THE LONG WAIT
Opening Prayer
My Father, as I read of your faithfulness in Scripture, use the history it shares to build my faith and help me trust you with greater measure.
Read ISAIAH 17, 18
A Prophecy Against Damascus
17 A prophecy against Damascus:
“See, Damascus will no longer be a city
but will become a heap of ruins.
2 The cities of Aroer will be deserted
and left to flocks, which will lie down,
with no one to make them afraid.
3 The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim,
and royal power from Damascus;
the remnant of Aram will be
like the glory of the Israelites,”
declares the Lord Almighty.
4 “In that day the glory of Jacob will fade;
the fat of his body will waste away.
5 It will be as when reapers harvest the standing grain,
gathering the grain in their arms—
as when someone gleans heads of grain
in the Valley of Rephaim.
6 Yet some gleanings will remain,
as when an olive tree is beaten,
leaving two or three olives on the topmost branches,
four or five on the fruitful boughs,”
declares the Lord, the God of Israel.
7 In that day people will look to their Maker
and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel.
8 They will not look to the altars,
the work of their hands,
and they will have no regard for the Asherah poles[a]
and the incense altars their fingers have made.
9 In that day their strong cities, which they left because of the Israelites, will be like places abandoned to thickets and undergrowth. And all will be desolation.
10 You have forgotten God your Savior;
you have not remembered the Rock, your fortress.
Therefore, though you set out the finest plants
and plant imported vines,
11 though on the day you set them out, you make them grow,
and on the morning when you plant them, you bring them to bud,
yet the harvest will be as nothing
in the day of disease and incurable pain.
12 Woe to the many nations that rage—
they rage like the raging sea!
Woe to the peoples who roar—
they roar like the roaring of great waters!
13 Although the peoples roar like the roar of surging waters,
when he rebukes them they flee far away,
driven before the wind like chaff on the hills,
like tumbleweed before a gale.
14 In the evening, sudden terror!
Before the morning, they are gone!
This is the portion of those who loot us,
the lot of those who plunder us.
Footnotes
- Isaiah 17:8 That is, wooden symbols of the goddess Asherah
A Prophecy Against Cush
18 Woe to the land of whirring wings[a]
along the rivers of Cush,[b]
2 which sends envoys by sea
in papyrus boats over the water.
Go, swift messengers,
to a people tall and smooth-skinned,
to a people feared far and wide,
an aggressive nation of strange speech,
whose land is divided by rivers.
3 All you people of the world,
you who live on the earth,
when a banner is raised on the mountains,
you will see it,
and when a trumpet sounds,
you will hear it.
4 This is what the Lord says to me:
“I will remain quiet and will look on from my dwelling place,
like shimmering heat in the sunshine,
like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”
5 For, before the harvest, when the blossom is gone
and the flower becomes a ripening grape,
he will cut off the shoots with pruning knives,
and cut down and take away the spreading branches.
6 They will all be left to the mountain birds of prey
and to the wild animals;
the birds will feed on them all summer,
the wild animals all winter.
7 At that time gifts will be brought to the Lord Almighty
from a people tall and smooth-skinned,
from a people feared far and wide,
an aggressive nation of strange speech,
whose land is divided by rivers—
the gifts will be brought to Mount Zion, the place of the Name of the Lord Almighty.
Footnotes
- Isaiah 18:1 Or of locusts
- Isaiah 18:1 That is, the upper Nile region
New International Version (NIV)Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Reflect
There are times when we sense God’s presence keenly and there are periods when he seems absent, even though he is not. Pause to be still, and in the stillness wait for the Lord’s still, small voice.These two chapters offer another bird’s-eye prophetic tour, this time of lesser superpowers in the ancient world (Damascus, Cush). It seems unlikely that Isaiah was widely traveled, but his work in Jerusalem seems to have given him an extensive knowledge of current affairs.
Chapter 18 provides an eye-witness account of a doomed strategic alliance. Judah’s southern neighbor, Egypt, was ruled by a powerful Ethiopian elite. It was amassing support for a strike on the Assyrians and elicited the support of their Judean neighbors. Isaiah appears to have witnessed their envoys’ arrival in Jerusalem. He spoke of a ‘people tall and smooth-skinned,’ their papyrus ships, a land of many rivers, and a strange language (18:2).
Some commentators wonder if Isaiah had seen their arrival in the southern port of Eilat in the Gulf of Aqaba. It reads like a first-hand account. This alliance never happened, but God’s reaction, as described by Isaiah, is intriguing. He played a waiting game (18:4), silently watching like the shimmering heat to see what transpired. There are times when God’s power is revealed in silence, which may even feel like his absence.
Apply
Are there situations in your life where you feel God is silent? How do you respond?
Closing prayer
In my waiting, I wait for you, Lord. In my wrestling, I wrestle with you. In my silence, I trust in you. Thank you that I will always find you faithful.
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