Crisis of Identity (The book of Isaiah) - Lesson 1 Q1 (Sabbath school 2021),The Biblical Perspective

hello everyone and thank you once again for joining us um at the biblical perspective for those of you who have been with us for a while you'll know that we're actually on a brand new quarter of studies and entitled and comfort my people and um for the first quarter of um 2021 we're actually going to be studying the book of isaiah so it's really exciting that we're actually here on a brand new year and i want to just say and happy new year to everyone and i hope that um 2021 will be better in many ways than it was in 2020 and before i go any further i just want to i'm just going to start with a a word of prayer so just to remind you are with myself colleen and you're with them pedro so let's just have a quick word of prayer before we continue into our into our first study of this quarter dearly father thank you for this opportunity that we have to study your word lord as we start our new study on the book of isaiah i pray lord that you'll help us to understand your word more as we study this book i ask these things in your name dear lord amen so um last last lesson we finished our studies and where we were looking where we were looking at education and now we're moving on to actually look at as i said the book of the book of isaiah so during this quarter during this um this first quarter of 2021 we're going to go and study the entire book of things of isaiah so this is a really good opportunity for you to to learn more about about isaiah himself and about him this period in history so it's definitely been a very um a very interesting lesson pedro this week um i wanted to start off by by just asking about um the book of isaiah and his context because i feel that it's important that you know as we start this brand new quarter and we're looking at the book that we kind of like have an appreciation and an idea of the foundational knowledge and insight that we potentially need to have um in order for us to understand um this book um better and when we actually start off in isaiah 1 verse 1 and if i'll just read that it says the vision concerning judah and jerusalem that isaiah son of a mars saw during the reign of ozer jethram ayaz and ezekiel king of judah so that in itself the alzheimer one verse one gives us like like a foundation in a sense of basically who the author is who the message is to and a bit about um the the political and historical time in which um in which the book of isaiah was set we also know as well that the background some of the elements of the background towards the book of isaiah in regards to what was happening to god's people during that time can actually be found in second kings 15 to 20 and also in second chronicles 26 to 32 so it's worthwhile for those of you who are coming on this journey with us to study the book of isaiah to actually read those elements in kings and also in second kings and second chronicles to to understand the historical elements a bit more but that's the first point i wanted to start off and ask you pedro just just about the the historical and cultural and political and even religious element of this book that we need to understand in order to understand in order to study it more in depth i think you have well presented um the elements that we need to take into consideration by reading verse 1 which really places us into the context of isaiah's complete ministry in terms of time and helps us to focus on the particular historical elements um that were developed at those times and you also said that in parallel to the book of isaiah we also have the book of kings in the book of the book of chronicles from which we can actually have more information more details about the different kings for instance in the book of isaiah we don't know what happened to husiah who is the first king being mentioned in verse 1 but when we go to the books you mentioned particularly to the book of 2nd chronicles 26 then we learn about how long he reigned we also learned interesting things about his character and how god interacted with him which in turn gives us more information about the nature of what isaiah is writing about as a vision coming from god so to remain within the book itself of course we can go outside of that and talk about what the political situation was at the time um isaiah comes on the scene in terms of the relationship of judah and jerusalem with assyria and the different kings of assyria we can go into all these details by the by the end of the book of isaiah the historical part of the book of isaiah we do have some details of that but i think what is important to really look at beyond the context which is the historical context which is absolutely necessary is the theological right importance of the message he received then for us today that will be application yes so yes you're right understanding the historical background understanding the political situation understanding isaiah and the ministry that he was involved in within that setting is important but we're going to focus particularly on the message itself yeah and that's great and before we actually go into the message itself um from a bible study perspective because i'm we're approaching this in order from you know to learn god to understand and know god's words more for someone who is starting reading off a book like isaiah or any other book like um is that the steps that we should ordinarily take that we would advise someone to take when you're starting off you know studying a brand new book like say you were going to study the book of isaiah as we are or you wanted to study the book of revelation or the book of genesis we wanted to do a study of a particular book would you say that that would be the appropriate steps to take in order to start that journey to find out all those different elements absolutely you should have an introduction an introduction to this book and in that introduction you tend to try and understand who is the writer what time he lived in now for isaiah this is pretty straightforward although on some aspects we will be more tentative but it is quite straightforward the time believed in the people who were around the political situation sometimes you don't have all these elements but it is worth trying to find out everything you can find out about the context in which the message comes will help understand the message definitely