ISAIAH’S PROPHECY of a new heaven and new Earth is the focus of this week’s Old Testament study. We note sections where Isaiah is cited by later prophets, highlight another example of the divine council worldview (God’s condemnation of a ritual meal for the Canaanite gods Gad and Meni), and discuss the parallels between the last chapters of Isaiah and the last chapters of Revelation.Continue Reading
THE DESTRUCTION of Assyria and the prophetic implications of its destruction are the focus of this week’s study.Continue Reading
THERE IS a chapter in the Book of Isaiah that is so clearly about the suffering servant, the Messiah, that have tended to avoid it for centuries.Continue Reading
GOD CAN deliver us in the face of overwhelming odds. We discuss two examples of this from the book of Isaiah this week–the miraculous healing of Hezekiah, marked by the backwards movement of the sundial’s shadow, and the deliverance of Jerusalem from the unstoppable might of the Assyrian army.Continue Reading
HEZEKIAH WAS a better king than any since David, and better than all those who followed. He repaired and restored the Temple, reinstituted the worship of Yahweh, and tore down the high places devoted to Baal and Astarte (not just in Judah, but in Israel, too).Continue Reading
ALREADY BUT not yet. That’s a phrase we use often when discussing Bible prophecy, and it’s appropriate again this week. We discuss the destruction of the northern kingdom, Israel, by the Assyrians as punishment for abandoning the LORD. Then we look at two chapters of the fascinating Book of Isaiah.Continue Reading