The Book of ISAIAH - Chapter Twenty Nine

Woe to David’s city

1

Woe to you, Ariel, Ariel,

    the city where David settled!

Add year to year

    and let your cycle of festivals go on.

2 

Yet I will besiege Ariel;

    she will mourn and lament,

    she will be to me like an altar hearth.

3 

I will encamp against you on all sides;

    I will encircle you with towers

    and set up my siege works against you.

4 

Brought low, you will speak from the ground;

    your speech will mumble out of the dust.

Your voice will come ghostlike from the earth;

    out of the dust your speech will whisper.

5 

But your many enemies will become like fine dust,

    the ruthless hordes like blown chaff.

Suddenly, in an instant,

6 

    the Lord Almighty will come

with thunder and earthquake and great noise,

    with whirlwind and tempest and flames of a devouring fire.

7 

Then the hordes of all the nations that fight against Ariel,

    that attack her and her fortress and besiege her,

will be as it is with a dream,

    with a vision in the night –

8 

as when a hungry person dreams of eating,

    but awakens hungry still;

as when a thirsty person dreams of drinking,

    but awakens faint and thirsty still.

So will it be with the hordes of all the nations

    that fight against Mount Zion.

9 

Be stunned and amazed,

    blind yourselves and be sightless;

be drunk, but not from wine,

    stagger, but not from beer.

10 

The Lord has brought over you a deep sleep:

    he has sealed your eyes (the prophets);

    he has covered your heads (the seers).

11 

For you this whole vision is nothing but words sealed in a scroll. 

And if you give the scroll to someone who can read, 

and say, ‘Read this, please,’ they will answer, ‘I can’t; it is sealed.’ 

12

Or if you give the scroll to someone who cannot read,

 and say, ‘Read this, please,’ they will answer, ‘I don’t know how to read.’

13 

The Lord says:

‘These people come near to me with their mouth

    and honour me with their lips,

    but their hearts are far from me.

Their worship of me

    is based on merely human rules they have been taught.

14 

Therefore once more I will astound these people

    with wonder upon wonder;

the wisdom of the wise will perish,

    the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.’

15 

Woe to those who go to great depths

    to hide their plans from the Lord,

who do their work in darkness and think,

    ‘Who sees us? Who will know?’

16 

You turn things upside down,

    as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!

Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,

    ‘You did not make me’?

Can the pot say to the potter,

    ‘You know nothing’?

17 

In a very short time, will not Lebanon be turned into a fertile field

    and the fertile field seem like a forest?

18 

In that day the deaf will hear the words of the scroll,

    and out of gloom and darkness

    the eyes of the blind will see.

19 

Once more the humble will rejoice in the Lord;

    the needy will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.

20 

The ruthless will vanish,

    the mockers will disappear,

    and all who have an eye for evil will be cut down –

21 

those who with a word make someone out to be guilty,

    who ensnare the defender in court

    and with false testimony deprive the innocent of justice.

22 

Therefore this is what the Lord, who redeemed Abraham, 

says to the descendants of Jacob:

‘No longer will Jacob be ashamed;

    no longer will their faces grow pale.

23 

When they see among them their children,

    the work of my hands,

they will keep my name holy;

    they will acknowledge the holiness of the Holy One of Jacob,

    and will stand in awe of the God of Israel.

24 

Those who are wayward in spirit will gain understanding;

    those who complain will accept instruction.’

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The Book of ISAIAH- Chapter29

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ISAIAH Chapter 1 to 39 

- Overview-

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STUDY - LINKS

The Book of ISAIAH

Part 1 by David Pawson

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The Book of ISAIAH - Chapter Twenty Eight

 

Woe to the leaders of Ephraim and Judah

1 

Woe to that wreath, the pride of Ephraim’s drunkards,

    to the fading flower, his glorious beauty,

set on the head of a fertile valley –

    to that city, the pride of those laid low by wine!

2 

See, the Lord has one who is powerful and strong.

    Like a hailstorm and a destructive wind,

like a driving rain and a flooding downpour,

    he will throw it forcefully to the ground.

3 

That wreath, the pride of Ephraim’s drunkards,

    will be trampled underfoot.

4 

That fading flower, his glorious beauty,

    set on the head of a fertile valley,

will be like figs ripe before harvest –

    as soon as people see them and take them in hand,

    they swallow them.

5 

In that day the Lord Almighty

    will be a glorious crown,

a beautiful wreath

    for the remnant of his people.

6 

He will be a spirit of justice

    to the one who sits in judgment,

a source of strength

    to those who turn back the battle at the gate.

7 

And these also stagger from wine

    and reel from beer:

priests and prophets stagger from beer

    and are befuddled with wine;

they reel from beer,

    they stagger when seeing visions,

    they stumble when rendering decisions.

8 

All the tables are covered with vomit

    and there is not a spot without filth.

9 

‘Who is it he is trying to teach?

    To whom is he explaining his message?

To children weaned from their milk,

    to those just taken from the breast?

10 

For it is:

    do this, do that,

    a rule for this, a rule for that;

    a little here, a little there.’

11 

Very well then, with foreign lips and strange tongues

    God will speak to this people,

12 

to whom he said,

    ‘This is the resting-place, let the weary rest’;

and, ‘This is the place of repose’–

    but they would not listen.

13 

So then, the word of the Lord to them will become:

    do this, do that,

    a rule for this, a rule for that;

    a little here, a little there –

so that as they go they will fall backwards;

    they will be injured and snared and captured.

14 

Therefore hear the word of the Lord, you scoffers

    who rule this people in Jerusalem.

15 

You boast, ‘We have entered into a covenant with death,

    with the realm of the dead we have made an agreement.

When an overwhelming scourge sweeps by,

    it cannot touch us,

for we have made a lie our refuge

    and falsehood our hiding-place.’

16

 So this is what the Sovereign Lord says:

‘See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone,

    a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation;

the one who relies on it

    will never be stricken with panic.

17 

I will make justice the measuring line

    and righteousness the plumb-line;

hail will sweep away your refuge, the lie,

    and water will overflow your hiding-place.

18 

Your covenant with death will be annulled;

    your agreement with the realm of the dead will not stand.

When the overwhelming scourge sweeps by,

    you will be beaten down by it.

19 

As often as it comes it will carry you away;

    morning after morning, by day and by night,

    it will sweep through.’

The understanding of this message

    will bring sheer terror.

20 

The bed is too short to stretch out on,

    the blanket too narrow to wrap around you.

21 

The Lord will rise up as he did at Mount Perazim,

    he will rouse himself as in the Valley of Gibeon –

to do his work, his strange work,

    and perform his task, his alien task.

22 

Now stop your mocking,

    or your chains will become heavier;

the Lord, the Lord Almighty, has told me

    of the destruction decreed against the whole land.

23 

Listen and hear my voice;

    pay attention and hear what I say.

24 

When a farmer ploughs for planting, does he plough continually?

    Does he keep on breaking up and working the soil?

25 

When he has levelled the surface,

    does he not sow caraway and scatter cummin?

Does he not plant wheat in its place,

    barley in its plot,

    and spelt in its field?

26 

His God instructs him

    and teaches him the right way.

27 

Caraway is not threshed with a sledge,

    nor is the cartwheel rolled over cummin;

caraway is beaten out with a rod,

    and cummin with a stick.

28 

Grain must be ground to make bread;

    so one does not go on threshing it for ever.

The wheels of a threshing-cart may be rolled over it,

    but one does not use horses to grind grain.

29 

All this also comes from the Lord Almighty,

    whose plan is wonderful,

    whose wisdom is magnificent.

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The Book of ISAIAH- Chapter28

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Isaiah 28 -cornerstone 

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The Book of ISAIAH - Chapter Twenty Seven

Deliverance of Israel

1 

In that day,

the Lord will punish with his sword –

    his fierce, great and powerful sword –

Leviathan the gliding serpent,

    Leviathan the coiling serpent;

he will slay the monster of the sea.

2 

In that day –

‘Sing about a fruitful vineyard:

3 

    I, the Lord, watch over it;

    I water it continually.

I guard it day and night

    so that no one may harm it.

4 

    I am not angry.

If only there were briers and thorns confronting me!

    I would march against them in battle;

    I would set them all on fire.

5 

Or else let them come to me for refuge;

    let them make peace with me,

    yes, let them make peace with me.’

6 

In days to come Jacob will take root,

    Israel will bud and blossom

    and fill all the world with fruit.

7 

Has the Lord struck her

    as he struck down those who struck her?

Has she been killed

    as those were killed who killed her?

8 

By warfare and exile you contend with her –

    with his fierce blast he drives her out,

    as on a day the east wind blows.

9 

By this, then, will Jacob’s guilt be atoned for,

    and this will be the full fruit of the removal of his sin:

when he makes all the altar stones

    to be like limestone crushed to pieces,

no Asherah poles or incense altars

    will be left standing.

10 

The fortified city stands desolate,

    an abandoned settlement, forsaken like the wilderness;

there the calves graze,

    there they lie down;

    they strip its branches bare.

11 

When its twigs are dry, they are broken off

    and women come and make fires with them.

For this is a people without understanding;

    so their Maker has no compassion on them,

    and their Creator shows them no favour.

12 

In that day the Lord will thresh from the flowing Euphrates 

to the Wadi of Egypt, 

and you, Israel, will be gathered up one by one. 

13 

And in that day a great trumpet will sound. 

Those who were perishing in Assyria 

and those who were exiled in Egypt will come 

and worship the Lord on the holy mountain in Jerusalem.

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The Book of ISAIAH- Chapter 27

- Read by David Suchet -

https://youtu.be/TX-WXP14JoU

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ISAIAH Chapter 1 to 39 - Overview 

The Bible Project 

https://youtu.be/d0A6Uchb1F8

STUDY - LINKS

The Book of ISAIAH

Part 1 by David Pawson

https://youtu.be/XqNzGrYbFWg

The Book of ISAIAH

Part 2 by David Pawson

https://youtu.be/1VLLZ_6ZjiE

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