Isaiah 21:3-5

Isaiah 21 was quite hard to understand contextually for me. It has a lot of prophetic and historical information which I will have to really investigate to understand more. Most of the chapter is about the Fall of Babylon which was not as yet a world power (Assyria was the world power at that time, as is expressed many times in the previous chapters). So Isaiah is predicting the Fall of the Babylonian empire before the empire even existed! What's more, he predicts what nation will cause it to fall and therefore replace it (the Medes and Persians). At one point, the description of the fall is very reminiscent of Daniel, where the Babylonian princes are all together eating and drinking while the Medes and Persians conquer their city.

'Prepare the table,
Set a watchman in the tower,
Eat and drink.
Arise, you princes,
Anoint the shield!' (Isaiah 21:5)

It is remarkably detailed and accurate for someone who lived when the empire he was prophesying about wasn't even an empire yet!

However, the verses that struck me were verses 3and 4

'Therefore my loins are filled with pain;
Pangs have taken hold of me, like the pangs of a woman in labour.
I was distressed when I heard it;
I was dismayed when I saw it.
My heart wavered, fearfulness frightened me;
The night for which I longed He turned into fear for me.' (Isaiah 21:3-4)

Isaiah, as accustomed as he was to destruction and violence, was afraid and distressed by this vision of God's wrath on Babylon. I've never been in labour before, and i guess i never will be, but i assume the pain is fairly horrific. To feel that kind of pain when you see something, especially when you are used to it, says something about the extent of the pain of the people going through it, wouldn't you agree?

This basically just reminded me how much God hates sin. He cannot stand it. Sinning a little bit here and there is not 'alright'. Drifting with the world and doing what it does (just with a lot more love) is not 'alright'. God punishes sin. He punishes it severely and drastically. By His grace only are we saved from that wrath. But knowing this, should we not be ever more conscious of our sin, and continually repent? Living a Christlike life does not only mean that we are to increase the positive (have more love, mercy, grace, kindness etc), but to decrease the negative (sin). Repeatedly in Isaiah we find the harshness with which God deals with sin. Harsh possibly to us. But to God, the severity is lenient. A terrible earthly death does not pay for the sin - an eternal death does. I believe we must constantly try to realise the depth of our own sinfulness, our own depravity and so doing, to come to a fuller knowledge of God's grace.