April 26, 2011 (Isaiah 31-35)

The footnotes in my Bible weren't very helpful today. It seemed as if the chapters I am reading are dealing with 'the end of time', instead of God dealing judgement to Assyria. The reason I say that is because of this section:

^34:1 Come here and listen, O nations of the earth.
      Let the world and everything in it hear my words.
 ² For the Lord is enraged against the nations.
      His fury is against all their armies.
   He will completely destroy them,
      dooming them to slaughter.
 ³ Their dead will be left unburied,
      and the stench of rotting bodies will fill the land.
      The mountains will flow with their blood.
 ⁴ The heavens above will melt away
      and disappear like a rolled-up scroll.
   The stars will fall from the sky
      like withered leaves from a grapevine,
      ^{or shriveled figs from a fig tree.}

Verse 4 especially reminded me of the end times. Somewhere else I had read that in those days the stars will fall from the sky. I thought about verse 4 - "The stars will fall from the sky like withered leaves....."  That is going to be a terrifying day. He continues telling about the destruction of the land:

¹⁰ This judgment on Edom will never end;
      the smoke of its burning will rise forever.
   The land will lie deserted from generation to generation.
      No one will live there anymore.
 ¹¹ It will be haunted by the desert owl and the screech owl,
      the great owl and the raven.
   For God will measure that land carefully;
      he will measure it for chaos and destruction.
 ¹² It will be called the Land of Nothing,
      and all its nobles will soon be gone.
 ¹³ Thorns will overrun its palaces;
      nettles and thistles will grow in its forts.
   The ruins will become a haunt for jackals
      and a home for owls.
 ¹⁴ Desert animals will mingle there with hyenas,
      their howls filling the night.
   Wild goats will bleat at one another among the ruins,
      and night creatures will come there to rest.
 ¹⁵ There the owl will make her nest and lay her eggs.
      She will hatch her young and cover them with her wings.
   And the buzzards will come,
      each one with its mate.

And then I was struck by this section -

¹⁶ Search the book of the Lord,
      and see what he will do.
   Not one of these birds and animals will be missing,
      and none will lack a mate,
   for the Lord has promised this.
      His Spirit will make it all come true.
 ¹⁷ He has surveyed and divided the land
      and deeded it over to those creatures.
   They will possess it forever,
      from generation to generation.

It will all come true. This will happen. And it reminded me of Peter's admonition in 2 Peter 3. I was going to reference just a few verses, but decided to list the whole chapter.


 ¹ This is my second letter to you, dear friends, and in both of them I have tried to stimulate your wholesome thinking and refresh your memory. ² I want you to remember what the holy prophets said long ago and what our Lord and Savior commanded through your apostles.

 ³ Most importantly, I want to remind you that in the last days scoffers will come, mocking the truth and following their own desires. ⁴ They will say, “What happened to the promise that Jesus is coming again? From before the times of our ancestors, everything has remained the same since the world was first created.”

 ⁵ They deliberately forget that God made the heavens by the word of his command, and he brought the earth out from the water and surrounded it with water. ⁶ Then he used the water to destroy the ancient world with a mighty flood. ⁷And by the same word, the present heavens and earth have been stored up for fire. They are being kept for the day of judgment, when ungodly people will be destroyed.

 ⁸ But you must not forget this one thing, dear friends: A day is like a thousand years to the Lord, and a thousand years is like a day. ⁹ The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent. ¹⁰ But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief. Then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and the very elements themselves will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be found to deserve judgment.

 ¹¹ Since everything around us is going to be destroyed like this, what holy and godly lives you should live, ¹² looking forward to the day of God and hurrying it along. On that day, he will set the heavens on fire, and the elements will melt away in the flames. ¹³ But we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth he has promised, a world filled with God’s righteousness.

 ¹⁴ And so, dear friends, while you are waiting for these things to happen, make every effort to be found living peaceful lives that are pure and blameless in his sight.

 ¹⁵ And remember, the Lord’s patience gives people time to be saved. This is what our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you with the wisdom God gave him—¹⁶ speaking of these things in all of his letters. Some of his comments are hard to understand, and those who are ignorant and unstable have twisted his letters to mean something quite different, just as they do with other parts of Scripture. And this will result in their destruction.

 ¹⁷ I am warning you ahead of time, dear friends. Be on guard so that you will not be carried away by the errors of these wicked people and lose your own secure footing. ¹⁸ Rather, you must grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

   All glory to him, both now and forever! Amen.

As I reread this chapter I was struck by the phrases that I went back and 'bolded'. The black bolded phrases deal with 'remembering what we have been told' and the red ones are admonitions as to how we are to live.

Peter's words still echo to us today. We can't just read the Word and go on our merry way. We are to really remember what has been written and allow it to change the way we live. God, continue to purify me through Your Word.