Written by: Laurence Gamlen - CPAS

Isaiah 7 v 10-11
Then the LORD spoke to Ahaz again, saying, “Ask for a sign from the LORD your God to prove to yourself that these things are true. It may be a sign from as deep as the place of the dead or as high as the heavens.”

Notes
Do you ever find yourself asking God for a sign to tell you what you should or shouldn’t be doing about a specific situation? I have to admit that I can get very childish about signs sometimes. If I am thinking about paying someone a visit, then an example might be something like, “God will want me to visit if the next set of traffic lights are green for go.” The trouble is that I wonder if the traffic lights had been fixed by God, or whether it was just by coincidence that they somehow stayed green as I approached.

King Ahaz of Judah was a young man in a difficult situation. His kingdom was being invaded, and he was forced to make a difficult choice. On the one hand, he could accept defeat, or make an appeal for help from the neighbours. Isaiah comes with a simple and clear message from God: “Trust in God, be quiet, and keep calm” (Isaiah 7:4). Faith in God was the answer, not to take on battles that he stood no chance of winning. But Ahaz was not listening to God.

Are you in a tight spot right now? God’s message remains the same: “Trust me, be quiet and keep calm.” Are you listening?

Isaiah 7 v 12-13
But Ahaz said, “I will not ask for a sign or test the LORD.”
Then Isaiah said, “Ahaz, descendant of David, listen carefully! Isn’t it bad enough that you wear out the patience of people? Do you also have to wear out the patience of my God?”

Notes
I remember once arguing with a waitress who was convinced that the meal that she had just brought over looked like the picture of the meal shown in the menu. From where I was sat, the two looked very different. She was as convinced of her point of view as I was of mine. Thankfully, the head waiter came along and agreed with me!

Who tries your patience? Does standing toe to toe with someone, pointing a finger with menace, trying to convince them that what you have to say is worth listening to, sound familiar? I get the impression that Isaiah was nearing his wits’ end with Ahaz. Here was one man who was not listening. Isaiah continued to talk about having faith in God, and Ahaz continued to put his trust in other people to help him out. He probably looked on his conversation with Isaiah as a waste of time.

Do you ever find yourself in a position where you think you are wasting your time trying to convince someone about something? Isaiah must have taken God’s message to Ahaz, and applied it to himself, and saved his breath: “Trust me, be quiet and keep calm.”

When you next feel that you are not being listened to, take on board God’s message, he’ll be listening, and longs to hear from you.

Isaiah 7 v 14-15
“The Lord himself will give you a sign: the virgin will be pregnant. She will have a son, and she will name him Immanuel. He will be eating milk curds and honey when he learns to reject what is evil and to choose what is good.”

Notes
Does God sometimes feel a million miles away from you? Any attempts at praying just seem to bounce off the ceiling. The Bible seems like a closed book, and other Christians always seem to have got a better deal than you! When you feel like that, it can be only a short step to thinking that God has no concern for you. In these verses, Isaiah the prophet is keen to reassure King Ahaz that despite how it looks, God has a plan, and asks only for the king to trust God for his deliverance. Still Ahaz remains unconvinced, despite what Isaiah says.

In the Old Testament, the words of the prophets and signs from God went together. Both demonstrated the reality of God’s presence and concern for his people. The sign was a visual aid to describe or confirm the truth about what the prophets were saying about God. The history of Israel is littered with signs that suggest God was actually interested in them and in their lives. This is not the action of an aloof God who stands miles away from us. No, this is a God who wants to get stuck in with all that concerns us.

There is of course a massive clue in the name of this particular sign, Immanuel, literally “God with us.” Thank God for the signs of his work in your life.

Isaiah 7 v 16-17
“You are afraid of the kings of Israel and Aram now. But before the child learns to choose good and reject evil, the lands of Israel and Aram will be empty. The LORD will bring troubled times to you, your people and to the people of your father’s family. They will be worse than anything that has happened since Israel separated from Judah. The LORD will bring the king of Assyria to fight against you.”

Notes
How do you respond to bad news? There are two usual ways of dealing with it: one is to stand and fight, the other is to run away. King Ahaz was all for standing and fighting. I think I would have packed my bags by now. This was not the most cheerful message to hear, I’m sure you will agree. It’s one thing to meet a pessimist, but in these verses, Isaiah is laying on the bad news by the spade full. Isaiah had become a prophet of doom to King Ahaz. The Assyrians would invade, leaving the place as a desert wilderness.

