Isaiah 47:13-14a All the counsel you have received has only worn you out! Let your astrologers come forward, those stargazers who make predictions month by month, let them save you from what is coming upon you. Surely they are like stubble; the fire will burn them up. They cannot even save themselves
When I was teaching, I often found myself going down a long row of band kids having one after another play the same passage for a grade. This may or may not have been pre-announced. Often there would be a student far into the process who would seem completely surprised by what was happening. I used this as an occasion to try to teach that whenever we can learn from someone else’s problems, it can be pain-free experience for us.
In today’s passage, Isaiah is writing directly to Babylon. It wasn’t to Israel and certainly is not to us. But, can we learn from their problems? Can we maybe gain some pain-free ex-perience? I believe we can. When Isaiah wrote this it was truly prophecy. None of it had oc-curred. He wrote, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to Babylon before they had done all their conquering. But he wrote of a time after they would themselves be conquered.
At the height of their powers they would have controlled much of the known world. They became unimaginable wealthy. They became exceedingly cosmopolitan due to their pol-icy of taking the ‘best’ people of the ones they conquered and merged them into their own society. They’d have done this with the ‘wise men’ or religious types also. But likely they al-ways favored their own. They were the winners after all. How powerful could the other gods be?
But Isaiah, again through the Holy Spirit, is saying, “Your day is coming.” He rather tauntingly suggests that they can turn to their astrologers in that day. But they won’t even be able to save themselves.
We could look at this and sort of look down on it all as crude and simplistic. So far beneath us and how far we’ve come. But is that really true? Aren’t there horoscopes in most modern papers? Not only that, but there is not a shortage of otherwise very intelligent people who are convinced that we cannot save ourselves from ourselves, but they know where to look for help - the sky! They search the night sky desperate to find some sign that we are not the only ones.
Well, in a manner of speaking, they’re on the right track. We aren’t alone. We were cre-ated by a loving Creator God Who placed us here on this planet that He made which is uniquely positioned to promote life. And we cannot save ourselves from ourselves. But that is why He sent a Savior! Jesus came to earth to live among us. He lived a sinless life and died a cruel death as the penalty for our sins. After three days He rose again and is coming back one day to gather His people. The sky doesn’t hold the answers but the One Who made the sky does! Turn to Him through His word and you’ll find all the help you need!
Blessings
Pastor Russ
