God Warns All the Earth of the Wrath to Come (Isaiah Sermon 36)

Well, 2012 is over and we made it, especially past December 21st, 2012, 3:21 Pacific time, that Mayan experts told us was when the end was going to come. I don’t even know what I was doing at that point. I guess it would have been like 6:20 or so in the evening. I think I was just doing whatever I was doing on that day. Wasn’t too troubled by the Mayan apocalypse. I guess I was convinced that God had not communicated his will for the future to the Mayans and not to us. For God has spoken through the Prophets by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen. And this church is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. And about that day and hour, Jesus said, “No one knows what’s coming, not the angels in heaven, nor even the Son, but only the Father,” he said in the days of his incarnation on Earth. But it brings up this question of just the tendency that we have for an interest in doomsday scenarios, an interest in the future, a deep seeded yearning to know where are we heading? What’s to become of us? And even deeper is the fear that it’s not going to be good, that we’re heading towards something really, really terrifying, something that really will bring the human race to an end, called doomsday scenarios.

Perhaps some monstrous meteorite is hurdling toward us, and there’s nothing that we’ll be able to do, to stop it, and it’ll smash the surface of the Earth and change the climate so significantly that no human life will be able to survive. Or perhaps radiation blast from solar flares on the surface of the earth will heat up the core of the Earth so significantly that life on earth will be impossible. Or a gamma-ray burst somewhere in the galaxy, which cosmologists tell us is the most powerful event that there is in the cosmos, will make its way to the Earth and end at all. Or maybe the gradual destruction of the earth’s ozone layer. Global warming will change the climate enough to make the human race become extinct. Or perhaps the eruption of a super volcano will do about the same thing, all those scenarios basically come from physicists and environmentalists and cosmologists. There are doomsday scenarios that come from the science of politics, as well, and military might. In my childhood, when I was growing up, it was the Cold War between the West and the Communist block, the Soviet Union, specifically United States and the Soviet Union. When I was an infant, I don’t remember this, of course, but the terror of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and students were trained how to huddle under their desks or how to go to a fallout shelter. Sometimes you see in old urban areas, those fallout shelter signs.

In 1983, when I was a junior in college, there was a TV program called The Day After, some of you may remember it, in which the story line runs…it was a TV movie. Tensions between NATO and Warsaw Pact escalated to the point where there was a full nuclear exchange, resulting in nuclear holocaust. And the TV movie focused on what would happen specifically to citizens of two communities in Lawrence, Kansas and in Kansas City, Missouri. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, those kinds of expectations shifted a bit and moved over to the possibility of terrorist groups, irresponsible terrorist groups, getting hold of thermonuclear weapons and bringing an end to the human race, or perhaps the threats of biological, like an airborne pathogen that could just spread like wildfire through our race and bring us to extinction. Amazingly, some movies even depict the threat of robots of artificial intelligence, which will rise up against their creators and take over the planet, winning that war and ending the human race. Now, all of these doomsday scenarios and many others have been the fodder for movies and other things like that, showing the tremendous interest that people have for that, shows that the human heart is fixed on the future in a dark sort of sense.

What’s interesting to me as I look at all of these things, I find that with all of these popular depictions of the end, they’re leaving one thing out, and I think it’s the greatest threat that there is to the human race, and that is the wrath of God. And frankly, the clearest, doomsday scenario that there is, is unfolded in the pages of the book you carried with you in here this morning, the Bible. There is a clear doomsday scenario unfolded for us in the pages of the book of Revelation, most specifically there. And that book is filled with the outpouring of the wrath of God on the sinful human race. Our dark fears about the future have their origins in the Garden of Eden, when Adam was told, as I prayed about a moment ago, that he must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and in the day that he ate of it, he would surely die. And Adam sinned, he ate from that fruit, and he heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and he was terrified, and he hid from God. And God cursed him and cursed the ground because of him, but he didn’t kill him that day. Instead, God had a purpose, a plan for history to unfold, and God decided to defer the death penalty that Adam did experience later on. And so that’s where it starts, the looking ahead with fear to a dark future and wondering when is it going to come?

