Can I pray for you in any
way? Send any prayer requests to OurChristianWalk@aol.com.
In Christ, Mark
In Christ, Mark
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
** Follow The Christian
Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk
** Like posts and send friend
requests to the author of The Christian Walk, Mark Cummings on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mark.cummings.733?ref=tn_tnmn
** Become a Follower of
The Christian Walk at http://the-christian-walk.blogspot.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
At the
uproar of Your army, the peoples flee; when You rise up, the nations scatter. Your
plunder, O nations, is harvested as by young locusts; like a swarm of locusts
people pounce on it.
Look,
their brave men cry aloud in the streets; the envoys of peace weep bitterly. The
highways are deserted, no travelers are on the roads. The treaty is broken, its
witnesses are despised, no one is respected. The land dries up and wastes away,
Lebanon is ashamed and withers; Sharon is like the Arabah, and Bashan and
Carmel drop their leaves.
“Now
will I arise,” says the Lord. “Now will I be exalted; now will I be lifted up. You
conceive chaff, you give birth to straw; your breath is a fire that consumes
you. The peoples will be burned to ashes; like cut thornbushes they will be set
ablaze.”
You who
are far away, hear what I have done; you who are near, acknowledge My power! The
sinners in Zion are terrified; trembling grips the godless:
“Who of
us can dwell with the consuming fire? Who of us can dwell with everlasting
burning?”
Those
who walk righteously and speak what is right, who reject gain from extortion and
keep their hands from accepting bribes, who stop their ears against plots of
murder and shut their eyes against contemplating
evil—they are the ones who will dwell on the heights, whose refuge will be the
mountain fortress. Their bread will be supplied, and water will not fail them. Your
eyes will see the King in his beauty and view a land that stretches afar. In
your thoughts you will ponder the former terror:
“Where
is that chief officer? Where is the one who took the revenue? Where is the
officer in charge of the towers?”
You will see those arrogant people no more, people whose speech is obscure, whose language is strange and incomprehensible. Look on Zion, the city of our festivals; your eyes will see Jerusalem, a peaceful abode, a tent that will not be moved; its stakes will never be pulled up, nor any of its ropes broken. There the Lord will be our Mighty One. It will be like a place of broad rivers and streams. No galley with oars will ride them, no mighty ship will sail them.
For the Lord
is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king; it is He who will
save us.
Your
rigging hangs loose: The mast is not held secure, the sail is not spread. Then
an abundance of spoils will be divided and even the lame will carry off
plunder. No one living in Zion will say, “I am ill”; and the sins of those who
dwell there will be forgiven.”
Isaiah 33:3-4,
7-24
This ends this
reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
In the remaining verses of Chapter
33, we see words of warning and judgment as well as words of salvation and
assurance.
Who will experience what?
It comes down to what side you
choose to be on: arrogance or humility.
On the arrogance side, we had the
enemies of Israel, the Assyrians.
They believed they triumphed as a
result of their own power and might, able to defeat any anyone they came up
against. That is, until they came up against the Lord God Almighty. For when
the Lord rises up, no one can stand against Him. And if any people choose to
not exalt Him, opting instead to exalt themselves, then they will face His
judgment. Such is what happened to the Assyrians.
Their people were caused to flee as
the Lord scattered the once mighty nation. Brave men, once fearless warriors, would
be found weeping aloud in the streets. The highways would be deserted as the
Lord’s judgment fell upon Assyria and dried up their fertile lands until they
were laid to waste. A once mighty empire would wither and be burned like chaff
and thornbushes as it encountered the consuming fire of judgment from the one
true God of the world. None of the false gods worshipped by the Assyrians could
be found coming to their aid.
In the end, the arrogant people
would be no more and with that Israel had lost one more enemy at the hands of
their Great Protector and Deliverer.
Conversely, there are words of hope
within these verses promising desolation and destruction to the arrogant but in
order to have them applicable one had to have exercised humility before the
same God who punished prideful, egocentric conceit.
How do you find yourself in the
category of the humble?
It’s simple really. You only need
place the Lord first in everything, dying to self so He might be able to fully
live and abide within you.
This life attitude turns everything
toward the Lord. He is the object of our attention and our praise because He is
the Author and Orchestrator of all things. And we find ourselves in His favor
when we follow the guidance found in the following verses in our scripture for
today:
Those who walk righteously and speak what is
right, who reject gain from extortion and keep their hands from accepting
bribes, who stop their ears against plots of murder and shut their eyes against
contemplating evil—they are the ones who
will dwell on the heights, whose refuge will be the mountain fortress. Their
bread will be supplied, and water will not fail them. Your eyes will see the King
in his beauty and view a land that stretches afar.
Look on Zion, the city of our festivals; your
eyes will see Jerusalem, a peaceful abode, a tent that will not be moved; its
stakes will never be pulled up, nor any of its ropes broken. There the Lord
will be our Mighty One. It will be like
a place of broad rivers and streams. No galley with oars will ride them, no
mighty ship will sail them.
For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our
lawgiver, the Lord is our king; it is He who will save us.
No one living in Zion will say, “I am ill”; and
the sins of those who dwell there will be forgiven.”
vv: 15-17, 20-22, 24
If you want to see the King of
kings and Lord of lords in all His beauty and glory, now and forever more,
finding your needs always met as you live under the shadow of His refuge and protection,
you need to:
1.
Walk righteously.
We do this when we place our
desires aside and make the Lord’s desires the desires of our heart. Following
His will and way will always place our feet firmly on the path of righteousness
with right living the by product.
2. Speak what is right.
We can only speak truth when we
speak the words the Lord gives us, whether we are speaking through the authority
of the holy word of God found in the scriptures or speaking words the Lord
gives us through the Holy Spirit, and we should consistently be seeking Him to
find out what we should say and when we should say it. It’s the only way we can
ensure we are always speaking right.
3. Turn from evil and sin.
If we walk righteously, this
becomes a non-issue but we need to be reminded that as much as the Lord desires
for us to live in righteousness, Satan desires us to live in sin, wickedness,
and evil which he is more than willing to lead a person to. Keep your eyes
firmly fixed upon the Lord in all circumstances and you will never need to be
concerned with gain from extortion or accepting bribes or getting caught up in
plots of murder or contemplating evil. The righteousness the Lord offers to you,
with the full extent of His power and might, will easily oversee the temptation
to sin. Satan cannot rival the Lord. Ever.
In the end translation, those who
place their fullest trust and faith in the Lord will always proclaim the
following, falling before Him humbly while acknowledging His majesty:
For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our
lawgiver, the Lord is our king; it is He who will save us.
Indeed, the humble, those who place
their hope in Jesus, will find their salvation. For there is no other way to
the Father than through His Son, the One who was the perfect example of
humility, the One who was, is, and will always be, THE Way and THE Truth, and
THE Life (John 14:6).
Amen.
In
Christ,
Mark
PS: Please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.
Send any prayer requests to OurChristianWalk@aol.com
No comments:
Post a Comment