Title: Grace of God / Isaiah 28:1-29
Contents Bible Reading: 28:1-29
Subject: God's Grace
The abundance we enjoy is not for our own comfort and pleasure, but for serving God. The region of Ephraim in the text was like a city built on the top of the valley like a glorious coffin. But because they abused their abundance, they were seen as ‘fading flowers’ in the eyes of God and in the eyes of the prophets.
1. I was proud.
Wealth and abundance make people proud. Pride is an unwillingness to acknowledge God. He is a disbeliever who forgets God and does not acknowledge any existence other than himself.
2. I was drunk on the world.
Alcohol makes people foolish (Proverbs 20:1). It exaggerates and defiles oneself (Genesis 9:21, Hab 2:15). Alcohol induces sensuality, which leads to moral and ethical depravity. The same is true of drunkenness and pleasure and luxury. Now is the time for believers to wake up and pray.
3. The saint's choice - The saint always does what he does for himself.
Two paths to choose
(1) Path of Suffering - There is a path of suffering that requires constant awareness and vigilance that abandons the compromise with reality for the sake of righteousness, which everyone hates to go.
(2) Path of Compromise - A path that leads to complacency and self-indulgence by compromising with reality appropriately in the religious life
4. The religious leaders of Judah mocked the prophet. (9-10)
They ridiculed the message for being childish and like nonsensical nagging. Because of their pride and debauchery. content of ridicule
1) It was despised as repeated nagging.
2) I hated the lack of consistency.
3) I was ridiculed for lack of sophistication.
5. Learn the wisdom of farmers (23-25) - God's people must come with wisdom in their work.
1) Farmers work hard. - You must learn the heart of a farmer. 126:5-6) The sower with tears devotes his whole life. There is no neglect. You must learn to be diligent - you don't know how to craft. Trying to get more work done in the allotted time.
2) The farmer works with a distant view. - I'm not in a hurry. You have to learn to be prepared.
It is said in Etmal that ‘one who prepares cannot overcome’.
3) The farmer works on the basis of knowing everything. -Because you know it broadly and deeply.
You have to learn to work in a balanced way. If there is no balance in our religious life, we cannot stand properly, let alone growth.