Consider these questions as you dwell in Isaiah 21:1-17:

1. Isaiah describes the weight of delivering messages of judgment, comparing it to the anguish of a woman in labor. How does this imagery emphasize the gravity and difficulty of conveying such messages? What does it reveal about the emotional toll on prophets like Isaiah?

2. The passage speaks of the downfall of Babylon and the shattering of idols. How does this illustrate God's sovereignty over the nations and the futility of human-made gods? What lessons can we draw from this about God's ultimate authority and power?

3. The closing statement emphasizes that the words spoken by God will surely come to pass. How should this truth affect our perspective on obedience and faithfulness to God? In what ways can we actively seek to align our lives with God's will in light of His sure and spoken judgments?

Transcript:

We get another glimpse at just how difficult all this language of judgment is for Isaiah here, don't we? You know, we have been looking at Isaiah and seeing how difficult these passages of judgment are and coming away with just this sense that this is a heavy weight, that this is judgment upon judgment. Now, there has been good news in there, there has been a lot of good things actually, amidst all this judgment, but it is continually heavy. And we see this in verse two when Isaiah says, a stern vision is told to me this is not a good thing, it is a hard thing. And notice what he says, the traitor betrays and the destroyer destroys.

This is more of the same, this is more of this hard judgment. And we see here all that is happening again. God uses these pagan nations to come in and judge other nations. This seems off to us, but this is how God works. God isn't smiting from above with lightning.

He is using these other nations to come in and overtake them. These are difficult things and we have to remember that this isn't as clean as the games perhaps that we played with war when we were kids, where we played with our little green army men and POW POW and they fell over and we were done. Or a game like Axis and Allies, a war board game, nice and clean. Or even modern day video games. You shoot a bad guy in a video game, even if it's from a first person perspective, and the body usually disappears.

And that's not what these invasions at all would be like, right? There would be the smell of death, there would be blood everywhere. There would be just terrible things. Men of all ages slaughtered, probably innocent women and children at points, slaughtered as well. This is ugly stuff.

And so we can see why Isaiah says therefore my loins are filled with anguish. Pangs have seized me like the pangs of a woman in labor. He says this in verse three. This is difficult stuff, but we see that even Babylon, we see this in verse nine. Fallen, fallen is Babylon, fallen is this empire that is huge and is powerful.

It's fallen. And all the carved images of her gods, he is shattered to the ground. In other words, God has caused this to happen. God is saying, Look, I am God. These gods, these things that you've carved with your hands have been shattered.

And O my threshing winter ones, what I have heard from the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, I announced to you, he is saying, look, this is happening, this is judgment. And I'm just the one bringing you these oracles, bringing you these words of judgment. But we see here that these words of judgment are sure. And that's the idea that Isaiah wants us to understand as this chapter closes up, right? And the remainder of the archers of the mighty men of the sons of Qadar will be few.

For the Lord. The God of Israel has spoken. In other words, this is God speaking. This isn't Isaiah's idea. This is God who is speaking.

And it is going to come to pass. It will happen. All of this will take place. All the terrible things that we've talked about, the shattering of idols, which is a good thing. But all of this will come to pass because God has spoken.

So it's important for us to remember that God has spoken to us. And God has spoken that he will, in fact come to judge the living and the dead. And all of the idols, whether it's the ones of old or the modern idols that we have made, will be smashed. And because the Lord, the God of Israel, has spoken, this is sure. And so this is a good reminder for us that we need to make sure that we are following God in obedience, that we are smashing our idols on our own because they will be smashed.

And so may we seek after God. May we seek after him. May we seek his face, that we might be the ones who are found to be faithful to Him. For he is the Lord. He has spoken, and we desire to keep his word.