Day 197, July 16: Bible reading & prayer
Isaiah 13-17 (chronological); Psalms 19-21, Acts 19:21-41 (OT/NT)
We are in the era of the kings of Judah and the kings of Israel, as recounted in 1 & 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles. Yesterday, we read about Ahaz, king of Judah, who walked in evil, worshiping all variety of “gods” except the Lord and burning “his sons in fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had driven out before the sons of Israel.” We also read about the last king of Israel, Hoshea, under whom the nation was exiled to Assyria, “because the sons of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God.” The Lord had warned “Israel and Judah through all His prophets and every seer….However, they did not listen, but stiffened their neck like their fathers, who did not believe in the LORD their God.” Today, we return to one of those prophets, Isaiah, when he prophesies regarding the fate of Babylon, Assyria, Philistia, Moab, and Damascus.
God often used the enemies of Israel to punish them, but He also did not spare these enemies from just punishment either, which is the theme in Isaiah today. Sometimes single prophecies can refer to more than one event, such as a repetitive “day of the Lord” when He judges His enemies. The prophecy regarding the king of Babylon that we read today sounds like it could describe Satan as well.
Reminder of historical background: as a consequence for Solomon’s disobedience, ten tribes were torn from the Kingdom of Judah, under Solomon’s son Rehoboam, and given to Jeroboam, to form the Kingdom of Israel. Judah’s kings, influenced by the legacy of faithful David, vary between good and evil. Israel’s kings, influenced by the legacy of rebellious Jeroboam, go from bad to worse. The books of the Kings cover both kingdoms, while the Chronicles tend to focus on the kingdom of Judah.
An overview of our yearly Bible reading plan, with all summaries so far, can be found here. My appeal for the resolution to read your Bibles is here.
July 16 chronological reading: Isaiah 13-17
Isaiah 13
v1-5 “The oracle concerning Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw.
Lift up a standard on the bare hill,
Raise your voice to them,
Wave the hand that they may enter the doors of the nobles.
I have commanded My consecrated ones,
I have even called My mighty warriors,
My proudly exulting ones,
To execute My anger.
A sound of tumult on the mountains,
Like that of many people!
A sound of the uproar of kingdoms,
Of nations gathered together!
The LORD of hosts is mustering the army for battle.
They are coming from a far country,
From the farthest horizons,
The LORD and His instruments of indignation,
To destroy the whole land.
v6-8 “Wail, for the day of the LORD is near!
It will come as destruction from the Almighty.
Therefore all hands will fall limp,
And every man’s heart will melt.
They will be terrified,
Pains and anguish will take hold of them;
They will writhe like a woman in labor,
They will look at one another in astonishment,
Their faces aflame.
v9-16 “Behold, the day of the LORD is coming,
Cruel, with fury and burning anger,
To make the land a desolation;
And He will exterminate its sinners from it.
For the stars of heaven and their constellations
Will not flash forth their light;
The sun will be dark when it rises
And the moon will not shed its light.
Thus I will punish the world for its evil
And the wicked for their iniquity;
I will also put an end to the arrogance of the proud
And abase the haughtiness of the ruthless.
I will make mortal man scarcer than pure gold
And mankind than the gold of Ophir.
Therefore I will make the heavens tremble,
And the earth will be shaken from its place
At the fury of the LORD of hosts
In the day of His burning anger.
And it will be that like a hunted gazelle,
Or like sheep with none to gather them,
They will each turn to his own people,
And each one flee to his own land.
Anyone who is found will be thrust through,
And anyone who is captured will fall by the sword.
Their little ones also will be dashed to pieces
Before their eyes;
Their houses will be plundered
And their wives ravished.
v17-22 “Behold, I am going to stir up the Medes against them,
Who will not value silver or take pleasure in gold.
And their bows will mow down the young men,
They will not even have compassion on the fruit of the womb,
Nor will their eye pity children.
And Babylon, the beauty of kingdoms, the glory of the Chaldeans’ pride,
Will be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.
It will never be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation;
Nor will the Arab pitch his tent there,
Nor will shepherds make their flocks lie down there.
But desert creatures will lie down there,
And their houses will be full of owls;
Ostriches also will live there, and shaggy goats will frolic there.
Hyenas will howl in their fortified towers
And jackals in their luxurious palaces.
Her fateful time also will soon come
And her days will not be prolonged.”
