Seeing Past the Swagger

From Isaiah 29 – 6 You will be punished by the Lord of hosts
With thunder and earthquake and great noise,
With storm and tempest
And the flame of devouring fire.
7 The multitude of all the nations who fight against Ariel,
Even all who fight against her and her fortress,
And distress her,
Shall be as a dream of a night vision.
8 It shall even be as when a hungry man dreams,
And look—he eats;
But he awakes, and his soul is still empty;
Or as when a thirsty man dreams,
And look—he drinks;
But he awakes, and indeed he is faint,
And his soul still craves:
So the multitude of all the nations shall be,
Who fight against Mount Zion.”
9 Pause and wonder!
Blind yourselves and be blind!
They are drunk, but not with wine;
They stagger, but not with intoxicating drink.
10 For the Lord has poured out on you
The spirit of deep sleep,
And has closed your eyes, namely, the prophets;
And He has covered your heads, namely, the seers.


"The reward," writes a reviewer in the New Yorker on the experience of reading journalist Richard Rovere,  "is appreciating the acuity with which he could see, past the swagger, what was genuinely at stake."

In Isaiah 29:6-10, we see how rare a gift of grace that is. Those the Lord uses to judge Israel have no idea of the deeper significance of their part. They are navigating through a dream, determines verse seven, and will get no greater sustenance from their risk, predicts verse eight than a thirsty or hungry man who only dreams of having those needs satisfied. They can't, in the phrasing of the New Yorker, see past the swagger.

It gets worse. Verse nine extends the indictment to the people of God, the students of His Book. They, we, are also sleepwalking. The Gospel plays out before them, and us, but we don't tune in. Even the prophets have their eyes closed. Even the very people who, in the phrasing of the New Testament would be quickened by the Holy Spirit our as though drunk by wine.

Blessed are we, though, that the Lord commits to never warning His people needlessly. By His grace, His Word, and His Spirit, we CAN see past the swagger. However we are used in or subsumed by today's drama, we can begin to perceive its greater Gospel significance. Used in influence or power like Israel's enemies, we can, by grace, allows the experience to humble us as we use what He has given in order to point to Him by our heart for service.

Likewise, where we receive confrontation or correction from the day's events, we can receive in humility and gratitude rather than in a wine-like stupor of anxiety or entertainment. We want to perceive the greater purpose. We would see Jesus wherever He places us in interactions.

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