This is the season in which we remember the birth of Christ.
Our thoughts are directed away from the commercialism commonly associated with this season.
Our desire is to see Jesus again for who He is – Our Immanuel – God with us.
Our focus in this Christmas season will be upon Isaiah 7- 9.
The Lutheran commentator H.C. Leupold gives Isaiah
Chapters 7-12 the title “Immanuel
book”[1],
because of the references to Immanuel in 7:14; 8:8,10. This prophetic section
foretells the conception and birth of Immanuel. The gospel of Matthew 1:21-23 links Immanuel to the Lord
Jesus Christ. The NT solves the mystery
of this mysterious Immanuel.
ISAIAH - A Brief Biographical Sketch
His name (Yeshayahu) means “God saves”. Not much is known about Isaiah.
- He was the son of Amoz (1:1).
- He was married (8:3).
- He had at least two children (7:3,8:3).
- Isaiah 6 contains his call and commission to the prophetic office in the year that king Uzziah died (740 B.C.).
- He lived in Jerusalem.
- His prophetic activity lasted approximately from 742-701 BC
- The greatest political event of his prophetic career would have been the fall of the Northern kingdom (Israel) to the Assyrians in about 722 BC.
No other prophet in the Scriptures has
said more concerning Israel’s Messiah than Isaiah. He foretells the Messiah’s birth in Isaiah
9. He also presents us with a most graphic picture of the Messiah as the suffering and martyred servant who was
wounded for our transgressions (Isaiah
53).
Chapter 7 contains the prophecy of the virgin birth of a son called Immanuel (7:14). This Immanuel is as mysterious and unique as Melchizedek who is “without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days or end of life…” (Genesis 14:17ff; Hebr. 7:3).
Here God commands Isaiah to speak to
king Ahaz of Judah[2], who is presently in a real quandary. We
read in 7:1,2 [3]
“In the days of Ahaz the son of
Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, Rezin
the king of Syria and Pekah
the son of Remaliah the king of Israel came up to Jerusalem to wage war
against it… King Ahaz and the people of
the Southern kingdom were clearly very afraid… “the heart…shook as the trees
of the forest shake before the wind…”. A
very graphic picture of fear!
Isaiah was commanded to speak to Ahaz and the people about this fear in 7:4-9:
“And say to him, ‘be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering stumps of firebrands…, at the fierce anger of Rezin and Syria and the son of Remaliah... 5 Because Syria, with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah, has devised evil against you, saying, 6 “Let us go up against Judah and terrify it, and let us conquer it for ourselves, and set up the son of Tabeel as king in the midst of it,” 7 thus says the Lord God: “‘It shall not stand, and it shall not come to pass.8 For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin. And within sixty-five years Ephraim will be shattered from being a people. 9 And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.’”
Isaiah found king Ahaz at the upper
pool. At that time Jerusalem’s water came from the Gihon Spring in the Kidron
valley, outside the city. [4]
Ahaz was worried about the water supply. It could be easily cut off by an
enemy. Isaiah was sent by God to give Ahaz
courage and hope.
Now keep in mind that in Isaiah was warned by God that, “the hearts of this people would be dull…. Their ears heavy and their eyes blind…” (Isa 6:9, 10).
That would be the mindset of a man like Ahaz.
He would not hear or believe any word from God through a prophet.
We
must never accuse God of not being patient with His rebellious people. He sends
His servants into His vineyard time and again (e.g. the parable of the tenants – Matt. 21: 33-46).
As Isaiah approaches king Ahaz, he finds
a man who had his mind made up. He believed that only Assyria could help him
now. To that end he would even give up the temple treasury (the things devoted
to God) to Assyria to save his neck.
In 2 Kings 16:7–8 we read
7 So
Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser
king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and
rescue me from the hand of the king of Syria and from the hand of the king
of Israel, who are attacking me.” 8 Ahaz also took the silver and gold
that was found in the house of the Lord and in the treasures of the king's
house and sent a present to the king of Assyria.
This mindset is disturbingly habitual
among God’s people. We are inclined turn to anyone for help before we turn to
our God. In Isa. 30:1-3 we find
the same mindset. Israel wanted to trust
in Egypt rather than in their God:
“Ah,
stubborn children,” declares the Lord, “who carry out a plan, but not mine, and
who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin;
2 who set out to go down to Egypt, without asking for my direction, to
take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh and to seek shelter in the shadow of
Egypt! 3 Therefore shall the protection of Pharaoh Turn to your shame, and
the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation.
… And these following words in Isa 30: 12-16
12 Therefore
thus says the Holy One of Israel, “Because you despise this word and trust in
oppression and perverseness and rely on them, 13 therefore this iniquity
shall be to you like a breach in a high wall, bulging out, and about to
collapse, whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant; 14 and its
breaking is like that of a potter's vessel that is smashed so ruthlessly that
among its fragments not a shard is found with which to take fire from the hearth, or to dip up
water out of the cistern.” 15 For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of
Israel, “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” (There is the call to have faith in God). But you were unwilling, 16 and you said,
“No! We will flee upon horses”; therefore you shall flee away; and, “We will
ride upon swift steeds”; therefore, your pursuers shall be swift.
