By Sam E. Stone
Each week our lesson planners include a devotional reading that is
parallel to the message of the printed text. Their choice for today,
Luke 8:9-15, comes from Jesus’ parable about the sower. It clarifies and
confirms the meaning of Isaiah 29. God is concerned about what we
really mean when we say we worship.
In Luke 8:10, Jesus quotes a similar passage in Isaiah (6:9) that
warns those who are “hearing, but never understanding . . . seeing, but
never perceiving.” Lewis Foster notes, “These words do not mean that God
desires that some will not understand, but it expresses the sad truth
that those who are not willing to dig for the treasure will never find
it. Their disinterest in spiritual truths and their concentration on the
things of this world keep them from pursuing the deeper lessons of the
parable.”
People’s Apathy
Isaiah 29:9-12
Isaiah declared that his hearers have made themselves blind and drunk. They refuse to see and understand the prophetic message. R. B. Y. Scott writes, “Willful disobedience to moral and spiritual claims upon his life finally destroys man’s capacity to hear and respond.” Such people stagger like a drunk man in their moral confusion. For them, all that Isaiah has been prophesying means nothing.
Isaiah 29:9-12
Isaiah declared that his hearers have made themselves blind and drunk. They refuse to see and understand the prophetic message. R. B. Y. Scott writes, “Willful disobedience to moral and spiritual claims upon his life finally destroys man’s capacity to hear and respond.” Such people stagger like a drunk man in their moral confusion. For them, all that Isaiah has been prophesying means nothing.
The people to whom the
message has been given come up with meaningless excuses (“I can’t read
it; it’s sealed” or even “I don’t know how to read”).
Described in these verses is a person who bandages his eyes and
covers his head (v. 10). By this he shows an unwillingness to listen and
learn what the Lord is saying to him through inspired messengers. One
of the New Testament passages citing this reference is Romans 11:7ff.
When speaking of how only a remnant of Israel will be saved, Paul
explained, “The others were hardened,” referring to Isaiah 29:10.
God’s Awareness
Isaiah 29:13-16
The so-called worshippers whom Isaiah condemned were only interested in keeping up appearances. If you had heard them sing or pray, you might have thought they were deeply spiritual. The problem is, you can’t see inside them like God can.
Isaiah 29:13-16
The so-called worshippers whom Isaiah condemned were only interested in keeping up appearances. If you had heard them sing or pray, you might have thought they were deeply spiritual. The problem is, you can’t see inside them like God can.
Their hearts are far from me. Their worship . . . is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
These words of Isaiah were quoted by Jesus when he described the
Pharisees and teachers of the law in his day (see Matthew 15:1-9). Mark
also recounts what Jesus said about these people, as he quotes this
text: “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites . . .
‘They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules’” (Mark
7:6, 7).
How God reacts to hypocritical worship is clear: The wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.
In speaking to the Corinthians years later, the apostle Paul contrasted
the truth of the gospel with the so-called wisdom of “the wise” (1
Corinthians 1:18ff). He concludes, “The foolishness of God is wiser than
human wisdom” (v. 25). No “human rules” can produce the kind of worship
the cross can generate. Regardless of how the world’s intellectuals may
view things, it is God’s analysis that counts in the end.
On another occasion, Paul cited these words of Isaiah to make his
case when challenged by some people who wanted their choices and
decisions to have supreme authority. “Who are you, a human being, to
talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,
‘Why did you make me like this?’” (Romans 9:20). Such a view would turn things upside down, as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
The
people of Israel would be judged for their unbelief. Faulty thinking
does not excuse wrong actions any more than the potter’s clay can
condemn the potter for how it has been made. When we worship, we must do
so from the heart, in harmony with God’s will.
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