Thursday, March 23, 2006
Isaiah's Prophecy
“Who hath believed the report?” The questions of all time won’t die, “To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?” Some still ask, “Why don’t I get it?”, as they always have and will continue until the absolute revelation of Jesus Christ becomes the undeniable reality. I know the questions because I asked them too. These are the ultimate questions of human existence. And when you’re on the outside, lookin’ in, they feel unanswerable. I remember thinking, “I’ll never understand this. It’s too weird.” Some of it is the emotional content. My family and I don’t attend the charismatic, “holy roller”, hand-clapping worship services, close and convenient to home, because of the “left out” feeling it holds for the quiet and reserved. But the real question isn’t “Who has shouted?” It is, “Who has believed the report?” It is all a matter of reading and believing. Most often, the belief would come first so that a person’s curiosity allows him to read with a ravenous hunger. Here, in Christianity Is Jewish, reading is placed in the sentence first. This is my fascination…reading, minus belief, is an option and a good one at that! As I read apologists like the Schaeffers, Lee Strobel, or Dr. Kennedy, I am utterly convinced, reading does lead to believing. I’m talking about the irrefutable fulfillment of the many, many Biblical prophecies in history, and the promises (prophecies) Christians are standing on because God has shown that He is good to His Word. There are evidences in archeology, secular historical writing, analysis of countless writers of faith and cross examination from the opposition, but let us dwell on the self-fulfilling evidence within the Bible. As Dr. Kennedy emphatically declares, “For those who are honest seekers after the truth there is abundant evidence.” (Why I Believe; p.116) “One of the purposes for God’s giving the Old Testament to the Jewish people was to be able to identify the Messiah when He came from among them. Prophecies are usually vague by nature; not the ones in the Word of God.” (p. 121) An unbeliever, right now, somewhere is saying, “I have honestly sought after truth and I don’t get it.”
“To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?” “Ah! To any who will listen with ears and minds,” dear Mrs. Schaeffer replies. (Sometimes I just wanna call her Mom!) “To any who will read with eyes and an ordinary understanding of words and grammar.”
She continues on the subject of Isaiah, “Forget that which men have said as they have taken the scissors of their unbelieving minds and have slashed out the supernatural parts of the Bible, letting them fall to the floor or in the fireplace, leaving a shorn bit of lacy scrap to piece together in the bizarre combinations [that] their own minds imagine to make more sense.” (Christianity Is Jewish; p. 92) Fitting it into the easier mythology/fable category isn’t a fair reading. Isaiah had a few words to put down on the paper of time, 700 years before Christ.
“To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?” “Ah! To any who will listen with ears and minds,” dear Mrs. Schaeffer replies. (Sometimes I just wanna call her Mom!) “To any who will read with eyes and an ordinary understanding of words and grammar.”
She continues on the subject of Isaiah, “Forget that which men have said as they have taken the scissors of their unbelieving minds and have slashed out the supernatural parts of the Bible, letting them fall to the floor or in the fireplace, leaving a shorn bit of lacy scrap to piece together in the bizarre combinations [that] their own minds imagine to make more sense.” (Christianity Is Jewish; p. 92) Fitting it into the easier mythology/fable category isn’t a fair reading. Isaiah had a few words to put down on the paper of time, 700 years before Christ.
