Monday, October 20, 2014

Who Has Our Trust?

  "Stop regarding man, whose breath of life is in his nostrils;  For why should he be esteemed?"  (Isaiah 2:22)

In context, Isaiah is picturing and prophesying richly-deserved judgment upon Judah.  A number of elements in the second chapter fitly describe what was experienced during the Babylonian captivity, but the overall intensity better portrays the future tribulation known as the Time of Jacob's Trouble (Jeremiah 30:7; Matthew 24; Revelation 6--19).
"In that day men will cast away to the moles and the bats Their idols of silver and their idols of gold, Which they made for themselves to worship, In order to go into the caverns of the rocks and the clefts of the cliffs Before the terror of the LORD and the splendor of His majesty," (vv. 20, 21; cf. Rev. 6:12, 15, 16). 

In such a time of unprecedented trauma, chaos, and terror, peace will be promised by the Antichrist, and his confident assurances will lead many to place faith in him.  Verse 22 is Isaiah's admonition to stop depending on people, however trustworthy and capable they may seem, and trust only in the living God. 

We continually struggle with faith in the seen versus faith in the unseen.  Our senses constantly scream that what we can see, hear, taste, touch and smell are reality, and the unseen realm of spirituality is (a) non-existent, (b) unscientific, (c) undependable at best, (d) an indication of insanity at worst.  The world system assures us that man is the measure by which the universe should be perceived, and what we do not understand shouldn't concern. 

Yet in times of difficulty, loss, death, despair, fear and heartbreak, times when we're overwhelmed by life's enigmas, faith in man won't do.  Even faith in faith will disappoint, for faith is only as valid as the object in which it is placed.  Thus, only faith in the living triune God of the Scriptures, the sovereign King of the universe, will sustain us through tribulation. 

The Father assures His own, "Do not fear, for I am with you;  Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.  I will strengthen you, surely I will help you, Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand," (Isaiah 41:10).  The Son, the Lord Jesus Christ invites, "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS," (Matthew 11:28, 29). 
The third Person of the Trinity, the blessed Holy Spirit, provides unspeakable comfort for all who belong to the Lord Jesus, even as the Savior promised, "I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you," (John 14:16, 17).


Father,
Grant grace that we who have been changed by the Lord Jesus would lean less and less on man and be deepened in our dependence upon You. 
In the Lord Jesus' Name,
Amen.


























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