Isaiah’s message to Ahaz was simple: “Stop worrying! I am in control of these
events! Be careful, be quiet, do
not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering
stumps of firebrands.” See how much God is for Ahaz! He sends a
prophet to him with a sure and faithful word. Truly, God does not withhold His
word from us. That word says: Be quiet! Trust in me!
Another fact: Ahaz, the son of Jotham, was a son of David. Pekah of the breakaway northern kingdom was not of the line of David. Of him we read in 2 Kings 15:23-38 that he had murdered the previous king Pekahiah and seized the throne of the northern kingdom (generally referred to as Israel). The point is that the Lord had no covenantal dealings with the kings of the northern kingdom. Pekah was merely the son of Remaliah (7:9).
In contrast to this, Ahaz was born into
the Davidic line - the covenant. He could have rested in God’s promises, “… I will establish the throne of his
kingdom forever” (2 Samuel 7:14). But very sadly, this king could not see that
a great and mighty God was committed to fight his battles for David’s sake –
for His own glory’s sake.
Instead of looking to His God, he saw
these two earthly kings, who from God’s perspective, were described as smoldering stumps (7:4).
Their fire had died and all that was left was the smoke! Ahaz should have been comforted by Isaiah’s
message. He should not have been
intimidated by their threatening words (7:6).
He should have remembered the truth expressed in Isa 40:15-17
“Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as
the dust on the scales; behold, he takes up the coastlands like fine dust.
16 Lebanon would not suffice for fuel, nor are its beasts enough for a
burnt offering. 17 All the nations are as nothing before him, they are
accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.”
Ahaz had to do nothing but to stand
firm in His faith in the God of his father David. It was not a leap in the
dark. It was a faith in a dependable God. It was a faith that was tested and
tried by his many godly predecessors.
Not to stand in faith in this situation would mean the downfall of the
nation. And so it was!
In the course of history, it was not
only so that the Northern kingdom would be taken into captivity by the
Assyrians in 722 BC, but 150 years later the Southern kingdom would share the
same fate, being taken into captivity by the Babylonians.
See how much God is for Ahaz! See how much grace is extended! Next time (Isa 7: 10- 25) we will consider an incredibly generous offer from the LORD God to this spiritually weak king, Ahaz. God says to Ahaz through the prophet “Ahaz, ask for a sign to prove that I am the faithful God that will protect you and sustain you…” (7:10).
We shall find that Ahaz fails to make an opportunity of this.
And we shall see that despite his unbelief God Himself will give a sign – “Immanuel” to prove that He is the faithful God who will deliver His people from their trials and tribulations. But, that will be the subject matter for our next sermon.
- This is the month and time of the year when we remember the birth of our Immanuel – the Living Word, who was given for our release from fear and anxiety – and from our own darkness. The message of Christmas is a message of comfort and joy!
- We
too are currently living in a very fearful and anxious age. Many people are fearful and
stressed. Because of this, the modern
mental health industry is flourishing. This is nothing new in the history of
mankind. In Jesus day, He saw many sick, distressed, demon oppressed, harassed
people. These were beset by all sorts of fears and phobias and emotional
ailments leading to all sorts of psychosomatic diseases. Many are like the
woman who had exhausted her finances to find a cure to her ailment (Mk 5:26). They crowd the consultation
rooms of doctors and psychologists. Many of them are religious. They go to
church, but their demons of fear and anxiety remain. Christ (the Wonderful Counsellor- Isa 9:6)
appears to be of no help at all. And the main problem is this: They
hear but do not understand; they keep on seeing, but do not perceive …” (Isa. 6:9).
Like Ahaz and the people of His day they do not respond to the word of
the Lord because their fears are great and their God is small. We cannot hear the Word of the Lord speaking
into our fears. We do not want to
believe these words from the Immanuel book, because we are preoccupied with man
made solutions, and with the words of false prophets more than this WORD. We do not hear these words: ‘Be
careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of
these two smouldering stumps of firebrands…”. There is too much noise
in our souls!
- Our generation is not firm in
the faith (7:9b).
We may not be professing atheists, but
we are practical atheists. We trust our purses, and will rob our treasuries to pay
for the opinions of secular, man- centred opinion or to find soul deadening
medications, drugs, alcohol, spending our money on endless forms of escapism. We are
not a generation that listens to
God. We
accumulate for ourselves teachers to suit our own passions, and we easily turn
away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths (2 Tim 4:3, 4)
- We
are not committed worshippers. We are not inclined to work from a God- centred faith. We
do not disperse from our churches full of faith and confidence in the power in
God. By nature, we are inclined to be Ahaz’s. We are easily intimidated by people and their
opinions. But when it comes to hearing the Word of God, calling us to faith and
obedience, it appears as if we are deaf and blind.
- We need Immanuel to restore
us. This
whole passage begs for a divine solution.
Next time we will consider God’s solution in Isa. 7:10-25. This is
the answer to the counsel offered in 7:4
Turn to Him in prayer now as we beg the Father through the Lord Jesus (God with us) by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit, to take away any such blindness and deafness as there may be.
May He enable us to look with biblical faith to God, and learn to interpret various intimidating situations before us, not at face value, but with biblical wisdom and insight.
The Grace of God be with you!
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