And so history is unfolded in the Book of Revelation, you have one judgment after another, one seal of the seven seals being broken after another, one trumpet or one bowl being poured out on the surface of the earth after another, and phenomenon, just appalling, startling, terrifying phenomenon. The sun dark and the moon not giving its light, the stars falling from the sky and the earth being removed, shaken and terror striking the entire human race. And judgments on the fresh water and on all the oceans and everything in the sea, dying and all of the water turning to bitterness to wormwood and people dying, just huge, huge numbers of people dying—a third of mankind dying in some of these plagues. Just think about that! Billions and billions of people, several billion people dying at the same time, you just… We can’t even conceive what that’s like. Chapter after chapter of this doomsday scenario, which is portrayed as prophecy, it’s going to come. The Bible says it’s going to happen.

And as we come to Isaiah 34, we have in microcosm, some of the themes that are unfolded for us in the Book of Revelation. As a matter of fact, Revelation quotes Isaiah 34 for some of it. We see in miniature the themes of the terror of the wrath of God being poured out on all nations on the face of the earth, right here in Isaiah 34. Now, next week, God willing will have the chance to look at the other side of the equation, Isaiah 35, which talks about the joy and delights of the redeemed. Some pastors take the two together, but I’ve chosen to preach this week on Chapter 34, and next week on 35, so please come back next week. And I won’t fail to give you the good news in Jesus this week as I desire to do every week.

I. God Summons the Nations to Listen (vs. 1)

But today we have the difficult business of looking at the wrath of God on all nations as depicted in Isaiah 34, and it begins in verse 1 with a summons, God gives a summons to all nations to hear him and to listen to him. Look at verse 1, “Come near, you nations, and listen; pay attention, you peoples! Let the earth hear, and all that is in it, the world, and all that comes out of it!” God is summoning the peoples of the world to listen to him and the pages of Scripture here, and he raises up people like me to proclaim it and to speak it so that you hear the sound of these words. And this is incredible, this is God’s grace, his indescribable grace to his enemies. To say, “I want you to know what’s going to happen. I wanna tell you what the future holds.” He’s the only one that can do it. God doesn’t have to warn us, doesn’t owe it to us to warn us. He can merely wipe out the sinners as he chooses to in his own time and in his own way—he does not have to warn us. But here he does give a very clear warning. He’s gracious and he summons the earth to listen to him. Just like at the very beginning of this book, in Isaiah 1:2, “Hear, O heavens; listen, O earth, for the Lord has spoken.” He wants people to hear him speak.

“God doesn’t have to warn us, doesn’t owe it to us to warn us. He can merely wipe out the sinners as he chooses to in his own time and in his own way—he does not have to warn us. But here he does give a very clear warning. “

We can also see in this word, the incredible patience of God toward his enemies, who are seething with hatred toward him, who are living in rebellion against him, and yet God so patient. This chapter written over 27 centuries ago, it’s a long time for God to wait. He is very patient. Not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance, as it says in 2 Peter. Sadly, so many of the people are not mindful of the fact that God’s kindness and tolerance and patience is meant to lead you to repentance. That’s what it’s for, God’s grace. And the warning here of this chapter, what it’s all about in the words of John the Baptist, as he called out to the sinners of his generation, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?” That’s what this is about, the coming wrath, the wrath to come. And he said, “Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.”

We also see in this summons in verse 1, the power of the word of God to deliver our souls. It is by listening to God speak that you will be saved. If you will just here and believe his word, you will be saved. Faith comes by hearing God’s word, and this scripture gives enough warning of what’s to come. He’s told us what’s coming. And if we heed that warning, if we hear it and believe it. Remember how I said in Hebrews 11:1, “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, but also the [rebuke] of things not seen.” To be brought up short to be convicted, to be convicted of sin by things not seen, to deal seriously with Judgment Day and the wrath to come, that’s a gift of faith, and God gives it by hearing the Word.

So Isaiah 34 has the power to lift up in your heart the themes you need to deal with, so that you don’t go in for the satanic illusion that things are always gonna go on is they always have. It’s a lie. There’s going to come an end. God himself will be the one to bring it about. But the good news in the center of all of this, faith in the crucified and resurrected Lord, has the power to deliver you from the wrath to come. If you will flee to Christ, he will welcome you. “All [that] the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me, I will never drive them away….[But] I will raise them up [on] the last day.” So you flee to Christ, and he will protect you from the wrath to come. You know why? ‘Cause he is the wrath to come. He is the wrath to come, he is the wrath of God. And if you flee to him, he will deliver you. So that’s a summons and he wants everyone to hear… And we’re part of that, we’re part of the world, we’re part of the nations on earth. We who are living here in the United States of America, we here in North Carolina in Durham, we’re part of the Earth. And God’s summoning us to listen to him today in verse 1. What does he say?

