everybody. Welcome back to another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Hey, it's what day's Wednesday as you're listening to this. Happy midweek. You've made it halfway through your week, and that's a win in and of itself. Hot this week in Texas. First a hundred degree days that we've seen all year coming at US, a hundred, 403. I've seen a couple of those on the radar. I think we've hit it already. I just think this is the first time it's been predicted. I think we just hit those temperatures regularly or at, I take that back. Some of it is, it feels like. 100 something outside feels like temperature. The actual temperature is 95 or whatever. Which I'm never quite sure what accounts for that. I'm guessing maybe it's the humidity. I think it's the humidity and combination. Yeah. It's like wind chill. It can feel like 30 degrees, but the windchill makes it feel like 15 degrees because, yeah. Okay. That makes sense. Yeah, hot days ahead anyways. Hot. Hot either way here, but it's been such a mild summer. It's been super mild. I almost welcome it. It's like where you been Texas this whole time? I've been waiting for those 110 days. Yeah. And I've been a little disappointed. Yeah. It has been mild. Back when I lived here the first time around, we had one summer where we had over 30, 35 days in a row of triple degree temperatures. Bring it on man. Really? I dare you. Really? Yeah. Pass hard. Pass on that one. I'm good. Without that. I don't need the 30 days of a hundred plus. I don't need it, but there's a little bit of Texas pride when I say, yeah we get hot temperature and this is how we live. Sure. We like it this way, but my AC bill being less. I'd rather have that than my AC bill being high. What do you keep your AC at? Maybe that's the issue. Typically like 76. Okay. Maybe you need to put it at 78 or 82 90. Not a lot of money that way. Just put it at 90, 95 will be good. Yeah, because really what you wanna do is just cut off the humidity. Yeah. So keeping it at 95, you'll be okay. I don't think so. Yeah, I think we'll pass on that. Air conditioning is a common grace. We talked about Common Grace in one of the last few episodes we did. Yeah. So I'm thankful for that. Keep our students in mind. They're down at Laham Springs. Latham Springs, and they are enjoying revival. We, we trust. And so they left yesterday, that's Tuesday. So as we recorded they left a few hours ago as we sit here right now. And so pray for them. They arrive safely. We do know that. So that's good news. But just be praying for the week in general. It should be a good week for them. Let's jump into our daily Bible reading, 'cause we got a lot of ground to cover in this episode, at least Isaiah 31 through 34. It's four chapters in case you're not great with math. But yeah, Isaiah 31 is is warning those that are gonna be tempted to go down to Egypt. And the backdrop of all of this, and again, I think we've mentioned this before, but for me this has been enlightening and helped me understand Isaiah so much more to understand that the backdrop and the main threat in the book of Isaiah is not Babylon. But Assyria, and that's what's happening here as well. The backdrop of this and the temptation that they would have to go down to Egypt is because of the Assyrians, because of the threat of the Assyrians. And so God is telling them, don't go down to Egypt. In fact, he's gonna tell them in verse three, if you do the helper, meaning Egypt will stumble, and he who is helped, meaning Judah will fall and they will all perish together. So he's saying you should not trust them. Instead, verses four and five. And there can be some confusion here. Some people wonder. Is the lion a negative omen and then the bird a positive one? Or are they both negative? Are they both positive? I think they're both positive because I think what God is saying is you can trust him. You can trust in the Lord to protect Jerusalem, that God is going to, rather than them needing to go down to Egypt to be protected, God is gonna be protect, protecting them. He is not terrified by their shouting that of the Assyrians or daunted by D. D, what's the word, daunted. Thank you. Daunted by their noise. So he's gonna protect them like a bird hovering over its nest. So the Lord will protect Jerusalem. And so God is telling them, turn to me instead. That's verse six. Turn to him because Yahweh is the only one that can actually deliver. Verse eight, the Assyrian shall fall by the sword, not of man. We're gonna read about this. In the next couple of days here, when we get into the narrative of what actually happens with Sin Ara coming against Judah, but that's really what's going on here in the first part of Chapter 31 at least, is I guess all of chapter 31 is God is warning the people when the Assyrians come. Don't go down to Egypt, don't look to anyone