To pose a question that was heavily on His mind,
The Lord appeared in a vision, to a man named Isaiah.
He asked, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?’ 1
How would you answer such a question from The Divine??
About the unspoken task, Isaiah had an idea.
Thus, details of the task they didn’t even discuss.
So, without further ado, he answered, ‘Here am I! Send me.’
The assignment was to make his fellow Judeans, 2
Dull of heart, with heavy eyes and ears shut,
Lest they come to understand, and from pending judgments be free.
For such an odd task, what might have been The Lord’s reason?
Coming from Him, that’s a strange caveat!
This was The Lord’s call for Isaiah to become a prophet.
Prophets should open hearts, eyes and ears, spiritually!
So how on Earth would he accomplish this task, au contraire?
By faith, he understood; then The Lord revealed His plan, tacit.
He understood The Lord was speaking pejoratively,
About Judeans’ sinful and idolatrous affaires. 3
Isaiah’s job was to preach The Lord’s Truth, full and clear,
Because that’s what The Lord requires His prophets to do,
Calling out sins, and that a post-judgment remnant would be saved.
Judeans were so tired of hearing ‘Truth’ so severe!
They’d killed prophets, and put ‘Truth’ in their …mirror, rear view!
When ‘in a fix’, they called on The Lord, and for a while, behaved.
Thus, most would just reject what Isaiah would have to say,
In doing so, they didn’t foresee judgments that on them would swell.
Most would be killed, and a remnant would be enslaved.
Some would get a taste of their ‘ancestors Egyptian days’,
Living to learn what happens when against The Lord we rebel,
With lifestyles that He always regards as …depraved.
Thus, Isaiah embraced his tough assignment,
And preached all the Truth The Lord had revealed to him.
He soon became a TOP NOTCH prophet, unrelenting,
With deep prophetic insights that were strident.
In the end, he was killed in a manner so grim,
Sawn in two (!) by a wicked king, later repenting! 4
Preaching The Lord’s Truth is among the greatest of assignments.
It attracts His enemies’ most ardent resistance!
They work to ensure folks turn their backs and walk away,
From The Lord’s righteous Truth, to all kinds of sinful defilements.
Folks won’t foresee their judgments because of ignorance,
Since most will refuse to hear what The Lord has to say.
And today…
All the world is in the grip of this ‘Truth Rejection’ effect’,
Unable to perceive the coming judgment tsunami,
Since they don’t regard anything as His works,
And dots between operations of His hands, they don’t connect. 5
They rely on science to explain things, physically,
Hey! Science has no ‘spiritual frameworks’!
To this earthly life, there are two broad dimensions:
Physical and spiritual. On both we need to rely.
Relying only on the first, and ignoring the second,
Is what folks did in Isaiah’s dispensation.
Since The Lord won't change, when to our lives their errors we apply, 6
Don’t be shocked when, (select your preferred ending)
…by The Lord’s judgments, we are bludgeoned, or
…on us, The Lord’s judgments are loosened, or
…to His harsh judgments, we are beckoned, or
…in His eyes, to Judeans, we’re likened, or
…in us, The Lord sees Judeans’ legend.
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1 See: Isaiah 6
2 Residents of ancient Jerusalem and the Jewish nation of Judah
3 The Lord had previously determined to send very harsh judgments on Judah, and especially Jerusalem, but He apparently needed time to arrange some details of the promised Babylonian invasion. Meanwhile, He authorized Isaiah to continue to warn people, knowing only a very few would listen and believe. Across the Bible’s Old Testament, this pattern is repeated: many calls to righteous living were given, but unheeded; prophets were ignored, some slaughtered, even as more were sent; until suddenly, extremely harsh judgments arrived, and only a small remnant of the peoples were protected. Ponder this: The Lord is activating this SAME PATTERN in our day! The only differences are He's applying it worldwide, and preachers are not slaughtered in our day. Caveat~
4 See: Isaiah (Wikipedia)
5 See: Isaiah 5:11-30
6 See: Malachi 3:6