Latest / Tabernacle Talk - A Bible Study Podcast with Pastor Bryon Self / Isaiah 5:18-30 - God Decides Good, Evil, and Punishment

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Isaiah 5:18-30 - God Decides Good, Evil, and Punishment · Tabernacle Talk - A Bible Study Podcast with Pastor Bryon Self

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  Welcome to Tabernacle Talk. Tabernacle Talk is a Bible study
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  podcast brought from Tabernacle Baptist Church in Essex, MD.
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  I'm your host, Brian Self. We hope this podcast encourages
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  you to know Christ, grow in his word, and show his love to
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  others. Let's dive right in.
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  Welcome back to Tabernacle Talk. Today we are in the latter
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  portion of Isaiah 5, and Isaiah 5, as we learned last episode,
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  is walking through the sins of the southern Kingdom of Judah.
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  These people that were supposed to be God's people, but instead
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  they were living just like the nations before them had lived.
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  And in some ways they were actually living worse as a
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  result of the fact that they had received truth from God.
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  They had been given wisdom. They had been told what was good
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  and what was bad, what they ought to do and what they should
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  not do. And they even with the wisdom of
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  God himself given to them, they chose to walk in their own path.
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  And I think even for us today, as we begin diving into this
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  portion of Scripture, we need to have a holy fear and trepidation
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  to go. God, I am receiving instruction
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  from you. Would you help me to obey it?
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  That I wouldn't just hear what is good, but that I would
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  actually live it out. That I wouldn't just hear what
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  is bad, but that I would actively avoid it in my own
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  life. Let's begin reading in verse
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  #18. I believe we'll get through the
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  end of the chapter today, but we'll begin in verse #18 Woe to
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  those who drag iniquity with cords of deceit and pull sin
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  along with cart ropes. To those who say, let him hurry
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  up and do His work quickly so that we can see it.
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  Let the plan of the Holy One of Israel take place so that we can
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  know it. Woe to those who call evil good
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  and good evil and substitute darkness for light and light for
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  darkness, who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.
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  Woe to those who consider themselves wise and judge
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  themselves clever. Woe to those who are heroes at
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  drinking wine, who are champions at pouring beer, who acquit the
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  guilty for a bribe and deprive the innocent of justice.
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  We'll continue on with some more of the sections. 24 and 25 are
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  the next one, and then verses 26 to 30 is our last one.
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  But in this initial section we see people that have proclaimed
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  themselves to be the true God of Judah, that they view their own
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  wisdom, their actions, their faculties, their senses as the
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  ultimate test of what is right and wrong.
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  We can see this in verses 18 through 18 and 19.
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  First, that Isaiah says these people, they drag iniquity with
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  cords of deceit and pull sin along with cart ropes.
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  That something is too heavy for them to carry all by themselves
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  and so they are bringing along more and more sin.
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  Isaiah is saying they have heaps of sin, so much so that they
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  need the assistance of cords and ropes in order to prop up all of
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  the wrongdoing that they are involved in.
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  He says in verse #19 that these people are skeptical of Isaiah's
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  preaching about what God's Word is and about what God has
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  declared. Because Isaiah's saying there
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  was going to come a time of judgment for Israel and for
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  Judah, and you guys are going to be in trouble unless you turn
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  back to Yahweh and you repent. And so these people scoffingly
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  say, well, let him hurry up and do his work quickly so that we
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  can see it. They're like, hey, you know,
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  where is this judgment of God? We, we don't see it happening
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  anywhere. They say, let the plan of the
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  Holy One of Israel take place so that we can know it.
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  Like if God's really all that upset with us, if he's really
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  real, then let him bring along destruction and judgment.
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  This reminds me of what we would read even in Second Peter
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  chapter 3 where Peter says that those that doubt even in his day
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  about 600 years later, he says above all be aware of this.
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  Scoffers will come in the last days scoffing and following
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  their own evil desires, saying where is his coming that he
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  promised. Ever since our ancestors fell
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  asleep, all things continue as they have been since the
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  beginning of creation. Hear these people that go, no,
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  we're, we're fine. There's never going to be any
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  judgment, any accounting, any reckoning of our bad behavior.
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  And this is exactly what was happening in ancient Israel.
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  But I want to echo to you guys, as Peter says in Second Peter 3,
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  do not think that God's patience, the fact that Jesus
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  hasn't come back yet as the judge of the whole world to
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  judge the living and the dead, don't view that as God's
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  indifference to the evil that is taking place.
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  Instead, God is patient. He's long-suffering.
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  He does not want, He doesn't desire, He's not willing that
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  anyone would perish apart from him.
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  His desire is that everyone would come to repentance.
