Good morning!
Text: Job 28-30; Isaiah 5
In Isaiah 5, we read more words of indictment against God’s people – the inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah. The image of a vineyard is painted, with God as the owner. Israel is the vineyard, and rather than good grapes, she has produced “wild grapes.” In 5:8-25, a series of six “Woes” are pronounced, each a charge against the nation. One got my attention, because it is so commonplace in our present-day culture;
“Woe to those who call evil good and good evil” (5:20).
These are not things we need to wring our hands about. Rather, they are garden variety evidences of people who do not know the Lord, who are lost and deceived. For God’s people, as in Isaiah’s time, it is serious in one regard – they are about to face severe consequences at the hands of Assyrian and Babylonian invaders. On the other hand, those consequences are designed to awaken God’s chosen ones and to prompt them to return back “home” to the Lord – so the judgment is actually God’s love and mercy in action. For the folks around us who have never known the Lord, their behavior of inverting good and evil is much more serious. If they refuse Jesus, their judgment is not “correction” but destruction. We ought to grieve and pray for the people of the world – that they might receive Jesus and be spared the grave “woes” we read in God’s Word.
in Him, Mike–