else. Trust in the Lord. Yeah. Verse five tells us that. God's going to initiate protection over his people. And then notice after verse five, and it's important to notice this five, five comes to four six. That's obvious, but I want you to see the progression in how it works. Verse five is God taking care of his people. And then verse six is, and so turn, so repent. It's almost like God is saying, respond to the grace that you're being shown. And that's not different to us or toward us today. It is God's kindness. Paul says. That leads us to repentance. And here you see it in action in God's interactions with Judah saying, please look at what I'm doing for you. And as a result of that turn, and I could encourage you all to do the same, as you see God's kindness in action towards you and giving you all the good things that you enjoy, the air conditioning, the paycheck, the food that you enjoy, the relative peace and security that you have. God is using that as a way to say. Notice who I am. Notice how good I've been to you, and as a consequence of that, turn from your sin and put your trust fully in me and not in the things. Yeah. Chapter 32, the focus shifts, as it so often does in the book of Isaiah, away from the present to the future and a future king. And this is gonna be the Messiah. And that's in 32. One behold, a king will reign in righteousness and princes will rule injustice. And he goes on here to describe what the millennial kingdom is gonna be like. And the millennial kingdom is gonna be a time when the undoing of Isaiah six is gonna be realized. Verse three, the eyes of those who see will not be closed. The ears of those who hear will give attention. Remember, Isaiah's commission was to go to those who would not hear and would not see. I. And so this time in the millennial kingdom, it's gonna be reversed. There's still gonna be sin there. The fool will be no more called noble nor the scoundrel said to be honorable. That means there still will be fools and scoundrels both in the millennial kingdom, those verse six who have a heart that is busy with iniquity. That jumped out to me this time around as the definition of a fool being one whose heart is busy with iniquity. And we would say we don't wanna be fools. We wanna be the opposite of that. So our heart should be busy with. Righteousness, busy with thinking about and pondering, how can I fear God? What does that look like for me to obey the Lord? But the millennial kingdom is gonna be marked by a reign of righteousness and foolishness. And the sins of these people, they are not going to be celebrated. They're not going to be honored the way that our world does today. You look around the world today and plenty of fools that are elevated, that are put up on pedestals and say, this is honorable during the reign of Christ. It's gonna be the opposite of that. Verses nine. In, in following, then we get into the the complacent women. But just complacency in general here, at least through verse 14. Those that are at ease are gonna find that, that they're gonna face judgment, that they're gonna be up against the judgment of the Lord. Now, this is long term. Verse 14, the palace being forsaken. The populous city deserted the hill and the watchtower will become dense forever. A joy of wild donkeys and a pasture of flocks. This could be looking forward to either the. The destruction by Nebuchadnezzar or the long-term destruction that's gonna come during the tribulation period, because what comes next is another return to the vision of the millennial kingdom. And verse 15, until the spirit is poured upon us from on high again, that's gonna be during the time of the millennial kingdom, where verse 18, the people will abide in peaceful habitation and secured dwellings and in quiet resting places. Yeah, this is a really interesting part here. I don't know why he identifies the women in particular, but maybe it's better just to see this as a call to all the people, as I think you just alluded to, to avoid a complacency with your relationship with God. And you talked about this a little bit on Sunday talking about sacrificially investing in our relationship with God, lest we, like Judah, find ourselves on the business end of God's discipline. Can you talk a little bit about that? Remind us what you preached and maybe if you see any connections between that and what you see here with these complacent gals. Y Yeah, just that, that idea. Remember in Haggai that the Temple Land ruins, and we made the point that temple represented our relationship with God. And so part of the call was, Hey, you know you, I'm calling you away from what you may want to do with your funds, your money, everything else, your paneled houses, and I'm calling you to turn your attention to making sure that your relationship with God, the temple IE. Is intact. And for them it was