“There’s going to come an end. God himself will be the one to bring it about. But the good news in the center of all of this, faith in the crucified and resurrected Lord, has the power to deliver you from the wrath to come.”

II. God’s Wrath is On All Nations and Their Armies (vs 2-4)

Well, look at verse 2-4, “The Lord is angry with all nations; his wrath is upon all their armies. He will totally destroy them, he will give them over to slaughter. Their slain will be thrown out, their dead bodies will send up a stench; the mountains will be soaked with their blood. All the stars of the heavens will be dissolved and the sky rolled up like a scroll; [and] all the starry host will fall like withered leaves from the vine, like shriveled figs from the fig tree.” That’s the message. And so there are two shocking kind of themes or ideas in this chapter. First is that God is a God of overpowering wrath. He’s a passionate being, and he is angry about sin. It’s very disturbing to people. Secondly, the fact is that God is angry with all nations—not just some of them, but with every single nation on the face of the earth. His wrath is against all their armies. And why is this? Why? What’s the cause of this? Well, the Bible’s answer is very clear: God is angry about sin. It makes him angry when we sin, and “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” Romans 3:23. And why are there no exceptions? Why are there no exceptions? Well, it’s because there’s not a single political nation on earth that exists solely and exclusively for the glory of God in Jesus Christ—not one. That’s why.

It’s very black and white, very simple, Jesus made it black and white, “He who is not with me is against me, and [whoever] does not gather with me scatters.” It’s really that simple. What does he mean? Whoever “does not gather with me scatters.” What is he gathering? Well, as I said before, sin had a scattering effect on the universe an explosive effect, like a fragmentation grenade just blowing up this beautiful, orderly, perfect world that God made, and God in Christ is bringing all of those pieces back together and making them one under one head, God himself. And so he is gathering together all the scattered children of God and making them one, he says in John chapter 11, and in Ephesians 1:10, he is bringing “all things in heaven and earth together under one head, even Christ.” Is there a political nation on earth that’s interested in those things, that’s exerting its time and treasure and talents and efforts toward doing that? There’s not one. And therefore they’re against him, you see? If you’re not gathering with them, you’re scattering.

Now, this chapter also gives stark pictures of judgment and wrath, armies, armies given over to slaughter, literally dedicated to destruction, there’s a Hebrew word that’s very significant theologically, it’s related to the word for harem in English. The giving over, almost in a sacred…a solemn sacred ceremony, a giving over to something, for a sacred purpose. In this case, it’s for the purpose of destruction. And so God in his holiness wants the toxic waste in one place and he wants to destroy it, and so it’s given over to destruction. He uses the same word with Joshua when they crossed the Jordan River and he put the harem, he put that devotion to destruction on the city of Jericho and everything in it. He said, “Don’t take any of it, it’s all devoted to destruction, all of it.” Or again, the command that God gave to Saul with the Amalekites, they were under the same thing. Well, here he’s doing it to all nations and all their armies; they’re all given over to destruction in his mind. Verse 3 is horrible, it’s horrible. Dead bodies, giving up a stench, mountains soaked with blood. This is not metaphorical, this is talking about dead people, lots of them, and the stench that comes from them.

In Verse 4, even the host in the heavens will in some sense come under the judgment. In the ESV in verse 4, it says, “All the host of [the] heaven shall rot away, and the skies roll up like a scroll. All their host shall fall as leaves fall from the vine, like leaves falling from the fig tree.” Part of this I think is just in some amazing way, the end of the cosmos, as we know it. Copernicus is right, the sun doesn’t revolve around the earth, the other way around. But this doctrine teaches that the earth is still the center of God’s attention, and when events on Earth come to their end, the stars will fall from the sky. Now, that may seem like mythology to atheistic cosmologists, but the Scripture says it multiple places, not one or two. And so the stars will come to an end, when events on Earth come to an end, when God decrees it. Perhaps, and by the way, it says they shall rot away or dissolve, John Newton picked up on this in one of the not as commonly sung verses of “Amazing Grace.” They’ll dissolve like snow. The sense is that all the elements in 2 Peter will melt in the heat, they will come apart and cease their present existence, they’ll dissolve.

