Isaiah 8:19-10:4

Isaiah 8:19

Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?

Isaiah 8:19–22

1 Samuel 28

- Mediums and spiritists are those who communicate with unclean entities (such as the dead). There are many non-Christian religions that communicate with mediums and spiritists. This is why God gets very angry when His children do this, because they are falling under the control of Satan and his demons.

See Leviticus 19:31; 20:6; 2 Kings 21:6; 23:24; Isaiah 19:3; Jeremiah 27:9–10

- God forbids His children to use mediums and spiritists, do not listen to them. God thinks this is evil. If people refuse to obey and still consult them, God will turn His face away from these people.

- If people refuse to obey and still consult them, God will turn His face away from these people.

See also Romans 1

- By not seeking spiritual truth, God will leave, and leave the mind to rot.

“Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.”

Isaiah 9:1–5

- Matthew 4:12-17 fulfills Isaiah 9:1-2 through Jesus. Jesus allowed God’s Light to shine upon the darkness of the Gentiles.

- From John 1:1-9 describes how Jesus is the light that gives light to every man in the world.

Isaiah 9:6–7

- The child from 9:6-7 and 7:14 refer to Jesus. He will bring light and peace to the world.

See 2 Samuel 7:12–13, 16

- This child’s kingdom will come from David’s blood line, and it will last forever.

Isaiah 9:8–10:4

- The repeated phrase is “Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away, his hand is still upraised.” It is related to Isaiah’s message against Israel in that because Israel has done evil in God’s eyes, God will punish Israel. But even though God has anger for the evil that Israel has done, God will still welcome His children home if they choose to come home and will thus never abandon them.

- The reasons identified for Israel’s prolonged judgment are listed in Isaiah 9:13-17

“But the people have not returned to him who struck them,

nor have they sought the LORD Almighty.

So the LORD will cut off from Israel both head and tail,

both palm branch and reed in a single day;

the elders and prominent men are the head,

the prophets who teach lies are the tail.

Those who guide this people mislead them,

and those who are guided are led astray.

Therefore the Lord will take no pleasure in the young men,

nor will he pity the fatherless and widows,

for everyone is ungodly and wicked,

every mouth speaks vileness.”

- God destroyed the cities Sodom and Gomorrah because the two cities did a lot of Evil in God’s eyes. God “rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah.” (See Genesis 19:1-29)

- God’s grace is that even though no matter how much we try to be good, we will never be good enough, He will still choose to love us and to welcome us. As long as we choose to be with Him and listen to His teaching, we will be welcomed back. God’s grace is the sacrifice of His one and only perfect son, Jesus Christ. Without Jesus, we would still be under the penalty of sin that is so great, we would never be able to set foot in Heaven and be with God. But Jesus died for us and washed away all our sins, allowing us to enter Heaven once again. God’s grace is thus very amazing. He chooses to welcome us back. Even though there is nothing we can ever do to become perfect or good enough to enter Heaven, God sacrificed His own son to allow us to get back to Him. Hence, God’s grace is great and eternal.

God’s wrath, similarly, is thus very amazing as well. He gives his people many chances to turn good before He punishes them (hence, “slow to anger”), but once those chances are ignore, He will punish them (like how He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah).

And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation.”