Journal Is 5-6 (all references are from the ESV; changes in punctuation are mine)
Scripture: “They have lyre and harp, tambourine and flute and wine at their feasts, but they do not regard the deeds of the LORD or see the work of his hands.
Therefore, my people go into exile for lack of knowledge, their honored men go hungry, and their multitude (are) parched with thirst.” Is 5:12-13
“Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and shrewd in their own sight!” Is 5:21
Observation: Think that God doesn’t have an opinion about growing in the knowledge of Him? He is clear: Think again!
Analysis: I think it is clear there is a hierarchy of what God wants us to put effort in. Before anything else it is: Know Him. Then it is: Grow in Him. Then it is Grow in the Knowledge of Him. Then, maybe, for #4 it is “declare the deeds of the Lord, how He provided for our Redemption.”
Isaiah is prophesying to Israel, God’s chosen people. The analog to Israel is the Christian church, you and me. Surrendering to Jesus is only opening the door; we are called, like CS Lewis says in the Chronicles of Narnia, “Further up and further in.”
We can consider ourselves so shrewd, so wise, so smart with so little knowledge. I can forget to regard the works of HIS hands and, even when I start to see them, I can think so little of them because “the sky is always that color, so what? The tides move in and out because of the moon in its place. Celestial dynamics at work.” And so forth.
Because I don’t see and ponder; I don’t read and study and take advantage of His Instruments of Grace lovingly given us; I don’t celebrate with gratefulness what He has done, is doing, and will do by His promises—I grow stale and stagnant. I become a one trick pony, growing old but never growing.
At the beginning of Chapter 5 in Isaiah, he prophetically talks about the vineyard and its failure, not living up to the promise the Beloved prepared for it. All it produced was “wild grapes.”
That can be me.
Check out Luke 20. Jesus is paraphrasing Isaiah 5.
Prayer: Astonishing that You parked in Isaiah during your three-year ministry. I never saw that before. What else are you graciously going to reveal?
Keep me from being a one trick pony, or really a donkey.
AMEN
Rick Sutton
PS: Bet you thought I was going to Is 6. Gotcha!