gonna be materialistic sacrifice 'cause they were gonna have to literally rebuild the temple. For us, it's thinking about, man, we, we live in an area. I made the comment on Sunday that our biggest concern is what's going in the shopping center over by target. Which by the way, if it's not wrong to care about that, like that's fine. I'm curious what's going in over there too, but. We need to also remember that we can be lulled into a state of spiritual complacency or spiritual stagnancy, e even, and be comfortable when God is calling us to realize that man following him is gonna cost us. We're not meant to be at home in this world. There was that worship song back in the early two thousands. All I know is I'm not home yet. This is not where I belong. And that's true. And we need to remember those things and. Look for our eternal rest in the future, and in the meantime, realize that to be a Christian here is swimming upstream. Jesus said, that the way is narrow and difficult, that leads to eternal life. And few there are who find it, but the way is broad that leads to eternal destruction. So sacrificing caring about these things, making sure that we're not too comfortable here, such that becomes our idol. I'm always reminded that the quote, I don't remember the first person to say it, but somebody said that for the unbeliever, this is as close to heaven as they'll ever get. And for the believer, this is as close to hell as we'll ever get. And so we can't. As believers think that this is as close to heaven as we'll ever get, because heaven's gonna be way better than this is. And speaking of heaven here, verse 15 excuse me, verse 18. Nope, I was wrong on both accounts. Verse 17. In the middle. In the middle, the effect of righteousness will be peace. And I think that's important because the peace that we all long for that kind of serenity and security that we desire, it says here is the result of righteousness. And so that tells me the greater the righteousness, the greater our experience of peace, the greater the wickedness, the greater our experience of. Tumult and turmoil and bad things. So the thing that you and I most deeply want, we will get in the millennial kingdom and beyond. When Christ is ruling and reigning over the creation, it's at this point when perfect righteousness is ruling that peace is experience. He says here, the result of righteousness is quietness. Trust forever. I love that imagery, quietness, and trust. I think about sitting on our chairs in our front porch with a good cup of coffee, enjoying a quiet, peaceful morning as the sun is rising. This is the mentality that at least I have about this. We all want something like that, and whether yours includes a cup of coffee or something else, the piece that we long for will only be known fully in Christ. But in the meantime, I think there's something important about saying the greater the righteousness of the people. The greater the experience of relative peace, relative righteousness, relative peace, I think we can experience some of that today. Although the ultimate only comes in Christ. So let's talk about what you just pictured for a second there. 'cause it got me thinking, okay what is everybody's individual conception of that, right? Is it okay for us to think that's yes. What eternity is gonna be like the eternal state, the new earth. We talked about recently some of that, that the new Jerusalem's gonna be there, but there's also gonna be nations and there's going to be people living in different parts of the globe. At that point, whatever the new earth is gonna look like, is it gonna be the the reality that we're gonna be able to say like designer situation, be like this is the reality that I want, so this is what my eternity's gonna be like. How much of that is really gonna be in our control? I wonder. I could tell by the way that you asked that question that you probably have different ideas and that's okay. I think part of what I was getting at, no, not necessarily. I wasn't trying to disagree with you. I'm just, you were disagreeing underneath your breath. I can tell. No. I'm really curious. The way you're looking at me right now tells me everything I need to know. Just kidding. Go ahead. No I'm not disagreeing with you because when I think of eternity, I think of, the fact of the new earth being able to go out and, play golf on a golf course on the new earth and enjoy that to the glory of God because we'll have glorified bodies and it's but then you'll have the camp that's yeah, but it's all about Jesus. Don't forget, it's all about Jesus and they're right, but it's, it can be both and. And I think that's the beauty of the eternal state. Yeah. Is that you're gonna know what it is to pursue the things that maybe you love doing as an expression of your worship to Jesus, rather than just as a self-satisfying thing