Isaiah 9:6
“For unto us a Child is born,
Unto us a Son is given;
And the government will be upon His shoulder,
And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor,
Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
This is one of the most well known verses in Isaiah, and perhaps in the entire Bible. It is a verse which predicts the coming of the Messiah, seven hundred years before His birth. In this verse, we have a detailed description of the Savior of humanity. We are told a Child will be born, who is in fact, the Son of God.
This verse was originally penned in the midst of extremely dark times in Israel’s history. Externally, they were facing the threat of destruction. The Assyrians began to expand their empire by conquering the nations adjacent to Israel and Judah. Internally, the nation became increasingly immoral. They lost site of the principles upon which they were founded, had wandered from the Lord, and invited the false gods of the surrounding nations into their borders. In earlier chapters, Isaiah describes these conditions by explaining the culture had begun to “call good evil and evil good.”
It is not difficult to see the similarities between Isaiah’s day and our own. Nations are facing the continual threat of terrorism, stemming from the same area of the world where Assyria once ruled. In addition, the tide of immorality is on the rise. It seems to be almost a daily occurrence, where some judge or legislator seeks to impose their personal immoralities upon the rest of us. We are being forced to accept sinful behavior as normal. We are even considered to be bigots, if we suggest that certain lifestyles are unacceptable to God. The Bible is looked upon either as an antiquated fairy tale, or viewed, like many interpret the constitution, as a document that changes to fit the times.
The ambiguous and shifting moral codes being pushed upon our culture are producing all kinds of social chaos. Yet, our leaders refuse to recognize the real cause of the social chaos is immorality and godlessness. We, like Israel, have pushed God out of the way, and as a result, we are experiencing what many call “the wrath of removal;” where God seems to have taken His hand of blessing off of us. We are suffering the consequences of removing God from our lives.
I am so glad in the midst of those dark days, God promised to send His own Son. The Wonderful, Counselor, and Prince of Peace has come to make a way for our sins to be washed away, and a relationship with God restored. Anyone who will receive Christ can have a brand new start in life, and have the hope of heaven. I am also very glad to know the Savior promised to return. The predictions concerning the first coming of Christ were fulfilled to the letter, and there are three times as many promises of His return, than there are of His incarnation.
The great hope for humanity is found in the pages of God’s Word.
Pastor Jim
Something sinister happens to us when we sin and do not receive an immediate consequence. We begin to think God is OK with our behavior, even though the Bible clearly teaches it is wrong. When we are not struck by lightning or swallowed by a whale, we think we have gotten away with our sin, and can keep on with it, without consequences. If that is the case, we have forgotten the very nature of how sin works. Paul wrote,
Solomon’s search for life has led him to the conclusion that life is better when we do not have to walk it alone. He gives four examples to illustrate his conclusion. These examples are more practical than they are poetic. First, he suggests that having a companion is better because we can get more work done. Second, if we fall down, we have someone to help us get back up. Third, we can warm one another, and finally, if attacked, we have a better chance of survival.
When Job’s counselors accused him of wrong, he began to justify himself before them. They claimed he was a sinner, so he declared his righteousness. As this argument continued to develop, Job’s justification began to cast blame upon God. If Job was innocent, then God must be wrong for allowing these things to happen to him. Perhaps this was the earliest development of the accusation we offer hear today, “how could God allow bad things to happen to good people.”
It could have been easy for a woman like Esther to feel forgotten. She had lost her parents at a young age, and was a believer living, in an area where she was surrounded by those who did not know the Lord. As the pages turn, it appears there must have been some level of persecution against the Jews, since Esther chose to hide her heritage from everyone in authority. This rising persecution will set the stage for much of what develops in her story. It seems as though, instead of allowing difficulty to tarnish her view of God, she allowed her situation to give God an opportunity to show His love in her life.
The bible is filled with great and precious promises. Of these, the one recorded here may be the pinnacle. For the past two thousand years countless saints, facing a vast array of difficulties, have clung to this promise and found God to be ever faithful to His word. The promise itself is both simple and all encompassing. We are told, God is able to create good out of all things that life throws at us.
Since the opening chapters of 1 Chronicles are designed to give us an accurate genealogical account of Israel, very little commentary is given. When that pattern is broken, our attention should be grabbed. In the case of Achar, we find a brief reference to his story alongside his name. Achar, or Achan, lived during the conquest of Canaan. He was among those men who followed Joshua across the Jordan, into the promised land. His situation gave him opportunity to be heroic, until greed got a hold of him.
Manasseh, king of Judah, will go down in history as the king who caused the fall of the nation. It was not his foreign policy, his economic plan, or his tax code, that killed the nation. Instead, it was his view of God and his stance regarding sin that would weaken the nation, and lead to its collapse. Later we read,
We have four boys who are separated by only five years. When they were little, we, like so many others families, spent a lot of our time visiting amusement parks. As the older ones grew, they were attracted to the bigger rides, and their younger brother wanted to do whatever they did. The problem was, many of the rides had a standard. If you were not a certain height, you could not ride. At times, this created quite a controversy. We tried everything to make him just a little taller, we spiked his hair, we bought shoes called “Heelies”, that had a wheel in the back, and provided a couple extra inches to his height. However, time and time again, when we reached the entrance, he was excluded. He simply did not measure up.
We live in a world of contrast. On the one hand, we see the fingerprint of God all around us, demonstrating His goodness. Earlier in the Psalms, David wrote, “The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork” (Psalm19:1). When we see the beauty of creation, the birth of a child, or the love of betrothal, we are struck by the goodness of God.
Jim Gallagher 