So the stars—but this could also in some way, and I think prophetic language can do double duty, that there’s a physical side, but there’s also a spiritual side. And the host in the heavens could also refer to Satan and his armies as well. Because it says in Ephesians 6:12, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” And so there are hosts in the heavenly realm, Satan and his demons and all that, and they’re going to get judged, God has spiritual enemies in the heavenly realms, and he has been very tolerant of them to allow them to continue to roam about the Earth and cause trouble and to tempt, and to accuse and to do all kinds of wickedness and evil. The heavens themselves, both physical and spiritual, are coming to an end. Hebrews 1, “They will perish….they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed.”

III. Edom Represents God’s Human Enemies (vs. 5-15)

Now, in verses 5-15, we turn our attention to the nation of Edom, to the Edomites, and I believe that Edom represents not only an actual physical nation that lived near Israel, but also, spiritually, they represent all of the reprobate human beings. These are people who hate God, who rebel against him, who stumble over the stumbling stone, which is also what they were destined for, as it says in Peter, 1 Peter. These are the rebels seething with hatred against God and against Christ. So it’s not just that God is gonna do all this punishing of Edom, it’s that the language just soars above that, and Edom then represents sinful humanity on mass, all those nations. Edom is all the nations. Does that make sense? So it’s representation here. So we go from universal talking about the universe, to have focused on not just all the nations and all their armies, but zeroing in on Edom. Look at verse 5, “My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; [behold], it descends in judgment on Edom, the people I have [devoted to destruction].” Do you see that? They’re given over to destruction, the people of Edom. Again, in verse 6, “The sword of the Lord is bathed in blood, [and] it is covered with fat—the blood of lambs and goats, fat from the kidneys of rams. For the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah and a great slaughter in Edom.” Bozrah is the capital, a city of Edom. Again, in verse 9, look at it, “Edom’s streams will be turned into pitch, [and] her dust into burning sulfur; her land will become a blazing pitch!”

So Edom as I have said, is both a historical nation and they are a spiritually representative nation, both in the Bible. Edom was made up of the descendants of Esau, Jacob’s brother. Esau was the twin brother of Jacob; in the Bible, he is a symbol of the reprobate man, the godless man who sold his birthright for a bowl of stew, who has no faith at all. No interest in redemptive history, no interest in a birth right, no interest in a blessing, except that it meant a good relationship with his dad. Loved meat, loved the good life, that’s Esau. He’s a representation of the reprobate, there are many prophecies of judgment against his descendants, the Edomites. Amos chapter 1 says, “For three sins of Edom, [and] even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because he pursued his brother with a sword, stifling all compassion because his anger raged continually and his fury flamed unchecked, I will send fire upon Teman that will consume the fortresses of Bozrah [capital city].” The whole little book of Obadiah is given over to a prophecy of destruction of Edom, who set their city up on a high place and thought that they could never be destroyed. God said, “I’m gonna bring you down.”

But the most significant Old Testament prophecy about Esau is in Malachi 1:2-4. There God says to the Jews, to the Jewish people, “I have loved [you].” He says to the descendants of Jacob, “I have loved [you].” And they answer back, as they do throughout the book of Malachi, they answer back, “How have you loved us?” So he’s gonna give an answer to that question, “‘Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?’ says the Lord. ‘Yet I have loved Jacob, but Esau I have hated.’” So how have I loved you? Because I elected you, because I chose you and chose not to treat you the way I treated Esau. That’s how I loved you. Not because you’re so great, because you’re not. But just because I chose you. So how have you loved us? Answer, I loved you in election, unconditionally. So to continue, “‘Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?’ the Lord [said]. ‘Yet I loved Jacob, but Esau I have hated. And I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals.’” Same language as Isaiah 34. Do you see it? The desolation language. Edom may say that we have been crushed, we will rebuild the cities. But this is what the Lord Almighty says, “They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Wicked Land, a people always under the wrath of the Lord.”

Now, the Apostle Paul takes that quote and drops it right into Romans chapter 9 to talk about God’s sovereignty and salvation. You’re familiar with the quote in Romans chapter 9, he uses this quote to talk about reprobates, or non-elect people, whom God has devoted to destruction. Romans 9:10-13, he says, “Not only that, but [Rebekah,] Rebekah’s children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: not by works, but by him who calls—she was told, ‘The older will serve the younger.’ Just as it is written: ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.’” Well, I’m not preaching through Romans 9, I’ve done that, you can listen on the internet, but basically, the lessons of that is unconditional election. God’s purpose in election is that he would get the glory for human salvation, and that no one who ends up in heaven will boast against him for anything. And so he makes the election before they do anything or can boast about anything, good or bad. God’s sovereign purpose, that’s why that God alone would be glorified in salvation, that’s the whole lesson of Edom of the descendants of Esau. So here in Isaiah 34, Edom is a real nation, they’re facing real judgments from God, but they’re also representative nation standing in the place of all of the reprobates mentioned in Romans chapter 9.