definitely okay that's great so um i wanted us to focus and stay in isaiah um um chapter one for for for this introductory um session looking at him the book of isaiah and i wanted to kind of like going back back to talked about the um the theological or the spiritual elements um of the study of isaiah of this book and i wanted to kind of like draw some parallel with the people that we with the message that we hear in isaiah 1 to to to our time and i wanted us to start by um looking at him isaiah 1 2 and 3. okay um because we've we've obviously done one it says two and three says hear oh heaven listen o earth for the lord has spoken i reached i read children and brought them up but they have rebelled against me the ox knows his master the donkey his owners he his owners manger but israel does not know my my people do not understand so in a sense that's the first introduction we we kind of like and we have within isaiah the first chapter and then after this we it's we hear mainly about the sins of israel and the sins of them judah the sins of jerusalem and all what the people were where i'm actually doing at that at that point and we also read in isaiah 1 verse 18 and it says come now let us reason together says the lord though your sins are like scarlet they shall be as white as snow though they are red as crimson they shall be like wool so what's actually happening here explain to me you know what's why the why the people are acting the way they are and why this message comes through this is an important question and it is also part of what we were saying at the beginning when i look at chapter one of the book of isaiah what i see is an interesting structure you said that we've done chapter one uh sorry we've done verse one but i'm not so sure that we've done it because right there in verse one that doesn't seem to be that challenging we have a wealth of information that we can gather on who isaiah is what his ministry was like how it was perceived for how long for instance you have how many kings mentioned you have four kings yes mentioned in here now the first king hussiah if you go to the other passages you mentioned such as ii chronicles chapter 26 when we hear about him we learned that his reign lasted for 52 years i mean that's the longest reign although manasseh um and another one had long reigns as well but nobody exceeded 52. so this is a long reign then we have his son jotham who reigned if we keep reading second chronicles 26 for 16 years then we have ahaz and then we have hezekiah all these guys they exercised their kingship for a long time so what we can gather here first of all is there is a long period of time on which god is working for the benefit of his people through the ministry of isaiah now in relation to the verses you've just read the type of the message would it would mean that it lasted for that long that the lord would try to address his people's problem which is they can't hear his voice they can recognize him and they go astray from him so right there the first verse puts into context the length in terms of time but also in terms of patience that god is exercising towards his people not only that how long isaiah bore the same message to a people asking them to return to god so right there in the first chapter first verse we can gather all of that what i see also when i read the first chapter i tend to deconstruct it and reconstruct it in different in a different way for instance do you have another question or no you can continue all right um for instance what what you see um i've already said about verse one that we have a length of time that is defined through the mention of those four things and the length of their reigns then what you learn about in verse this is how i would restructure it um verses five and six can you read verses five and six for me yes it says um it says why should you be beaten anymore why do why do you persist in rebellion your whole head is injured your whole heart afflicted from the soul of your feet to the top of your head there is no soundness only wounds and bruises and open sores you see isaiah over this long period of time i'd like to say that all that is being written here cover covers the whole of isaiah's ministry however long that was and we know from verse one it's long the situation is one of a sick body god that in in these verses five and six we face the situation that of a body that is sick that is diseased a body that is written with malady yes this is the context of isaiah's ministry and this is what he is addressing then also to add to that as well um as well as what you've read there's this portion i'm coming to okay because i'm kind of restructuring that's fine the the the chapter so that we can follow my points yes so in verses five and six we know about the situation now in verses two to four we learned about the cause of the situation but if you look at the way it is structured it doesn't come like this so you have to do it yourself this is a technical point now on how to understand the whole the passage you you read the whole thing then you discover point by point the what the information is there about so verses five and six you hear about the situation a sick body versus two to four you hear about the cause of that malady can you read for us please that's two and what did you say sorry two to four two to four it says hear o heavens listen o earth for the lord has spoken i read children and brought them up but they have rebelled against me the the ox know his master the donkey his owner his owners manger what israel does not know my people do not understand are sinful nation a people loaded with guilt a brood of evildoers children given to corruption they have forsaken the lord they have spurred the holy the holy one of israel and turned their backs on him you see this is 2-4 this is why the whole body now is diseased from the soul of the feet to the crown of the head everything is bruises and disease why because they refuse to hear the voice of god god concedes them as rebellious children whom he brought into this world and cared for yet they turned against his authority you're with me now the chapter continues um by telling you the result of this this situation verses seven to nine now so first of all we saw verses five and six then we that was the the situation situation then we saw verses two to four the cause of that situation and we again keep in mind that this is the situation