So, we get the conclusion here of this story of the forces of Sennacherib threatening Jerusalem. We saw that they were coming in and making these claims against God saying, Hey, all the gods of the other people, they were prayed to, and those cities fell. The same thing is going to happen to yours, so just give in. Well, we saw that Hezekiah went to Isaiah, and he asked him for help. They went with sackcloth and ashes. They were truly wanting the help of God. The reply of the prophet, Isaiah here is very stern. In verse 23 here we say, Whom have you mocked and reviled?

So, this story continues, and it's an interesting one, isn't it? We had this Rabshakeh come and deliver this message. And basically, it was making a mockery of God. It was equating him to all the false idols of the other nations because this king of Assyria is saying, Hey, they thought their gods were going to save them. You're going to end up the same. Your God is not going to be able to save you. And so we hear, as we come to chapter 37, that King Hezakiah heard all this. And what did he do? He goes into a mourning mode. He tears his clothes. He covers himself with sack cloth, and he went to the house of the Lord. This is a sign of submission.

And so, as we come to Chapter 36, we see this narrative telling us basically what Isaiah has been prophesying has come to pass. Remember, they were going to trust in the forces, the horses, the armies of Egypt, but it hasn't now done them any good because here is the King of Assyria. There was no protection. Even the forces of Egypt couldn't hold back this Sennacherib, King of Assyria. We see that this is understood here as this messenger comes. We see in verse 6, Behold, you are trusting in Egypt that broken reed of a staff, which will pierce the hand of any man who leans on it, such as Pharaoh, King of Egypt, to all who trust in him. In other words, has been able to help you, and he's going to turn us back on you, is basically what he's saying.

As we come to chapter 35, we get some imagery of joy and of happiness. It's really a contrast to what we saw in the last chapter and what we have seen leading up to this, all this language of judgment. Now we see the people of God rejoicing in the salvation of the Lord. There is so much in here that we are familiar with, and we'll see that as we go along. But we have to remember the last chapter. As always, context is important. Remember in the last chapter, we read about this land that was going to be made a desolation. Remember, there would be nothing but birds there, and really there wasn't going to be anything growing.

This word of judgment we have read today acknowledges deeply who is really in control. There are those who set themselves up against God. We see this in the first verse, Are you destroyed or who yourself have not been destroyed? You traitor whom none has betrayed. These are the ones who are in opposition to God. These are the ones who have come in and done these terrible things to the people of Israel and of Judah, but they now understand who they need to call out to.

This word of judgment we have read today acknowledges deeply who is really in control. There are those who set themselves up against God. We see this in the first verse, Are you destroyed or who yourself have not been destroyed? You traitor whom none has betrayed. These are the ones who are in opposition to God. These are the ones who have come in and done these terrible things to the people of Israel and of Judah, but they now understand who they need to call out to.

As we continue through the prophetic words of Isaiah and the story that is being told here, we come to a passage that I think is maybe one of the most convicting ones that we have come to. I think the greatest temptation for us, while we are guilty of idolatry, don't get me wrong, as I've mentioned many times, just because we don't craft a wood, images, and bow down before them, doesn't mean we're not idolatrous. We struggle with this. This is a real thing for us. But I think what we see here is truly a message that resonates with us, isn't it? This idea of complacency.

I've got to say, that was a good job out of my tongue to get tied up on the words, the tongue of the stammerers. That was rather humorous. I thought about re-recording it and editing that out, but that's too good not to share with you. I hope you get a kick out of my stumbling over tongue of the stammerers. Anyway, here we are in verses 1-8 of chapter 32, and it is a little bit different here, isn't it? We do not have the strong words of judgment. There is definitely this sense of the righteousness of God and those who are opposed to Him, but it's not quite the strong language that we have been used to. Instead, we have a prophetic word of a King that will reign in righteousness.

What we see here in Isaiah 31 is a return to this idea that the people of Israel are going down to Egypt to find safety and to find strength. They're putting their hope in men. They're putting their hope in chariots and horses and armies instead of trusting in God, the one who has declared that he is in covenant with them, that has proven himself to be faithful to his people. Remember, these people who are doing this, they know their history. They know that God has had their back and they're going to Egypt, the place that they were leaving from.

We might come to this and see the heading that the ESV puts on this, The Lord is gracious, and think that maybe we wouldn't have very much judgment language here. But we have been reading the Book of Isaiah, have we not? And we have seen this connection between the judgment of God and the grace of God. Now, this only makes sense to us, but it's easy for us to often separate the two right?

As the word of the Lord comes to Isaiah and God speaks, he lays it all on the line here, doesn't he? Ah, stubborn children. Now, that's an imagery that we can easily understand, can't we? Now, we might think of a child that we know that is particularly stubborn or was when they were younger, but I don't think we need any specifics here. We know what a stubborn child looks like. We know that stature, that way that they stand when they're being stubborn. They just are being that way

As we continue through the Book of Isaiah, we once again see language of judgment, but we also see this idea of the faithfulness of God. We see that things are so bad in Judah, things are so bad in Jerusalem that they don't even understand what is happening. We see here in verse 9, Estonish yourselves and be astonished, blind yourselves and be blind, be drunk, but not with wine. Stagger, but not with strong drink. In other words, they don't get it.

Again, we get an idea that the people are hearing these judgments from the Lord through the mouth of the prophet, Isaiah, but they've decided what differences does it make. Notice what it says here. Hear the word of the Lord, you scoffers, who rule this people in Jerusalem. They're like, God isn't going to do anything to us. We're fine here. We've seen how God has judged other places, and that's not going to happen to us.

We are back to words of judgment. Today, we once again see that this judgment is on Ephraim and Jerusalem. These judgments are to the people of God. These are not to outside people. And in fact, as we get to the end of this section that we've read today, we're actually going to see that God is once again going to use people from outside the Hebrew group of people in a way to judge them. But we see here that the problem is pride, don't we?

As we come to Isaiah 27, we see a lot more good news than words of judgment. But this all is happening, this God driving out the evil and restoring his people is in view of the idea of judgment, is of him bringing his people back to himself of doing this discipline for the purpose of restoring his people. But we start out here with the idea that God is going to overthrow evil. Notice in verse 1, in that day, the Lord, with his hard and great and strong sword, will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent.

As we come to chapter 26 today, it starts out with a little bit of a feeling that maybe this isn't going to be so much about judgment. Maybe it'll be a little bit more positive here than things that we have seen. But then we get into it. And even though the language for us, our modern mindset, I think, reads this a little bit differently as we come to it. And then we see that this is pretty harsh judgment language as well. I'll explain what I mean. We see verse two, Open the gates that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in. You keep him in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on you because he trusts in you, trust in the Lord forever.

As we have been looking at all of these prophecies of judgment in the Book of Isaiah, I've been pointing out that this is a good reminder for us that God judges evil, that God has something greater going on, that He is holy, that He is just, and that he is in control. Here we see that, don't we? Because all of this judgment is over all the nations of all these places. It means that God has power over all things and that he is doing something here. He is doing something to the greater good for the greater bringing of glory to Himself. We see that here God is going to swallow up death forever.