Chapter 2

2:1-5

2:6-11

2:12-18

2:19-22

Recap

A. Find Out:

1. When will this occur? v.2a

2. What will happen? v.2b,c

3. Why will people come to it? v.3a,b

4. What will go from it? v.3c

5. What will the Lord do? v.4a

6. What will the nations do? v.4b

7. So what call is made? v.5

B. Think:

1. What different designations are given to this location?

2. Why, essentially, will people come there?

3. What effect will that have?

C. Comment:

     This chapter again starts with the reference to this being what Isaiah saw about Jerusalem and Judah. This and 1:1 are the only such references in the book. Whereas chapter 1 was an overview of the state of Judah and Jerusalem, these verses are verses of hope for the “last days”. Of course the apostle Peter identified the church period as the last days (see Acts 2;16,17) but it may also be that there are “last last days” i.e. the end of this period.   Well, what will happen?

     First, there will be a lifting up of Jerusalem (the mountain of God, Zion, where the temple is) and people from all nations will come to it. Second, there they will meet with God and He will teach them and they will return home with His word, His law, in their hearts.

     Finally, the Lord will become a peacemaker between nations and peace will come across nations. In one sense this has all happened with the church being born in Jerusalem as the Spirit of God came down and met with believers and sent them out with the word in their hearts and peace between them. Yet if we compare this with Revelation 20, it seems it may have a wider meaning when all nations will be at peace during a thousand year reign of God and there will be peace across the whole earth.

D. Application:

1. God's promise is hope for the end.

2. That hope will be of Himself in the midst of His people.

Chapter: Isaiah 2

Passage: Isaiah 2:6-11

A. Find Out:    

1. What has the Lord done? v.6a

2. Of what are the people full and what do they do? v.6b,c

3. Of what is the land full? v.7,8

4. So what will happen? v.9

5. Where are they counselled to go and why? v.10

6. What will be the result on that day? v.11

B. Think:

1. What is the charge against the nation here?

2. What is apparently going to happen?

3. With what effect?

C. Comment:

     Turning from the future to the present, the prophet first of all declares that the Lord has left the nation to its own devices with the result that they have been taken over by superstition and occult activity. There is an echo of this sort of thing in Romans 1:24,26 & 28 where we see that God gives up, or removes His restraining hand from godless and wicked people (Rom 1:18). Here now, the Lord has stepped back and let the nation go its own foolish way, so that now they worship idols, gods of other nations, and materialism.

     But that is not all! Having left them, to reveal their own perverse hearts, the Lord also warns that He will come to punish them. A day is coming when He will come with His glory and splendour and they will flee into caves to hide and all their boasting and pride will be brought to nothing. When that happens there will be a great humbling and the high and lofty aspirations of godless men will be brought crashing down and everything will be brought into perspective when the presence of the Lord is revealed.

     In our own times we constantly hear the foolish boastful words of godless men in the media and in politics and in the street. Their words will last for a time - but only a time!

D. Application:  

1. God often lifts off His hand of restraint to reveal foolish hearts.

2. He still holds those people accountable!

Chapter: Isaiah 2 

Passage: Isaiah 2:12-18      

A. Find Out:

1. For who and what has the Lord a day in store? v.12

2. For what sort of things in verses 13 and 14?

3. For what sort of things in verse 15?

4. For what sort of things in verse 16?

5. What will be brought low and humbled? v.17

6. And what will happen? v.18

B. Think:

1. How are men exalted in the things listed in this passage?

2. Why was that wrong?

3. How does that happen today?

C. Comment:

     The people had put their trust in superstition and the occult (v.6) in material prosperity (v.7a) and their own strength (v.7b), so now the Lord says He is going to bring down everything that they have raised up. The trees and the mountains were natural resources they were using wrongly (to build for self-glory and to worship idols on), towers and fortified walls were things of their own making that gave them a sense of self importance and security, and trading ships and royal vessels they used to enrich themselves by foreign trade and make themselves look good in the eyes of others. All these things simply increased their pride and their arrogance and led them to believe that they could live without God, but these are a special people whose very origins depended on God.

     In verse 17 is an echo of verse 11, that arrogant and proud men will be dealt with by God, so that they will be brought down to their true position and God will be seen for who He truly is, the Lord of all. When this happens all idols will go, for only God will be seen as worthy of worship. In the world today there is a similar exalting of things and human achievements, and pride and arrogance prevail and (according to Revelation) God will deal with it similarly.

D. Application:

1. Foolish sin always seeks to exalt man.

2. True wisdom always seeks to exalt God!

Chapter: Isaiah 2

Passage: Isaiah 2:19-22        

A. Find Out:

1. What will men do and why? v.19

2. What will they do with their idols? v.20

3. Where will they go and why? v.21

4. What instruction is given? v.22a

5. Why? v.22b

B. Think:

1. Can you see how this passage is in two parts?

2. What is the start of each part that is almost the same?

3. How is the end of each part different?

C. Comment:

     In this final part of this chapter we find a certain symmetry. At the beginning of it, in verse 19, is an echo of verse 10 and that is repeated in verse 21. It is a warning that men will flee from the false security of their man-made habitations and run to find protection in caves and holes in the ground. The reason for this is the terror created in man by the coming of the Lord in all his splendour. In the latter two references, the reason given is that He will rise and shake the earth. When earthquakes come, people flee from human habitations. So it is that this last part is divided into two, with two almost identical warnings of a coming fear.

      After the first warning is a simple consequence that will occur: men will throw away the idols that they had previously cherished. Now they will realise that they are meaningless, indeed the word here for idols really means “non-entities”, and that is what these man-made objects of worship will be seen to be. But if man had previously relied upon these worthless idols, he had also relied upon his own abilities, and the second warning is followed by an injunction not to trust man because he is just a created being with breath breathed into him by God. Instead, is the implication, trust only in the Creator, God Himself, not in anything less.

D. Application:

1. When God reveals Himself, Fallen Man falls in fear.

2. It is only because of Jesus that we need not be the same.

RECAP - "The Mountain & Day of the Lord" - Isaiah 2

SUMMARY :  

In this second group of 4 studies we have seen :

- the hope of the last days:

  - the nations coming to the Lord in Jerusalem

  - the Lord teaching and judging between them

  - peace coming to the whole world

- the judgement of the present days:

  - an indictment on the state of the nation

  - a threefold warning to flee the coming of the Lord 

  - a twofold statement that pride & arrogance will be brought

     down

  - a listing of the things men rely on that will fall

COMMENT :

     Hope comes before judgement. Although there will come a great time of shaking when the splendour of the Lord will be revealed, its aim will be to bring men to their senses, rid them of their false sense of security and bring them to a place of trusting in God alone. God's purpose in the end times is to bring people into relationship with Him where He can bring peace to the world. That is the hope yet to come.

LESSONS?

1. God's intent is to dwell in our midst.

2. God removes His hand of restraint to reveal hearts of sin.

3. Sin always exalts man, but pride will eventually fall.

4. The glory of God will always bring fear to sinful man.

5. God's intent is for us to trust Him alone.

PRAY :

     Ask the Lord to help you see how these verses apply to the state of the world today. Pray for it.

PART 3 : "The Fall of Human Splendour"

     In this next Part we will see in horrifying detail how the Lord intends to come and judge the sin and folly of Jerusalem's leaders and those who parade their finery as an expression of their pride.  Again a condemnation of sinful mankind.