“God’s purpose in election is that he would get the glory for human salvation, and that no one who ends up in heaven will boast against him for anything. And so he makes the election before they do anything or can boast about anything, good or bad.”

In verse 5-7, it speaks of the sword of God’s wrath. It says there, “My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; [behold], it descends in judgment on Edom, the people I have totally destroyed. The sword of the Lord is bathed in blood, it is covered with fat—the blood of the lambs and goats, fat from the kidneys of rams, for the Lord has a sacrifice in Bozrah and a great slaughter in Edom. And the wild oxen will fall with them, the bull calves and the great bulls. [And] their land will be drenched with blood and the dust will be soaked with fat.” So the sword of the Lord is his judgment against his enemies, and he does battle up in the heavenly realms and wins and then descends down to do battle on Earth with his human enemies.

And the language here is very bloody, it’s very sacrificial, there’s a real sacrificial feel here, so I was meditating, what are the bulls and the oxen and the fat from the kidneys and all that. That’s all sacrificial language. And I guess as I am meditating on this is how it works: basically, the whole purpose of animal sacrifice was to teach the lesson of substitution, right? The animal died, and the man or the woman didn’t. You see? And all of that points to the cross. Don’t you see that Jesus died and we don’t. That’s what animal sacrifice was to teach, but here, what’s getting sacrificed, it’s not animals. I know it’s all talking about animals, but it’s not animals. It’s not the blood of animals, that’s making the dust in the sand of Edom red with blood. These are people, because they would not follow him and they would not believe in him, and there was no substitution for them. It’s a great sacrifice, a terrible slaughter performed by the sword of God’s wrath.

In verse 8 it says there is a day of the Lord in which he will uphold Zion’s cause. It says, “For the Lord has a day of vengeance, a year of retribution, to uphold Zion’s cause.” So here we come to the idea of the day of the Lord, deferred judgment. It’s not here yet. And so for all the Edoms there are in the world, it’s just not here yet. Just God’s patient and he’s bearing with great patience, it says, the objects of his wrath prepare for destruction. Same teaching in Romans 9, he’s patiently bearing with them, but he does have a day of vengeance, he has a day of the Lord that is coming, and people think as it goes on and saying, “It’s not coming, nothing’s gonna come. Everything’s gonna go on as it always has.” That’s what they think, but it’s not true, because God has a day in store for judgment and for wrath. And it says specifically he is gonna take vengeance on the enemies of his people to uphold Zion’s cause he’s going to beat up on those who have beat up on his people. He’s going to kill or shed the blood of those who shed the blood of his people. I think that’s the home base of understanding, verse 8, “The Lord has a day of vengeance, a year of retribution, to uphold Zion his people, to uphold their cause.”

If you read about it in Daniel chapter 7, there are these four beasts that come up out of the sea, and they represent vast empires, human nations, organized and terrifying, and the fourth one, the terrible beast, not even described, we don’t know what kind of beast it is, but it’s worse than all the others. And there are these horns and there’s this final horn, and it says that the saints were given over to the horn, he wages war on them and he conquered them, He shed their blood, he killed him, he was allowed to win for a while. Daniel says, “for a time, times and half a time.” Now, many scholars believe this is talking about the Antichrist, the final world ruler who will organize the world in one government and use all of that political power and military might against the people of God. And I think that’s true, but I also think John says, “You’ve heard that there is an Antichrist coming, and many Antichrists have come,” so there’s been lots of them. I think Hitler was one, I think he organized a nation, military power, and governmental structure against the people of God. He crushed them and killed them, like Dietrich Bonhoeffer for example. But when they die, when they get separated from their bodies and they go up, according to Revelation chapter 6, they go up and say, “OK, God, how long? How long until you avenge our blood?” Revelation 6, “When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who’d been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. [And] they called out in a loud voice, ‘How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the Earth and avenge our blood?’ Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer until the full number of their fellow servants and brothers who would be killed as they had been was completed.” Patience, more people have to die.