that you want to go do. They're not mutually exclusive. You would do all you do according to one Corinthians 10 31, to the glory of God, you would be able to do that imperfection, which means there would never be a competition between your favorite. Fill in the blank cup of coffee, your favorite person, and Jesus, because you would enjoy that person and that cup of coffee to the glory of Christ. You would recognize them as a gift from your good savior. You would see all the good in them as an expression and a reflection of Jesus, your savior. So yeah, absolutely. I agree with that entirely. And what I was getting at is not so much the exact image of sitting on my front porch with a sunrise, but more that, that sense. And that experience of serenity. Peace. You hear birds, you feel a gentle breeze. That concept of peacefulness is one flavor and one, I think experience that we can expect in the new heavens and the new earth, although perfected without sin at all. And that's an exciting thing to think about. I'm just trying to paint a picture of one aspect of it. Yeah. In fact, there was a quote that our friend Eric Zeller sent out from John MacArthur on Twitter. This week in the wake of MacArthur's passing where he, MacArthur was saying that because of that reality man, that this future that is gonna be there in the presence of God and without sin and everything else. He said, death for the Christian really is a friend because it, it ushers us into the presence of God, which is a different way to look at death for sure. That's right. Chapter 33 the focus returns here at the outset to Assyria, chapter 33, verse one, ah, you destroyer, who yourself have not yet been destroyed, you traitor, whom none has betrayed. This is talking about the Assyrians at this point. And yet God is going to look at his people and you'll, if you look at verse two, there's a different approach. Now they're willing to be patient. At least a remnant of them are, oh, Lord, be gracious to us. We wait for you be our arm every morning. And so their mindset now is God, we're gonna. We're gonna wait for you. We're gonna trust you. Even verse five, recognizing God's authority, God's power, God's sovereignty. The Lord is exalted for He dwells on high. He will fill Zion with justice and righteousness, and he will be the stability of your time. So they're confident. Even as Assyria is amassing, the threat is growing. Hey, we can trust in the Lord. In verse 10, we see this God's sovereignty expressed from his own perspective. When he says, now I will arise, says the Lord. Now I will lift myself up and now I will be exalted. And so God's timing is his perfect unfolding of his sovereign plan. And here he's saying this is now when it's gonna happen. He does look forward to this. Remnant though, he says, who among us, verse 14 is gonna be able to dwell with the consuming fires as the judgment comes. Who can dwell there? It reminds us of Psalm 15 and in some of the other Psalms of who can dwell on God's holy hill and it's similar language here. He who walks uprightly or righteously. And speaks uprightly, who despises the gain of oppression. So the righteous ones, those are the ones that are gonna be okay during the judgment of God that is coming here. But God is going to bring the judgment and the people can wait and the people can trust in that the language. Notice of verse 16 when he says his bread will be given him in his water will be Sure. That would've. Particularly in poignantly for them, because this is something that was felt greatly during a siege like they were gonna experience when the Assyrians came against the city. That bread was gonna be a, an immensely costly commodity. Water was gonna be necessary, has Akira, was gonna have to build the tunnel to, to bring water into the city. And so God is promising those that are righteous, you're gonna be fed and you're gonna be watered. And that's more than just spiritual realities. I think it's even pointing to the fact that he's gonna take care of them physically too, there. I wanna point out to you too, that faith must a, as a necessity of its reality, produce works, which is why God can say through Isaiah who are there gonna be those who don't experience his consuming fire. It is those who walk righteously and speak uprightly. In other words, the one that possesses faith in Yahweh will. Of necessity. Display works that demonstrate faith is active. We're gonna see this again in the New Testament, so this is not brand new. I just wanna show you though the way that the scriptures pointed out, everyone's faith who is real and active will produce real and active works. In this case, it looks like someone who walks righteously. That is, they have a life that is not perfect, but one that is blameless before God. They speak not with perfection, but they are upright with their words. And