But still, there is a reference to that child, the one called Immanuel, the one that would signal God’s presence among his people. For those who had eyes to see and ears that hear, they would find God himself there with them within the emptiness.

When you get the prophet of doom banging on your door, it can be very hard to hear the voice of God, or to sense the hand of God in what is going on. When you are too busy thinking about just getting by when the going is getting really tough, and your world seems to be very empty, try to keep half an eye and half an ear open for the sign of the Son being with you in the middle of it all. Ask God to keep you open to seeing the signs.

Isaiah 7 v 18-20
“At that time the LORD will whistle for the Egyptians, and they will come like flies from Egypt’s faraway streams. He will call for the Assyrians, and they will come like bees. These enemies will camp in the deep ravines and in the cliffs, by the thorn-bushes and watering holes. The Lord will hire Assyria and use it like a razor to punish Judah. It will be as if the Lord is shaving the hair from Judah’s head and legs and removing Judah’s beard.”

Notes
Judah’s days were numbered. Isaiah continued to tell the King of Judah, the young and faithless Ahaz, that nothing could be done to prevent his kingdom being laid waste by invaders from Egypt and Assyria. Ahaz had already heard from the prophet that the only way out of this mess was to trust God, advice that the king decided not to take. Judah found herself under God’s just judgement. 

I was doing a bit of gardening the other day. I spent ages cutting back a massive climbing plant that had sneaked up between the wall and the gutter, and risked pulling the guttering away. I needed to do something to pull it back into some sort of shape, and that meant hacking most of it away. 

The point I’m making is that God wants to do a similar thing in our lives too. The cutting away of all the rubbish gives opportunity for fresh growth in the right direction, and for the Christian that means growing back towards God. Out of the mess that was Judah, there would be a new beginning. As we can see from previous readings from Isaiah chapter seven, there was a sign from God demonstrating his presence in the form of a child called Immanuel. He was there, even in the middle of the mess.

Take some time now to thank God for reaching out towards us.

Isaiah 7 v 21-23
“At that time a person will be able to keep only one young cow and two sheep alive. There will be only enough milk for that person to eat milk curds. All who remain in the land will go back to eating just milk curds and honey. In this land there are now vineyards that have 1,000 grapevines, which are worth about 1,000 pieces of silver. But these fields will become full of weeds and thorns.”

Notes
Isaiah continued to paint a picture of what life in Judah would be like after the imminent Assyrian invasion. These verses are part of a conversation that Isaiah the prophet had with the King of Judah, Ahaz. Despite Isaiah’s warnings, the king remained unmoved and stubborn. He refused to listen to the prophet's wisdom. 

Coming up against a stubborn person can be hard work, especially if we have a tendency towards stubbornness too! I find that this brings out the worst in me, and I tend to want to dig my heels in even more and give no ground. I think I can identify with Ahaz, because sometimes I know that it can be hard for God to get a message through to me.

A good prayer for me would be Samuel's response to God when God wanted to use him in his service: "Speak, Lord … I am listening" (1 Samuel 3:10). Will you join me in praying that today?

Isaiah 7 v 24-25
“The land will become wild and useful only as a hunting ground. People once worked and grew food on these hills, but at that time people will not go there, because the land will be filled with weeds and thorns. Only sheep and cattle will go to those places.”

Notes
Isaiah continued to warn young King Ahaz of what would become of his kingdom. It was going to become a forsaken place, and although once it had been a fertile and profitable place to grow grapes for wine, those days were to be in the past. The place was to become abandoned, a bit of a no-go area to everybody and everything, except for the sheep and the cattle (but then, they can survive practically anywhere).

When I was very young, I used to live in a part of a big house, out in the middle of nowhere. I remember that it was a dark and damp place to live, but the garden was just right for a young boy growing up with his brother. I visited that house some thirty years later; it had been reduced to a pile of rubble, and a motorway thundered past only a few metres away. There was no sign of how it was all those years ago.

When we experience the bad times, it can be so easy to look back to how things were, and to despair. I believe that God asks us to look forward instead, as he prepares to do a new thing within us. The hopelessness of a situation can give way to hopefulness as we allow God to work within our lives. He has a plan for you and for me, and he promises to see that plan through.

Why not take a moment now to thank him for the plan that he has for you, and for your future with him?


word-on-the-web uses the Scripture text taken from the Youth Bible, New Century Version (Anglicised Edition) copyright 1993 by Word Publishing Milton Keynes