But there is a day of vengeance that will come later in Revelation, “The third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and in the springs of water, and they [turned into] blood…. [And] the angel in charge of the waters [said]: ‘You are just in these judgments, you who are and who were. the holy One, because you have so judged,” that’s enough, but there’s a reason too, “‘for they shed the blood of your saints and prophets, and you have now given them blood to drink as they deserve.’ And I heard the altar respond: ‘Yes, Lord God Almighty, true and just are your judgments.’”

Now, Edom’s judgments are a foretaste of hell, look at verses 9-10. It says, “Edom streams will be turned into pitch, her dust into burning sulfur; her land will become blazing pitch! It will not be quenched night and day; its smoke will rise forever. From generation to generation it will lie desolate; no one will ever pass through it again.” If you know what to look for, this sounds a lot like hell, lot like hell. Revelation 14, it speaks of those that receive the mark of the beast and worship the image. And it says, if anyone does that “he, too, will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment rises forever and ever. There is no rest, day or night.” It’s almost the exact same expression. And so, Edom’s judgment, in Isaiah 34 is a foretaste, a picture of hell of eternal judgment, unquenched fire, smoke rising, burning sulfur, unresting aspect day and night, etcetera.

And in Verses 11-15, The once flourishing land of Edom is turned into chaos and emptiness, a picture of complete desolation and rejection by the Lord. Look at the verses, it says, “The desert owl and screech owl will possess it; the great owl and the raven will nest there. God will stretch out over Edom the measuring line of chaos and the plumb line of desolation. Her nobles will have nothing there to be called a kingdom, all her princes will vanish away. Thorns will overrun her citadels, [and] nettles and brambles her strongholds. She’ll become a haunt for jackals, [and] a home for owls. Desert creatures will meet with hyenas, and wild goats will bleat to each other; there the night creatures will also repose and find for themselves places of rest. The owl will nest there and lay eggs, she will hatch them, and care for her young under the shadow of her wings; [and] there also the falcons will gather, each with its mate.” Many times Isaiah speaks in this kind of language, natural language of desolation, desert life, etcetera, coming on the land as an active judgment from God.

So I think in space and time in history, God judged the people of Esau, the Edomites and turned their land into this. But look at some of the details, it says, “[I’m going to measure] out over Edom, the plumb line of chaos and the measuring line of desolation.” These are the exact words that God uses to describe the creation after Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Verse 2, “Now the earth was formless and empty.” Same words used here, so what God’s saying is, “I’m going to deconstruct what I have constructed. It’s the opposite, I’m going to take my power and go the opposite direction, not building up into beauty and order, but breaking down into chaos and desolation.” And he says, “I’m gonna use a measuring line and a plumb line.” It’s a very meticulous careful work. He knows what he’s doing. It’s not accident, he knows what he’s doing. And he speaks in the language of thorns. Thorns is the language of God’s curse. It’s gonna overrun her citadels, and nettles and brambles her strongholds, and desert creatures will live there undisturbed from generation to generation.

So summary, Edom represents not merely one nation of God’s enemies, but all nations, ultimately. Nations that fought against the people of God and persecuted them and oppose God’s glory in the world, God will judge them completely, in effect speaking them out of orderly created existence, not annihilation, but just the end of that beauty of creation that they have known, and their land will become desolate because all of them will be dead.

IV. God’s “Book” Is Written, and Every Line Shall Be Fulfilled (vs. 16-17)

Now finally, in verses 16-17, we have the book of the Lord referred to here, “Look in the scroll of the Lord and read: None of these will be missing, not one will lack her mate. For it is his mouth that has given the order, and his Spirit will gather them together. He allots their portions; his hand distributes them by measure. [And] they will possess it forever and dwell there from generation to generation.” So this is God’s scroll, it refers to his sovereign plan. He has worked all this out, “All the days are ordained for [the world] were written in [God’s] book before one of them came to be,” according to Psalm 139. And so you look in the scroll and it’s all been figured out, all of it, and not only that, but we have his Spirit moving out to take what was written in the scroll to make it happen.

So as you had early on Isaiah 14, you have God’s plan and God’s hand, as we’ve talked about before, God’s plan and in his hand, God’s plan plus his hand equals the future. Isaiah 14:26-27, “This is the plan determined for the whole world; [and] this is the hand stretched out over all nations.” See plan and hand. “For the Lord Almighty has purposed,” that’s planned, “and who can thwart him? His hand is stretched out,” there’s his power, “and who can turn it back?” So there’s gonna be a lot of wild animals there, and desolation will be there, and judgment, and that really happened, I think, to the Edomites, it happened to their nation, and all of it according to the purpose of God. Paul had it right in Athens, when he said, speaking of all of human history, “From one man [God] made every nation of men…and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. [And] God did this so that [people] would seek him and…reach out for him and find him, though, he is not far from [each] one of us.”

