Isaiah 1:23

“Everyone loves bribes, and follows after rewards.” (NKJV)

Isaiah 1 is basically God’s condemnation of the behavior of the nation of Israel. He lists sin after sin after sin. And then, in the middle of verse 23, my eye caught this phrase: “Everyone loves bribes, and follows after rewards.” This struck in my heart because I believe that it is a good description of American society. We are often (usually) in for what we can get. Think about it! How many times have you gone out to eat somewhere because you had a coupon? How many times have you bought something because it was on sale? How many times have you made a decision because there was some gift or benefit for you? I do these things all the time and each and every time, the benefit that I receive is a bribe or reward for making that decision. Decisions made in this fashion are about what we can get out of it, not what God wants or what might be best for someone else. Bribes. Rewards. It’s basically how our society works.

This is God’s judgment on such a society:

Therefore the Lord says, the Lord of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel, “Ah, I will rid Myself of My adversaries, and take vengeance on My enemies. I will turn My hand against you, and thoroughly purge away your dross, and take away all your alloy. I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. Afterward you shall be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city.” (Isaiah 1:24-26).

I had a great-aunt. She passed away a number of years ago. But when she passed away and her children were cleaning out her home, they found rooms and closets full of dolls. Now there’s nothing wrong with dolls per se, but in this case, all the dolls were in their original boxes and hidden away. Most had been purchased from TV shopping channels. She just bought and bought and bought. Today we call such people hoarders. But the fact is that many of us buy things that we really don’t need. (That’s why dollar stores are so popular; we can indulge without bankrupting ourselves.) The idea is that we self-indulge; we buy to make ourselves happy (whether we buy food, experiences, or stuff). Rather than seeking the Lord and being content with what He has given us, we buy, buy, buy. We get, get, get. We do, do, do in an effort to assuage the pain of living this life rather than turning to the Lord.

The Lord wants to purge us of our compulsions and compel us into His loving arms. The prophet Isaiah writes:

“When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and purged the blood of Jerusalem from her midst, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning, then the Lord will create above every dwelling place of Mount Zion, and above her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night. For over all the glory there will be a covering. And there will be a tabernacle for shade in the daytime from the heat, for a place of refuge, and for a shelter from storm and rain.” (Isaiah 4:4-5:1)

We don’t need to try to run away from the problems that pound us. God is our place of refuge and our shelter from the storm. There is an old hymn that talks about this:

The Lord's our Rock, in Him we hide
A Shelter in the time of storm;
Secure whatever ill betide
A Shelter in the time of storm.

A shade by day, defense by night
A Shelter in the time of storm;
No fears alarm, no foes afright
A Shelter in the time of storm.

The raging storms may round us beat
A Shelter in the time of storm
We'll never leave our safe retreat
A Shelter in the time of storm.

O Rock divine, O Refuge dear
A Shelter in the time of storm
Be Thou our Helper ever near
A Shelter in the time of storm.

Chorus:
Oh, Jesus is a Rock in a weary land
A weary land, a weary land;
Oh, Jesus is a Rock in a weary land
A Shelter in the time of storm.

How often do I run to Jesus during the storms of life? Rather I would eat, buy, do to distract myself from the things that really aren’t going to go away. Better that I understand that no foe can stand against my Lord and to trust Him, regardless of how the circumstances look. Better that I school myself against bribes, rewards, and self-indulgence and instead lean on the Shelter that is ever near.

© 2012 Robin L. O’Hare. All Rights Reserved. Permission granted for nonprofit and church groups to use this article in its entirety (including this notice). For other uses, please contact servinggodalone@yahoo.com.

Isaiah 1:15-29

“When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; Put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes. Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rebuke the oppressor; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool. If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land.” (NKJV)

There is a time when the Lord will not hear our prayers, even the prayers of those of us who are believers.

That is a harsh statement, but perhaps this is a harsh time, demanding harsh truths. The fact is, would you rather hear easy words that may not be true or harsh words that will change your life? I know for me, sometimes I’m tired of harsh things. But harsh things from the Lord are like goodness to my heart because they come from His heart of love, His longing for me to be in right relationship with Him.

“Even though you make many prayers, I will not hear.”