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  Now we know certainly from Scripture, not everyone will
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  come to repentance, but that's not as a result of God hating
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  people, of God, not wishing for people to make the right choice.
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  Instead, they choose evil. And then we read in verse #20
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  something that is very applicable to today's society,
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  really in whatever nation of the world that you are in.
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  This is true over and over again.
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  Sadly, this is often been true even in churches.
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  And through what pastors teach, through what professing
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  Christians do, they follow this blueprint, if you will, in verse
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  #20 he says woe to those who call evil good in good evil.
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  So let me give just a few examples.
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  God views marriage and intimacy within marriage as a wonderful
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  thing, a good thing, something ordained and commanded by Him.
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  Our world would say, well, you need to test out the car before
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  you buy it, and so therefore you need to be intimate with one
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  another before marriage. They say it is evil, it's
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  unwise, it's dumb to follow God's instruction on marital
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  intimacy. But God says this is good and it
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  is evil to engage in intimacy outside of marriage.
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  Our world hasn't flipped. You can look at what God gives
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  about human sexuality, that it's supposed to be one man and one
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  woman for one lifetime. The world says, well, that's
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  really restrictive, it is evil. It is you're engaging in bigotry
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  to say that that is the prescription and we think it can
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  be man and man, woman and woman, polyamory all these sorts of
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  things. Whatever you want to do goes
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  they call good what God is called evil and they call evil
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  what God is called good. Even today just saw a headline
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  that an individual at their company had espoused frustration
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  with having to affirm same sex relationships and and all of
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  that as a part of their job having to wear memorabilia
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  proclaiming that particular lifestyle and the individual was
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  fired as a result of their dissatisfaction with that.
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  Now I do not know all the particulars of that situation
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  very well could be that a person was not disagreeing in like a
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  Christ like a Jesus like way, a way that would mimic the way
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  that Christ himself loves and cares for those that, yes, are
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  in sin, yes, need to repent, but yet Christ always treated those
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  in sin with need to repentance still in a godly way.
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  We as fallen humans can often, if you will, we can have a right
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  position, but a dreadfully wrong and sinful disposition.
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  There's a right way and a wrong way to oppose our world's
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  teachings on sexuality. So I don't know if the person
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  did everything in the right way. I don't know if they, you know,
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  were some bastion of great Christian about holiness and
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  love and care, or if they said and, and did some things or use
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  some language that they should not have.
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  I don't know all the particulars of that.
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  But it is certainly an area in which our world strongly
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  disagrees with God and where God has, if you will, given us the
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  the instruction about the tree of the knowledge of good and
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  evil. I am telling you what is good
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  and what is bad. And our world says, as Eve said,
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  no, what you said was evil, I think is actually ultimately
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  good. Even as you look through verse
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  20, there's those parallels between the story of the Garden
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  of Eden and hear what Israel was doing that you have the tree of
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  the knowledge of good and evil. So that's what are those who
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  call evil good and good evil. You can think back to Genesis 1
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  where into the darkness God spoke light.
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  And here it says, And who substitute darkness for light,
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  and light for darkness? And then it says Who substitute
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  bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter that God has the way that
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  He has created us to operate as those made in His image to
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  accomplish His work in the world and the world around us.
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  The nation, whatever nation you're in does not follow what
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  God has said. It doesn't matter what nation on
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  earth that you're in. Mankind without Christ does
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  this. And even those of us that
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  profess to know Christ can very often say, I know God said that
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  this is bad or that I shouldn't do this, but I really want to do
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  this or say this or have this attitude.
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  And so we often and fall into the same trap.
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  And so we need over and over again to go back to the source
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  of who tells us what is actually ultimately good, both for us and
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  for others and for our relationship with God, and what
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  hurts that relationship. Verse 21.
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  Woe to those who consider themselves wise and judge
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  themselves clever. None of us are the ultimate
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  authorities on what is good or bad.
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  None of us are the ultimate authorities on what happens in
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  the spiritual side of things. The only way that we can know
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  ultimate truth is through the Word of God.
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  And so don't judge yourself to be wiser than the Word of God.
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  Don't think of yourself as more clever than the writers of
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  Scripture inspired by the Holy Spirit.
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  Then in verse #22 he says, what are those who are heroes at
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  drinking wine? Who are champions at pouring
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  beer? We talked a little bit about
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  this last episode, the pervasive drunkenness that made it so that
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  people were pursuing pleasure instead of pursuing God.
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  And we see in verse #23 that this goes forward to the fact
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  that this was people in positions of leadership that
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  threw their intoxication through their pursuit of pleasure and
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  worldly goods, they were actually harming other people.
