Hope in Disaster is Not the World - Isaiah 29-33

 Isaiah 30:1-5 (ESV)

Do Not Go Down to Egypt

“Ah, stubborn children,” declares the LORD,

“who carry out a plan, but not mine,

and who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit,

that they may add sin to sin;

who set out to go down to Egypt,

without asking for my direction,

to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh

and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt!

Therefore shall the protection of Pharaoh turn to your shame,

and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation.

For though his officials are at Zoan

and his envoys reach Hanes,

everyone comes to shame

through a people that cannot profit them,

that brings neither help nor profit,

but shame and disgrace.”

Who do you turn to in times of disaster?  Family? Work? Banks? Friends? Churches? Neighbors?  Load Sharks?  Credit Cards? Yard Sales? 

What is your go-to when things are getting rough? Who you do call? Spouse? Children? Parents? Your professional skills?  Your work habits? 

In the above chapter (30) we begin to read about Israel turning to Egypt in the time of need.  What is the need?  Well, in chapter 29 we just read about Israel (Jerusalem) being under-siege.   A wicked nation has come to take Jerusalem captive.  The horrors we read in 29 have lead to the poor decisions in chapter 30.  When the nation of Israel has had this rough time and this awful experience, they do not turn to God, their Father.  Instead they turn to Egypt.   The seemingly turn to two towns in Egypt, Zoan and Hanes.   We know little about them but the envoys they Israel sent out to appeal to Egypt for help, have reached these two cities.   We know little about these cities, but we do know that there was no profit found in them for help.   We do read that instead of the support they were hoping in, the envoy from Israel was I stand brought to shame and disgrace.   In fact, God, through Isaiah, tells them that the “shelter in the shadow of Egypt” they thought they would get, has, instead given them humiliation.   

When we turn to someone other than God for our help in times of need, we do the same thing.   We hope to get help but we receive humiliation instead.   Maybe not at first.   But, in disaster we often think the world has the answer for us.  It does not.  Egypt in God’s Word is always a picture of the lost and dying world.  This is not where we are to turn.  The prophet Habakkuk’s words ring as equally true here to remind us that our only help in times of disaster and trouble is God.  He is our hope and our rejoicing: 

Habakkuk 3:17-19 (ESV)

Habakkuk Rejoices in the LORD

Though the fig tree should not blossom,

nor fruit be on the vines,

the produce of the olive fail

and the fields yield no food,

the flock be cut off from the fold

and there be no herd in the stalls,

yet I will rejoice in the LORD;

I will take joy in the God of my salvation.

GOD, the Lord, is my strength;

he makes my feet like the deer's;

he makes me tread on my high places.

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments.