April 22, 2022: Day 87 – Isaiah 21-25 and Psalm 142

There is much of the same in this Scripture, but then there is something completely different.  We begin in the same vein that we started with prophecies against Babylon and Edom and Arabia which sound similar to the others.  In the days to come you will face destruction.  There is also a warning to Jerusalem about what is to come.  Isaiah lets them know that captivity is on its way and that God will: “roll you up tightly like a ball and throw you into a large country.”  That large country would be Babylon and that did take place.  In Jerusalem a puppet ruler would be set up, and this would be Eliakim.  This would take place at a later time by the Egyptians, but it did take place just as Isaiah said it would.  

We continue to hear the prophecies against foreign lands including Tyre which houses the famous Tarshish which is to where Jonah tried to flee.  We then hear a much more general warning against the entire earth and what is to come.  This is then immediately followed by a call to praise the Lord.  This chapter seems very much out of place but it does remind us of the importance of knowing that even in the midst of the mess and disaster which we face, God is able.  We see in this chapter the precursor for what we find in Revelation 21.  Compare Isaiah 25:7-8 with Revelation 21:4.  There are unmistakable similarities.

Psalm 142 was written within the context of David in the cave when he is fleeing from Saul, we have a few of those.  It is similar to what we find in Isaiah 24:18 where you see this succession of terror leads to falling into a pit which leads into being caught in a snare.  But once again we find a good ending when David is able to say: “Then the righteous will gather about me because of your goodness to me.”  What a great way to deal with the tragedy that inevitably overtakes our lives at one time or another.