the people will be more than
willing to follow the Lord as they walk on the highway of holiness to Israel
serving their resurrected King of Glory.
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: Just as
God will change the hearts of the Jewish people in the future so they can live
for Him and serve Him, he can do the same for people who will call upon the
name of the Lord today.
My Steps of Faith for Today: I desire to
continue to serve the Lord and do the things that the Spirit of God leads me to
do.
Memory
verses for the week: Psalm 46:1-8
1 God is our refuge and strength, a
very present help in trouble. 2
Therefore we will not fear though the earth should change, and though the
mountains slips into the heart of the sea; though the waters roar and foam,
though the mountains quake at its swelling pride. Selah.
4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy
dwelling place of the most high. 5 God
is in the midst of her, shell will not be moved, God will help her when morning
dawns.
6 The nations make an uproar, the
kingdoms tottered; He raised His voice, the earth melted. 7 The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of
Jacob is our stronghold. Selah. 8 come behold the works of the Lord, who has wrought
desolation in the earth.
Answer
to yesterday’s Bible Question: “Nimrod”
(Genesis 10:9.”
Today’s
Bible Question: Were the two books of
Chronicles written before or after the captivity?”
Answer
in tomorrow’s SD.
8/1/2013
8:55 PM
No comments:
Post a Comment