Isaiah 7:17-25

A SENTENCE OF DOOM

Isaiah 7:17. The Lord shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people, &c.

I. God is sovereign in the whole earth. He is the great controller of all nations. All governments are but instruments which He uses when and as He pleases (Isaiah 7:17). A thought full of comfort for the righteous, of terror for the unrighteous.

II. The consequent insecurity of all prosperity that is not based upon, and promotive of, righteousness (Isaiah 7:23). True of nations: Britain will be “Great Britain” only so long as God pleases. True of individuals: (H. E. I. 3991, 4403–4406).

III. Whatever chastisements God may have inflicted, He has always a more terrible one behind (Isaiah 7:17).

IV. Seeing that all these things were threatened against and inflicted upon God’s chosen people, learn that no mercy that God has shown us will furnish any immunity for us, if, notwithstanding that mercy, we sin against Him. There is a tendency in our evil hearts to think, that because God has been specially good to us, we may sin with less risk than others; but the teaching of the Bible is, that those who “turn the grace of God into lasciviousness” shall be visited with a sorer doom than others (H. E. I. 4564, 4568, 4570).