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  So it wasn't just, oh man, you know, there's a fun party and
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  I'm really living it up here. It was actually people that were
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  responsible for the lives of others, who are responsible for
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  justice that did not do what was right as a result of their
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  pursuit of drunkenness and pleasure.
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  So he says, what are those who are heroes at drinking wine, her
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  champions at pouring beer, who acquit the guilty for a bribe?
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  That people that should have been condemned because they
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  received money, they were fine. This is an abhorable an
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  abhorrent. I mixed abhorrent and horrible.
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  This is an abhorrent practice that we see happen even today in
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  many situations that that as people donate funds to a
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  particular politician or a judge that they are able to receive
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  favorable treatment as a result of them bribing.
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  This is a horrible thing. Whenever you mix politics and
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  money, this will always be a bad thing.
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  We can see this even right here in Scripture says and deprive
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  the innocent of justice. All right, this next section
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  then. So we've seen a a bunch of sins
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  of these people then verses 24 and 25.
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  Therefore, as a tongue of fire consumes straw and as dry grass
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  shrivels in the flame, so their roots will become like something
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  rotten and their blossoms will blow away like dust.
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  For they have rejected the instruction of Yahweh of
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  heaven's armies, and they have despised the word of the Holy
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  One of Israel. To reject the source of life
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  means that you are embracing your own destruction and demise.
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  Verse 25 Therefore, you always anger burned against his people.
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  He raised his hand against them and struck them.
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  The mountains quaked and their corpses were like garbage in the
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  streets. And all this his anger has not
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  turned away and his hand is still raised to strike that
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  there were temporary punishments all along the way for Israel.
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  So this is still a hundred, 150 years before Judah is taken into
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  captivity by Babylon, but over the course of decades, God was
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  punishing them in small ways to let them know that their
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  behavior was not OK. We're told in Hebrews 12.
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  Don't despise the discipline, the chastening of the Lord,
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  because a father that loves his children is going to discipline
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  them so that they do not do the bad things and that they embrace
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  the good things, that they know that there's punishment as a
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  result of following bad habits and bad ways of living.
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  Now continuing to talk about the Lord and what he is doing.
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  Verse #26 to the end of chapter 5, He raises a signal flag for
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  the distant nations and whistles for them from the ends of the
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  earth. Look how quickly and swiftly
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  they come. None of them grows weary or
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  stumbles. No one slumbers or sleeps.
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  No belt is loose and no sandal strap broken.
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  Their arrows are sharpened and all their bows strung.
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  Their horses hooves are like their chariot wheels are like a
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  whirlwind. Their roaring is like a lions.
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  They roar like Young Lions. They growl and seize their prey
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  and carry it off and no one can rescue it.
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  On that day they will roar over it like the roaring of the sea.
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  When 1 looks at the land, there will be darkness and distress.
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  Light will be obscured by clouds here.
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  God says Judah, I am bringing punishment on you for the
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  wickedness that you were doing. You have rejected my word.
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  You have enabled the guilty who should have been punished.
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  You have punished the innocent who should have received
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  justice. You have lived for your own
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  pleasure. And so as a result, there is
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  going to be, there are going to be consequences.
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  Can I ask you today, are you allowing sin to simply have a
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  home in your life or are you pursuing God's way of living?
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  Are you pursuing life and joy, good community and care of
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  others, or are you pursuing your own way?
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  What makes you feel good? What gets you out on top?
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  Or are you living for the Lord and for others?
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  There is a very plain path placed here before us in Isaiah
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  5 and the simple command is follow the Lord, follow His way.
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  Because when God judges, it is a total judgement.
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  It is a judgement that we are shocked to see what God
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  accomplishes, and though it is not instantaneous, it is
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  certain. Just because God isn't punishing
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  every evil person right now to the fullest extent does not mean
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  that He will not one day punish. And can I tell you, even if you
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  are not the most rich or powerful, your sins are not
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  ultimately sins just against humanity, though very often they
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  are. Your sins are sins.
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  They are statements of rebellion against the eternal God, the
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  Judge of all creation. And so humble yourself before
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  him, Repent of your sin, believe in Jesus and trust that He will
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  forgive you as He would have done for any of those in Judah
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  that turned to Him. And we'll see next episode what
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  it looks like when a person realizes their state before God.
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  I'm really looking forward to chapter 6.
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  It might take me like 3. It may take me 3 episodes to get
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  through Isaiah chapter 6, just because it's so wonderful and
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  has so many incredible truths for us.
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  This was a sobering passage of scripture, and so I I hope that
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  it has called your attention to your sin, to God's holiness, and
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  of our desperate need to follow God, not rebel against Him.
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  Thanks for tuning in. Hope that you have a wonderful
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  day.