Isaiah 26:16
The Bible says in Isaiah 26:16-21, “LORD, in
trouble have they visited thee, they poured out a prayer when thy chastening
was upon them. Like as a woman with child, that draweth
near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth
out in her pangs; so have we been in thy sight, O LORD. We have been with
child, we have been in pain, we have as it were brought forth wind; we have not
wrought any deliverance in the earth; neither have the inhabitants of the world
fallen. Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead
body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as
the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. Come, my people, enter
thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were
for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast.
For, behold, the LORD cometh out of his place to
punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall
disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain.” There are
many sources from which suffering can come. Some people cause their own
suffering because of foolish decisions. Other suffering comes as a consequence
to sin. God punishes sin because He is the Judge of the whole earth. God’s
chastisement is something to avoid because of how painful it can be. His
chastisement can be, “like as a woman with child, that draweth
near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth
out in her pangs.” There are two ways to avoid such painful chastisements. The first
way and the surest way to avoid God’s chastisement is
to do the right thing. Do right until the stars fall. The Bible says about
Jesus in Psalms 45:7, “Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness: therefore God, thy God, hath anointed
thee with the oil of
gladness above thy fellows.”
The second way to avoid God’s chastisement is to truly repent and to
quickly confess your sins wherever you have sinned. It says in First
Corinthians 11:31-32, “For if we would
judge ourselves, we should not be judged.
But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be
condemned with the world.”
Perhaps the greatest judgment that the
Lord has brought upon the earth to this point in time is the existence of
death. Death is all around us. Everything and everyone dies sooner of later. Of
course, we know why death exists. Death exists because of God’s judgment that
came because of what happened in the Garden of Eden. The Bible says in Genesis
2:16-7, “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of
every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But
of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt
not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest
thereof thou shalt surely die.”
Death is a terrible thing. Death takes everything down with it: the rich and
the poor alike. Even if you live a wonderful life, enjoying every success and
every benefit that this world can offer, when you die you lose it all. The Bible says in First
Corinthians 55-56, “O death, where is thy
sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the
strength of sin is the law.”
But there is an answer to the sting of
death and to the victory of the grave over life. The answer is the resurrection
from the dead: life after death. The Bible says in First Corinthians 15:57, “But thanks be to God, which giveth us the
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” By the Holy Spirit
Isaiah gave a very clear prophesy of the resurrection from the dead hundreds of
years before Christ. It says in Isaiah 26:19, “Thy
dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall
they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of
herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.”
In addition to the resurrection Isaiah
chapter 26 also presents a view of the Great Tribulation. It says in Isaiah
26:20-21, “Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy
doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the
indignation be overpast. For, behold,
the LORD cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for
their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more
cover her slain.” The “indignation” refers to God’s anger against sin. Thankfully,
God is very patient and very merciful, but eventually He must punish sin.
Sometimes He waits hundreds of years, but eventually judgment must come to
those who refuse to believe and who refuse to repent. One interesting point
made in Isaiah chapter 26 is that even when the wrath of God does come, it is
short-lived. The time of judgment is called “a little moment.” Seven years
of tribulation is not very long compared to the total length of human existence
upon the earth. It is important to remember once again that when we talk about
the judgment of God, we are talking about the judgment that Jesus will bring
upon the earth. Jesus came the first time to save all who would believe, but
Jesus will come the second time to judge all those who will not believe.
Speaking of Jesus and the judgment that He will bring, the Bible says in
Revelation 19:11-16, “And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that
sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge
and make war. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many
crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he
himself. And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in
blood: and his name is called The Word of God. And the armies which were in
heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.
And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with
it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and
he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath
of Almighty God. And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written,
KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.”
The Bible says in Isaiah 27:1-6, “In that day
the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing
serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that
is in the sea. In that day sing ye unto her, A
vineyard of red wine. I the LORD do keep it; I will
water it every moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day. Fury is
not in me: who would set the briers and thorns against me in battle? I would go
through them, I would burn them together. Or let him take hold of my strength,
that he may make peace with me; and he shall make peace with me. He shall cause
them that come of Jacob to take root:
Three things are told to us about
Satan that are very revealing. He is “piercing,” he is “crooked,” and he is “in the sea.” In the
Bible the “sea” is sometimes symbolic of the peoples of the earth. For example,
the Bible says in Revelation 17:1, “And there came one of the seven
angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come
hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the
great whore that sitteth upon many waters.”
The last phrase of Revelation 17:1 is explained in Revelation 17:15 that says,
“And he saith unto
me, The waters which thou sawest,
where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and
multitudes, and nations, and tongues.” The
devil lives among the peoples of the earth. He hates them. He has departed from
the true ways of God in every sense. The devil is constantly causing tortuous
pain among people wherever he can. Whenever he can he is a destroyer of those
created in God’s image. Of course, it started in the Garden of Eden when Satan
tempted Adam and Eve and caused death to enter into the world. It continued
outside of the Garden of Eden when the first child born into the world lost his
potential to be something for God and became a murderer.
But God has always had a plan to bring
judgment upon Satan, and to give him his reward for the death and suffering
that he has caused the entire human race. The plan of God concerning the
judgment on Satan was first announced to Satan himself in Genesis 3:15. God said,
“And
I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her
seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise
his heel.” The one who will “bruise” the head of Satan is the “seed” of the woman. We know from other revelation in the Word
of God that the “seed” is Christ.
God keeps His promises in His own time
and in His own way. God made a promise in the Garden of Eden concerning
judgment upon Satan. That promise will be kept when Jesus returns. God has also
made other promises, and those promises will also be kept. God made promises to
Abraham about the nation of
The Bible says in Isaiah 27:7-13, “Hath he
smitten him, as he smote those that smote him? or is
he slain according to the slaughter of them that are slain by him? In measure,
when it shooteth forth, thou wilt debate with it: he stayeth his rough wind in the day of the east wind. By this
therefore shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged; and this is all the fruit to
take away his sin; when he maketh all the stones of
the altar as chalkstones that are beaten in sunder, the groves and images shall
not stand up. Yet the defenced city shall be
desolate, and the habitation forsaken, and left like a wilderness: there shall
the calf feed, and there shall he lie down, and consume the branches thereof.
When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off: the women come,
and set them on fire: for it is a people of no
understanding: therefore he that made them will not have mercy on them, and he
that formed them will shew them no favour. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the
LORD shall beat off from the channel of the river unto the stream of Egypt, and
ye shall be gathered one by one, O ye children of Israel. And it shall come to
pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be blown, and
they shall come which were ready to perish in the
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Copyright; 2008 by Charles
F. (Rick) Creech
All Rights Reserved