Isaiah 14
v1-2 “When the LORD will have compassion on Jacob and again choose Israel, and settle them in their own land, then strangers will join them and attach themselves to the house of Jacob. The peoples will take them along and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess them as an inheritance in the land of the LORD as male servants and female servants; and they will take their captors captive and will rule over their oppressors.
v3-11 “And it will be in the day when the LORD gives you rest from your pain and turmoil and harsh service in which you have been enslaved, that you will take up this taunt against the king of Babylon, and say,
‘How the oppressor has ceased,
And how fury has ceased!
The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked,
The scepter of rulers
Which used to strike the peoples in fury with unceasing strokes,
Which subdued the nations in anger with unrestrained persecution.
The whole earth is at rest and is quiet;
They break forth into shouts of joy.
Even the cypress trees rejoice over you, and the cedars of Lebanon, saying,
“Since you were laid low, no tree cutter comes up against us.”
Sheol from beneath is excited over you to meet you when you come;
It arouses for you the spirits of the dead, all the leaders of the earth;
It raises all the kings of the nations from their thrones.
They will all respond and say to you,
“Even you have been made weak as we,
You have become like us.
Your pomp and the music of your harps
Have been brought down to Sheol;
Maggots are spread out as your bed beneath you
And worms are your covering.”
v12-21 ‘How you have fallen from heaven,
O star of the morning, son of the dawn!
You have been cut down to the earth,
You who have weakened the nations!
But you said in your heart,
“I will ascend to heaven;
I will raise my throne above the stars of God,
And I will sit on the mount of assembly
In the recesses of the north.
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.”
Nevertheless you will be thrust down to Sheol,
To the recesses of the pit.
Those who see you will gaze at you,
They will ponder over you, saying,
“Is this the man who made the earth tremble,
Who shook kingdoms,
Who made the world like a wilderness
And overthrew its cities,
Who did not allow his prisoners to go home?”
All the kings of the nations lie in glory,
Each in his own tomb.
But you have been cast out of your tomb
Like a rejected branch,
Clothed with the slain who are pierced with a sword,
Who go down to the stones of the pit
Like a trampled corpse.
You will not be united with them in burial,
Because you have ruined your country,
You have slain your people.
May the offspring of evildoers not be mentioned forever.
Prepare for his sons a place of slaughter
Because of the iniquity of their fathers.
They must not arise and take possession of the earth
And fill the face of the world with cities.’
v22-23 ‘I will rise up against them,’ declares the LORD of hosts, ‘and will cut off from Babylon name and survivors, offspring and posterity,’ declares the LORD. ‘I will also make it a possession for the hedgehog and swamps of water, and I will sweep it with the broom of destruction,’ declares the LORD of hosts.
v24-27 “The LORD of hosts has sworn saying, ‘Surely, just as I have intended so it has happened, and just as I have planned so it will stand, to break Assyria in My land, and I will trample him on My mountains. Then his yoke will be removed from them and his burden removed from their shoulder. This is the plan devised against the whole earth; and this is the hand that is stretched out against all the nations. For the LORD of hosts has planned, and who can frustrate it? And as for His stretched-out hand, who can turn it back?’
v28 “In the year that King Ahaz died this oracle came:
v29-31 ‘Do not rejoice, O Philistia, all of you,
Because the rod that struck you is broken;
For from the serpent’s root a viper will come out,
And its fruit will be a flying serpent.
Those who are most helpless will eat,
And the needy will lie down in security;
I will destroy your root with famine,
And it will kill off your survivors.
Wail, O gate; cry, O city;
Melt away, O Philistia, all of you;
For smoke comes from the north,
And there is no straggler in his ranks.
v32 ‘How then will one answer the messengers of the nation?
That the LORD has founded Zion,
And the afflicted of His people will seek refuge in it.’”
Isaiah 15
v1-9 “The oracle concerning Moab.
Surely in a night Ar of Moab is devastated and ruined;
Surely in a night Kir of Moab is devastated and ruined.
They have gone up to the temple and to Dibon, even to the high places to weep.
Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba;
Everyone’s head is bald and every beard is cut off.
In their streets they have girded themselves with sackcloth;
On their housetops and in their squares
Everyone is wailing, dissolved in tears.
Heshbon and Elealeh also cry out,
Their voice is heard all the way to Jahaz;
Therefore the armed men of Moab cry aloud;
His soul trembles within him.
My heart cries out for Moab;
His fugitives are as far as Zoar and Eglath-shelishiyah,
For they go up the ascent of Luhith weeping;
Surely on the road to Horonaim they raise a cry of distress over their ruin.
For the waters of Nimrim are desolate.
Surely the grass is withered, the tender grass died out,
There is no green thing.
Therefore the abundance which they have acquired and stored up
They carry off over the brook of Arabim.