Jesus says later, under the new covenant. Now, well under the New Testament, that is out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks, and so a heart that is right before God walks righteously and speaks uprightly. So don't get confused about this is not works. Righteousness. This is evidence of faith displayed in the works of righteousness. And ladies listening to this, you may want to show up at Women's Bible Study on Saturday and actually hear more of that exact same concept expressed during the the message there from Ephesians. Oh, cool. So what is it a man? Is it a Amanda preaching? She's, yeah. What what chapter? Ephesians two, eight through 10. All right. So yeah, the works that have been prepared for us. Right on. Yep. Yep. That's exciting. Yeah, it will be From here, the rest of chapter 33. He does talk more about the millennial kingdom. Your eyes will behold the king in his beauty. The king is gonna be the Messiah there. Verse 20. Behold Zion, the city of our appointed feast. Your eyes will see Jerusalem. Untroubled habitation, immovable tent, whose stakes shall never be plucked up again. This this picture of this future Jerusalem's reality is looking forward to the millennial kingdom when the Lord is verse 22, our judge, our law giver, and our king who will save us. That's the Israelites speaking of him in that capacity there. So those days are coming again, the messages of judgment and hope that are interwoven throughout Isaiah. Isaiah I know I keep saying this. I find Isaiah is. It's a dense book. It's, there's so much there. And it's, I, you wonder how, what would've been received, I guess we know Isaiah six, but you wonder how, from the faithful remnant, how they would've received all of this as it's being delivered from the prophet there. It looks like it's one of those books that provides a lot of foundation for the New Testament concepts. Yeah. And even if he's, even if he's not being deliberately quoted, there are, they're drawing. A ton on Isaiah's resources to speak about the new Covenant. Yeah. Chapter 34 really sets up chapter 35 but chapter 34 is talking about the judgment the tribulation, the judgment that's gonna come against all nations. Again, we have to ask ourselves, has this happened yet? And if the answer is no, then we must assume. Because God is faithful to his word and faithful to his promises that it's yet future. And I think here we're looking forward to a future time when God is going to judge. He's going to be enraged against verse two. All the nations furious against all their hosts. The host of heaven, verse four shall rot away and the skies roll up like a scroll. That's language indicative of what we. John sees in Revelation chapter six. So this is eschatological judgment that's taking place here. This is the tribulation. This is the ultimate judgment of God. And in verses eight and following, the Lord has a day of vengeance, a year of recompense for the cause of Zion, for his people Jerusalem, the streams of. Edem. So Edem is singled out here as a representation of all of the nations that are gonna suffer. So this isn't just about edem per se, but it's really about what God is gonna do to all of the nations that are gonna come there. And what you see here in the rest of this chapter is absolute desolation. All that once was inhabited by edem is now gonna be made desolate. The wild animals are gonna be there, the owl is gonna nest there, verse 15, and lay her eggs and hatch and gather their young and the shadows there. And so this is God's saying to the people judgment is going to come and when it comes is going to be all encompassing and he's going to act for the sake of Zion, for the sake of Judah, for the sake of his covenant with David. You can even think that, but ultimately for the cause of his own name and the glory of his name. We see some evidence too, of an early, or at least language that speaks later of the developments of the idea of hell verse 10, night and day. It shall not be quenched. Its smoke shall go up forever. And this in part, remember this is the beginning of the section starting in verse eight, that Lord has a day of vengeance. So you see hints of. Exer exercise of just judgment in the creation of and the sustaining of hell. And here it's just ever so slightly foreshadowed. You don't see a full expression of it. But I think that's what's happening here. Verse 10, night and day. It shall not be quenched it smoke shall go up forever, generation to generation. It shall lie. Waste none shall pass through it forever. This is the desolation that God effects on his. Enemies. And by the way, notice here, it's a de creation event where God spoke all things into existence. Now he is speaking judgment upon it and leaving it desolate, broken without anything. He stretches the line of confusion over it and the plumb line of