Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Isaiah 8:9, Ephesians 6:14a

The continuing story of Isaiah moves to the impending destruction of Israel by the hand of Assyria. Isaiah has a child named ‘Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz’ which means ‘Speed the spoil, Hasten the Booty’. God tells him that the child will not be old enough to say ‘Mummy’ or ‘Daddy’ before Assyria will come to conquer the land. God talks to Isaiah and tells why Israel will be conquered, and also says this:

Be shattered, O you peoples, and be broken in pieces!
Give ear, all you from far countries.
Gird yourselves, but be broken in pieces;
Gird yourselves, but be broken in pieces.’ (Isaiah 8:9)

I find it interesting that that last phrase was used twice in a row, unchanged. This obviously renders importance in God’s mind. It is like a preacher repeating a line for the sake of emphasis.

It has a fairly obvious meaning in the historical context. God tells the nations (namely Assyria) to gird themselves, or get ready for battle. But be broken in pieces – in other words, ‘don’t think you have anything to do with the outcome’. The Assyrians will get ready for battle, come and conquer Israel and think they are mighty and powerful because they have done so. I reality, we know from chapter 5 and 7 that it is God who has called them (like puppies, remember?), and God that has given them victory. Here he commands them: ‘Gird yourselves! But be humble, because it is only for my purposes that you succeed.’

In a more applicational sense, this phrase can be directly applied to us. God tells us to gird ourselves, but be broken in pieces. In other words: ‘do what I command, do your best in everything, but never be proud of it, for it is only I that does it’. More specifically, it is in Ephesians 6 that we are told to ‘gird ourselves’ – ‘Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth’ (Ephesians 6:14a). This is a command, that we might be effective for God. This girding is to go into spiritual warfare. But even so, we are to be ‘broken in pieces’ for it is only God who conquers. It is only God’s will that is done. In fact, in the spiritual war, counter-intuitively, the less we are ‘broken in pieces’ in our heart, the less effective we are.

Let us all seek today to be broken before our God and King, but gird ourselves in readiness for obedience to Him.

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