For the cry of distress has gone around the territory of Moab,
Its wail goes as far as Eglaim and its wailing even to Beer-elim.
For the waters of Dimon are full of blood;
Surely I will bring added woes upon Dimon,
A lion upon the fugitives of Moab and upon the remnant of the land.”
Isaiah 16
v1-4 “Send the tribute lamb to the ruler of the land,
From Sela by way of the wilderness to the mountain of the daughter of Zion.
Then, like fleeing birds or scattered nestlings,
The daughters of Moab will be at the fords of the Arnon.
‘Give us advice, make a decision;
Cast your shadow like night at high noon;
Hide the outcasts, do not betray the fugitive.
Let the outcasts of Moab stay with you;
Be a hiding place to them from the destroyer.’
For the extortioner has come to an end, destruction has ceased,
Oppressors have completely disappeared from the land.
v5 “A throne will even be established in lovingkindness,
And a judge will sit on it in faithfulness in the tent of David;
Moreover, he will seek justice
And be prompt in righteousness.
v6-12 “We have heard of the pride of Moab, an excessive pride;
Even of his arrogance, pride, and fury;
His idle boasts are false.
Therefore Moab will wail; everyone of Moab will wail.
You will moan for the raisin cakes of Kir-hareseth
As those who are utterly stricken.
For the fields of Heshbon have withered, the vines of Sibmah as well;
The lords of the nations have trampled down its choice clusters
Which reached as far as Jazer and wandered to the deserts;
Its tendrils spread themselves out and passed over the sea.
Therefore I will weep bitterly for Jazer, for the vine of Sibmah;
I will drench you with my tears, O Heshbon and Elealeh;
For the shouting over your summer fruits and your harvest has fallen away.
Gladness and joy are taken away from the fruitful field;
In the vineyards also there will be no cries of joy or jubilant shouting,
No treader treads out wine in the presses,
For I have made the shouting to cease.
Therefore my heart intones like a harp for Moab
And my inward feelings for Kir-hareseth.
So it will come about when Moab presents himself,
When he wearies himself upon his high place
And comes to his sanctuary to pray,
That he will not prevail.
v13-14 “This is the word which the LORD spoke earlier concerning Moab. But now the LORD speaks, saying, ‘Within three years, as a hired man would count them, the glory of Moab will be degraded along with all his great population, and his remnant will be very small and impotent.’”
Isaiah 17
v1-3 “The oracle concerning Damascus.
‘Behold, Damascus is about to be removed from being a city
And will become a fallen ruin.
The cities of Aroer are forsaken;
They will be for flocks to lie down in,
And there will be no one to frighten them.
The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim,
And sovereignty from Damascus
And the remnant of Aram;
They will be like the glory of the sons of Israel,’
Declares the LORD of hosts.
v4-6 “Now in that day the glory of Jacob will fade,
And the fatness of his flesh will become lean.
It will be even like the reaper gathering the standing grain,
As his arm harvests the ears,
Or it will be like one gleaning ears of grain
In the valley of Rephaim.
Yet gleanings will be left in it like the shaking of an olive tree,
Two or three olives on the topmost bough,
Four or five on the branches of a fruitful tree,
Declares the LORD, the God of Israel.
v7-8 “In that day man will have regard for his Maker
And his eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel.
He will not have regard for the altars, the work of his hands,
Nor will he look to that which his fingers have made,
Even the Asherim and incense stands.
v9-11 “In that day their strong cities will be like forsaken places in the forest,
Or like branches which they abandoned before the sons of Israel;
And the land will be a desolation.
For you have forgotten the God of your salvation
And have not remembered the rock of your refuge.
Therefore you plant delightful plants
And set them with vine slips of a strange god.
In the day that you plant it you carefully fence it in,
And in the morning you bring your seed to blossom;
But the harvest will be a heap
In a day of sickliness and incurable pain.
v12-14 “Alas, the uproar of many peoples
Who roar like the roaring of the seas,
And the rumbling of nations
Who rush on like the rumbling of mighty waters!
The nations rumble on like the rumbling of many waters,
But He will rebuke them and they will flee far away,
And be chased like chaff in the mountains before the wind,
Or like whirling dust before a gale.
At evening time, behold, there is terror!
Before morning they are no more.
Such will be the portion of those who plunder us
And the lot of those who pillage us.”