isaiah is dealing with over all these years all right now the result of that in verses 7 to 9 and then 28 to 31 so basically all of these verses are basically the result well one of the questions that i did have was in verse nine it talks about sodom and gomorrah well you haven't read it no i haven't so read it first so we need to read seven to seven seven to nine it says um your country is desolate your city is burned with fire your fields are being stripped by foreigners right before you laid waste as when overthrown by strangers the daughters of zion is left like a shelter in a vineyard like a hunt in a field of melon like a hut in a field of melons like a city under siege unless unless the lord almighty had left us some survivors we would have become like sudden we would have been like gomorrah you see we saw what the situation was disease malady problems a whole sick body yes then we saw that the cause has to do with behavior a behavior against god now the result of that it when we look at we it's like we're breaking down what it means to be diseased what it means to be sick that's material physical emotional spiritual decay this is what we see in in verses 7 to nine hard times rebellion against god wins hard time yes not listening to the voice of god recognizing the voice of god is a state of disease that brings hard times upon the whole nation and the the last part verse 9 says if god had not been merciful even in this condition they would have disappeared in much the same way sodom and gomorrah dissipate from the face of the earth so we learn here about god's mercy still in this situation for that long according to verse one despite their condition you're with me now if you look at verses 28 to 31 we're still looking at the results of that situation 28-31 yeah so i'm reading from the new international version and it says i'm reading isaiah 1 28 and it says but rebellious and sinners will both be broken and those who forsake the lord will perish you will be ashamed because of the sacred oaks in which you have delighted you will be disgraced because of the gardens you that you have chosen you you will be like an oak with fading leaves like a garden without water the mighty men will become tinder and will work a spark both will burn together with no one to quench the fire this is the result of being diseased because you would not listen because you would not hear and for that long even when god exercises mercy you see how these verses are informing us all of that within the historical background the time that we hear about by isaiah mentioning the kings in verse 1 during whose reign he ministered so this is the result now i have more verses for you to read how does the situation express itself if you look at verses 15 sorry 10 to 15. if you want me to read this i can while you're looking at 21 to 23 yes so shall i read yes that's fine okay let me read 10 to 15. hear the word of the lord ye rulers of sodom give ear unto the law of our god ye people of gomorrah to what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me says the lord i am full of the burned offerings of rounds and the fat and of the fat of the fair beast and i delight not in the blood of the bullocks or of the lands or of the eagles when ye come to appear before me who have required this at your hand to treat to tread my calls bring no more vain oblation incense is an an abomination unto me the new moons and the south the calling of assemblies i cannot away with it it is iniquity even the sullen meetings your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth they are trouble unto me i am weary to bear them and when he spread forth your hands i will hide mine eyes from you ye when ye make many players i will not hear your hands are full of blood this is how the whole situation expresses itself antagonism between god and his people a people who will descend more and more into rebellion and abomination while still keeping the rituals the rituals of worshiping god now if you look at verses 21 to 23 yeah and it says see how the faithful city has bought has become a harlot she once was full of justice righteousness used to dwell in her but now murderers your silver has become dross your choice wine is diluted with water your rulers are are rebels companions of thieves they all love bribes and chase after gifts they do not defend the cause of the fatherless the widow's case does not come before them all of this we don't have time to continue with that for long but the the image i want to the picture i want to give here is in this first chapter we are given all this information the last bit of information is what god offers and we won't have time to read it but we can find this in verses 16 to 20 and verses 24 to 27. this is what god offers so if we summarize we see first of all in this first chapter that the situation is depicted in verses 5 to 6. in and then we have the cause of that situation in verses two to four and then in verses 15 to uh sorry seven to nine we have the result verses 28 to 31 the results of that then verses 5 10 to 15 and 21 to 23 we have how that situation express itself over all that period of time that isaiah is ministering to god's people yes yes okay so and we're actually short on time and we there's actually quite a lot more we need to say about this and we won't actually have the opportunity to discuss that today but i know that we'll be going in depth during our live where we will be able to address some of the key issues that we did not have time to but we're only at the beginning yes yes so thank you for joining us today and i'd like to encourage you to join us on our live where we'll be where we'll be able to go deeper into this topic not only go deeper but you'll be able to um to ask your questions so that we can all have a better understanding of this very first chapter of isaiah before we go deeper and further into the study of this book so thank you for being with us and i'll see you next time on the biblical perspective

Channel: The Biblical Perspective

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Keywords: Sabbath school 2021, sabbath school Q1 2021, sabbath school crisis of identity, Sabbath school crisis of identity - Book of Isaiah, the book of Isaiah chapter 1, the book of Isaiah, Pedro Antonius, colleen dixon, the biblical perspective

Id: ZmO_jpZiUyk

Length: 29min 48sec (1788 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 26 2020