I think that many of us have been taught that when God is silent, He is not ignoring us. And that may be true some of the time. But there are other times when God is silent because He is refusing to hear our prayers, regardless of how many prayers we pray. You see, He is waiting for one specific prayer, the prayer of confession, the prayer of repentance. We know that He will always hear that prayer because He has promised so. 1 John 1:9 states, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” To whom should we confess? Well, first of all, we need to confess to the Father. After committing adultery (and getting exposed publically), King David prayed:

“For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Your sight” (Psalm 51:3-4, NKJV).

The evil that we do is first and foremost against God. It may also be against others, but our confession must first be to Him.

There is a sequence within the verses in Isaiah that I think are important. The first is to “wash yourself, make yourselves clean.” Now, of course, we can’t expunge our sins ourselves, but we can confess them and seek the Father’s forgiveness. He has promised to cleanse us from all unrighteousness once we confess. However, that cleansing is conditional; it hinges upon our willingness to confess at least the sins we know. (Are there sins we commit of which we may be unaware? Yes, of course.)

The second thing is to put away the evil that we are doing. In the words of my pastor, “Stop it!” It’s that simple . . . and that hard. Things that we have been doing have become habits. We may actually fall into the behavior without even thinking, at least initially. So we need to make a conscious effort to put the evil away.

I think about putting things away. It’s very easy to not put things away. Have you ever done that in your home? I know that teenagers are often accused of not putting away their clothes and other possessions, but simply dropping them on the nearest surface. I do that, too, sometimes, simply leaving things at the closest place and not putting them away . . . in the cupboard, in the closet, in the dishwasher, back on the shelves, in the drawer. It only takes a few seconds to put something away, but sometimes we feel so overwhelmed, so tired. We indulge ourselves by not putting away. And yet, it only takes a few things not put away to completely mess up our homes.

The Lord here is talking about more than just dropping our evil in the nearest drawer so that it is out of sight. He’s talking about putting it away from us completely forever. Digging a hole and burying it so that it can never be seen (or done) again. He says to “put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes.” God sees all! So if we are to put away our sin, it means we can never, ever, EVER do it again.

A few years ago I developed an allergy to chocolate. Well, I think I developed this allergy. I spent six of the worse hours of my life in a hospital ER with pains that were so horrible that I wanted to die. The doctor was flummoxed and couldn’t decide what the problem was. They tested me for a heart attack, for ulcers, for all kinds of things. Finally after talking to me, he told me that his best guess was that I had developed a reaction to the chocolate that I had eaten that day. I decided to never eat chocolate again. Even if the doctor was wrong, it’s simply not worth the chance.

Never to eat chocolate again. Now I have to tell you that I absolutely love hot fudge sundaes, chocolate chip cookies, and chocolate cream candy from Sees. But I will never eat any of it again. I have put it away forever.

There are other things in my life much more important that my reaction to chocolate that I should put away forever. These are sins and are an affront to the Father Who gave His all for me. I need to put them away.

God emphasizes that when He continues with “Cease to do evil.” Just stop it! My husband and I were talking last night about how self indulgent our society has become. Our days seem to be filled with the question of “what do I want to do now?” rather than focusing on what we should be doing. (There are so many ministry opportunities staring us in the face if we would simply put aside the idea that our time, our resources, our efforts are our own.) The scripture commands us to “cease to do evil.” If we have the courage to ask, God will reveal to us those things we are doing that are evil.

Lastly He tell us to “learn to do good.” Do you know that we aren’t born good? We are born innocent, which is actually not a lack of sin but a protection from the sin that has already captured our hearts simply because, as babies, we don’t have the wherewithal to step aside from ourselves and see the Lord. But as babies, we are not good. Quite the contrary, babies are totally self-absorbed! We have to learn to do good. We have to find out what those good things are and then train ourselves to do them. And the best, most reliable teacher is the Holy Spirit. Other teachers may point us in the right direction, but we need to be careful to whom we listen. Some people who appear to be trustworthy actually are not! They are false teachers. But we can listen to the Holy Spirit every time and know that He speaks only the heart of God.

If we want the Father to hear our prayers, we must first deal with our sin. We must confess it, put it aside, and learn to do good. And then the Father, Who longs to speak to us, will hear and prayers and have communion with us.

© 2012 Robin L. O’Hare. All Rights Reserved. Permission granted for nonprofit and church groups to use this article in its entirety (including this notice). For other uses, please contact servinggodalone@yahoo.com.