July 16 OT/NT readings: Psalms 19-21, Acts 19:21-41
We are reading Psalms in the Old Testament reading plan. In this document, I list the Psalms in order of appearance, followed by author (if known), context of the Psalm’s writing (description of context that appear in the Biblical text before some Psalms are quoted), and the Old Testament reading it appears after. Here is that information for today’s Psalms:
Psalm 19, appears as 33rd/150 Psalms, authored by David, during the war between the house of David and the house of Saul (2 Samuel 1-4), Day 112
Psalm 20, appears as 78th/150 Psalms, authored by David, after his defeat of the Arameans and the Ammonites (2 Samuel 10, 1 Chronicles 19), Day 131
Psalm 21, appears as 34th/150 Psalms, authored by David, during the war between the house of David and the house of Saul (2 Samuel 1-4), Day 112
We are in the book of Acts, written by Luke. At the beginning of our reading yesterday, Apollos, who Aquila and Priscilla had met in Ephesus, had been sent to Corinth, and Paul had departed Antioch on his third missionary journey. He returned to Ephesus, where he found some disciples who did not know about the Holy Spirit and only knew about the baptism of John for repentance. He baptized them in the name of the Lord Jesus and then laid his hands on them, and the Holy Spirit came upon them. He entered the synagogue, according to his usual pattern, and spoke boldly for three months, until some of the Jews became hardened and disobedient and he withdrew to the school of Tyrannus for two years. “God was performing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul….Some of the Jewish exorcists…attempted to name over those who had the evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, ‘I adjure you by Jesus who Paul preaches’….And the evil spirit answered and said to them, ‘ I recognize Jesus, and I know about Paul, but who are you?’…the name of the Lord Jesus was being magnified” and “the word of the Lord was growing mightily and prevailing.”
A summary of the book of Acts, which is really a summary of the rest of the New Testament, including when all the letters of the apostles were written, is here.
Acts 19
v21-23 “Now after these things were finished, Paul purposed in the Spirit to go to Jerusalem after he had passed through Macedonia and Achaia, saying, ‘After I have been there, I must also see Rome.’ And having sent into Macedonia two of those who ministered to him, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while.
v23-27 “About that time there occurred no small disturbance concerning the Way. For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, was bringing no little business to the craftsmen; these he gathered together with the workmen of similar trades, and said, ‘Men, you know that our prosperity depends upon this business. You see and hear that not only in Ephesus, but in almost all of Asia, this Paul has persuaded and turned away a considerable number of people, saying that gods made with hands are no gods at all. Not only is there danger that this trade of ours fall into disrepute, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis be regarded as worthless and that she whom all of Asia and the world worship will even be dethroned from her magnificence.’
v28-41 “When they heard this and were filled with rage, they began crying out, saying, ‘Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!’ The city was filled with the confusion, and they rushed with one accord into the theater, dragging along Gaius and Aristarchus, Paul’s traveling companions from Macedonia. And when Paul wanted to go into the assembly, the disciples would not let him. Also some of the Asiarchs who were friends of his sent to him and repeatedly urged him not to venture into the theater. So then, some were shouting one thing and some another, for the assembly was in confusion and the majority did not know for what reason they had come together. Some of the crowd concluded it was Alexander, since the Jews had put him forward; and having motioned with his hand, Alexander was intending to make a defense to the assembly. But when they recognized that he was a Jew, a single outcry arose from them all as they shouted for about two hours, ‘Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!’ After quieting the crowd, the town clerk said, ‘Men of Ephesus, what man is there after all who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is guardian of the temple of the great Artemis and of the image which fell down from heaven? So, since these are undeniable facts, you ought to keep calm and to do nothing rash. For you have brought these men here who are neither robbers of temples nor blasphemers of our goddess. So then, if Demetrius and the craftsmen who are with him have a complaint against any man, the courts are in session and proconsuls are available; let them bring charges against one another. But if you want anything beyond this, it shall be settled in the lawful assembly. For indeed we are in danger of being accused of a riot in connection with today’s events, since there is no real cause for it, and in this connection we will be unable to account for this disorderly gathering.’ After saying this he dismissed the assembly.”
Dear Lord,
The LORD of hosts has sworn saying, “Surely, just as I have intended so it has happened, and just as I have planned so it will stand.”
We read these prophecies that You have fulfilled and it builds our faith for the prophecies You have yet to fulfill.
A throne will even be established in lovingkindness,
And a judge will sit on it in faithfulness in the tent of David;
Moreover, he will seek justice
And be prompt in righteousness.
Our King will return. You have promised.
the assembly was in confusion and the majority did not know for what reason they had come together.
While we wait, protect us from the enemy of our souls, the source of lies and confusion.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
"While we wait, protect us from the enemy of our souls, the source of lies and confusion." Amen. Thank you Dr. Milhoan. Peace.