emptiness. He's destroying what he once created. And this is an act of his just judgment. This is something to be afraid of, and yet not afraid in the sense of saying, as a Christian, we should fear his judgment, but we should be afraid for our. Friends and our neighbors who, who don't know this, if we really believe this, and I ask this sincerely, if you really believe this, what is it doing for you? If you only feel self satisfied that there's salvation for you in Christ? I guess that's a good thing to have security in that. But don't forget, there's a lot of people that this will be affected against, and this is not a good end for anybody who's involved in it. For sure. You mentioned the de creation. I'm curious to get your thoughts on the. What takes place to this current earth in the end, because Peter talks about the heavens are gonna dissolve like fire and the earth is gonna be burned as well. There's two camps out there. There's the kind of. The rehab camp, remodel camp, and then there's the recreation camp. Do you have a particular dog in the fight on, on which one of those you would side on? It's actually because of Peter that I believe it's a, I don't like the term refurbish because it does conjure up ideas of, oh it's almost brand new, but it's not, it looks brand new. I think that's probably one of the closest parallels is that God so destroys it, that he takes what's left over and creates. Something that is consistent. Yeah, there's a continuity with it. Yeah, but entirely other and different because it's creation without sin. So although there is a. There is a sense in which it's a refurbished creation because he destroys all of it by fire, but it's still the same stuff that he's gonna use. In other words, God's not going to ex nihilo create new earth. New people. Yeah. It's the same earth, it's the same material. He's gonna repurpose it and perfect it. That's my thought about that. What would you say? Yeah. And I think that fits with Romans eight too. When it, when Paul says that creation groans under the way of the curse. Longing for the appearance of Christ. If creation's gonna be blown to smither means, and there's a new creation coming, that's. Totally brand new, not like anything of the old then. Then it's not gonna be groaning and longing for that day. Be like, let's just wait. Let's just pause on that. I'm good guy. Yeah, we're good? Yeah, this is fine. Yeah. It's fascinating though, because you wonder what similarities will be there because you go to the Grand Canyon today and it's awe inspiring. It causes you to glorify God. 'cause you see it, you go to the oceans, you go to the rocky mountains. Although we've talked about whether or not there'll be oceans in the eternal state. Oh, anyways. Let's pray and then we'll be done with with this episode. God we confess the mysterious is beyond us. And ultimately, as the word says, the secret things belong to you. And yet those are secret things that one day we'll know when we are with you and when we're in the new creation and when we get to experience these things. And we are excited about that though. Even as Pastor Rod was saying, this reality of the uncreation, of the judgment, of the wrath that's gonna be poured out is a reality that. Real people are going to experience. And even if they're not there during the tribulation period, they ha will have perhaps perished beforehand. They're gonna still experience your wrath and its fullness in eternity apart from you. And so we wanna be faithful as believers to be reaching those that need to hear Christ. And as we think about our existence as a church, we wanna be a church that lives on mission to reach, teach and train. And the first part of that is reaching the lost. And so we wanna be mindful of those that you've brought into our path, across our path in our neighborhoods and our workplaces to share the good news of faith in Jesus Christ. With them so that they will come to faith and repentance and turn to him for salvation. And so help us to be ambassadors that are passionate about reaching those people so that less and less we'll face your wrath on Judgment day. And so we thank you so much for today for your word, and we pray that we will continue to be faithful to you. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Keep your new Bibles and tune in again tomorrow for another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Bye all.

thanks for listening to another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. This is a ministry of Compass Bible Church in north Texas. You can find out more information about ourChurch@compassntx.org. We would love for you to leave a review to rate to share this podcast on whatever platform you happen to be listening on, and we will catch you against tomorrow for another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast.