Contemplate these questions as you dwell in Isaiah 14:1-23:

1. The passage describes God's impending judgment on Babylon and their arrogant belief that they were a great light in the world. How does this depiction of human pride and God's response challenge your perspective on human accomplishments and God's sovereignty?

2. The text emphasizes the idea of God restoring Israel and choosing them again. What significance does the concept of restoration hold in your understanding of God's faithfulness and redemption?

3. In verse 23, God speaks of making Babylon a possession, hedgehog, and pools of water and sweeping it with a broom of destruction. How do these vivid metaphors illustrate the thoroughness and completeness of God's judgment? What lessons can we draw from this about God's justice and His role as the ultimate judge?

Transcript:

We are back to talking about Babylon. We see here again that Babylon is going to fall. They have been the ones who have come and brought this judgment upon Judah because of their turning away from God. But they have come to believe that they are great. They have put themselves in the place of God, even though God has, in fact, been using them to judge Judah, their pride has gotten the best of them. They are not seeking God. They have become the instrument of God, but they are not God's people. We see that Jacob will restore, that Israel will come back to Judah, will return to God. We see this here in verse 1. For the Lord will have compassion on Jacob, and will again choose Israel, and will set them in their own land, and so sojourners will rejoin them, and will attach themselves to the house of Jacob. This is the idea of God's faithfulness. Remember, there is a significant part of this promise of God to the people of God that goes beyond this promise of the line and lineage, at least the Messiah and having the King David, the lineage of David involved with the kingly position in Israel and Judah.

There is also this idea of the land. And so, when they're taken from the land, that is extreme punishment. And so, God returning to them, God choosing Israel again, connected with idea of the land. They're no longer soldiers. They're no longer like Abraham and Isaac and Jacob before their people went into the land. Remember that Abraham, while he was in the promised land, he didn't take possession of it. He was a sojourner. And we see in the Book of Hebrews, the idea here of these heroes of the faith, they were longing for this coming into the land, and they were really longing for the Kingdom of God that it was far off, but they believed that they trusted that it would come. But here God is saying, You're not going to be a soldier. I am going to bring you back into the land. And so when that happens, we read that Israel is going to taunt Babylon. Now, this is an interesting passage here. There's a lot of arrogance here from people of God, right? But it isn't arrogance that we're better. It's know that God is better, that God is the one who has brought them down.

And the idea here is they thought that they would be a light. We see this here in verse 12, How are you all fallen from heaven? O Daystar, son of the dawn. The idea is that maybe they saw themselves as being this bright light in the world. They thought this light in the sky. And there's some suggestion that maybe this is meaning Venus because Venus would be brightest at the dawn. They think they're the light. They think they're the brightest light in the sky. But then comes the sun. We know that even though we see Venus in the night sky and it is bright, what happens when the sun comes out? It goes away completely. That's the idea here. You think you're pretty hot stuff, but when the real sun comes out, when the light of God shines, you will be nothing. God is the one who is in control. We see in verse 22, the conclusion of these are taunting statements by people who have come back into the land, his chosen people. I will rise up against him, the declares of the Lord of Host, and we'll cut off from Babylon's name and remnant, descendant and posterity.

You get the idea that this is going to be a complete, total overthrow. They will not be remembered. They won't have this remnant that will come back. They're going to be completely overthrown. They're not going to have descendants or people who come after them. I noticed verse 23, And I will make it a possession, hedgehog, and pools of water. I will sweep it with broom of destruction, to clergy the Lord of hope. Who is the one who's doing this? It is God. Just as God used people of Babylon to judge the people of Judah, God is going to come judge Babylon in the same way for their cry. This is another difficult passage here in Isaiah. What do you and I do with this? What do we take for application? And once again, I want to encourage us to remember, this shows us again that God is in control. We need to trust His sovereign will. We need to trust His plan. We need to trust that He is the one who is doing His goodwill for the good of His people, that He works all things together for good for those who love Him.

So may we remember this passage and trust in God's sovereign work, not only in our lives, but in the world.