V. How Isaiah 34 Prepares Us for the Second Coming of Christ

Now, how does this chapter prepare us for the second coming of Christ? Well, it’s going to happen, these things are going to happen. Jesus quoted this in Matthew chapter 24. Matthew 24, he said, “Immediately after the distress of those days ‘“the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.” ‘[And] at that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all nations…will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.” It’s going to happen. It’s not a metaphor, it’s a prophecy.

Revelation 6 picks up in the same language, “I watched as he opened the sixth seal. [And] there was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red…the stars in the sky fell to the earth, as late figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind. The sky receded like a scroll rolling up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. [And] then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and every slave and every free man hid in caves and among the rocks and the mountains. [And] they called to the mountains and the rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of that the their wrath has come, and who [is able] to stand?” They’re gonna be looking for a refuge, like a cave at that point, there’s no cave that will be a refuge. Oh, but there is a refuge. It’s right now today, it’s faith in Jesus is the refuge.

Finally, at the end of the Book of Revelation, there is the the dragon, the great dragon, that gets thrown down in Revelation 12, because he’s defeated in the heaven, comes down to the earth, and he calls forth this beast from the sea. As I’ve said the Antichrist, he comes forth, and in Revelation 17, sub-rulers, 10 Kings come together to give him their power and to make him chief among them. And it says in Revelation 17:14, “They will make war against the Lamb.” Think about that. They will war against Jesus. They’ll have a war against Jesus. Can I just say bad idea, bad idea. They’re gonna war against the Lamb and against his followers, but the Lamb will overcome them because he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings, and with him will be his called, chosen, and faithful followers.

And so Revelation 19 depicts that final battle, and that’s the fulfillment of Isaiah 34, that’s the sword of the Lord, that descends. Jesus is the sword of the Lord, he is the wrath of God descending in Revelation 19. He comes back, the heavens are open, and he comes down with the armies from heaven, and they descend on the Antichrist and on the dragon and the false prophet and all of the armies of people that are assembled there together against the Lord and against His followers. In Revelation 19:19 and following says, “I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to make war against the rider on the horse and his army. But the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who had performed the miraculous signs in his behalf. [And] with these signs, he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshiped his image. The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur. The rest of them were killed with the sword that came out of the mouth of the rider on the horse, and all the birds gorged themselves on their flesh.” Does that sound like Isaiah 34? It’s exactly the same, Revelation 19.

Now, that’s the second coming, that’s that final battle. But, friends, the deeper issue is deliverance from hell itself. It’s just one day when the sword comes down and lots of people die, but the real danger is the second death. Now, I just wanna stop and say, I know for a fact, many people struggle with this doctrine, they struggle with the picture of God as a wrath-filled being. They do, it’s repulsive to them. I even know some that have walked with the Lord for a while, very conspicuously and fruitful, who have recently turned away from evangelical Christianity because of a hatred of the doctrine of the wrath of God and hell, they just can’t accept it, and other theologians and writers, people like Rob Bell and all that, try to come up with what they consider to be a better story than this. What arrogance to think that we can come up with a better end of human history than this one, we can’t. God knows what he’s doing, God knows what he’s doing. And those people forget some things, they forget, for example, the very nature of God, that “God is light; [and] in him there is no darkness at all.” And he will have the darkness out of his universe, he will get rid of it, ’cause he hates it, and frankly, if he didn’t hate the darkness, he wouldn’t be good.

“The deeper issue is deliverance from hell itself. It’s just one day when the sword comes down and lots of people die, but the real danger is the second death.”

Secondly, all sin is an affront directly to his glory, and sin is proportional to the glory of the individual you sin against. It’s weightier to spit in the face of your father than to spit in the face of your brother. It just is. It just has to do with the weight of glory and what is due, what honor is due to that individual. Well, how much honor is due to God? How much honor should he get from us? Therefore, sin against him is of infinite weight and value.

Thirdly, and most significantly, Christ himself received the descending sword of God’s wrath on our behalf, he took it inside himself, he died under the wrath of God as our substitute. He is the cave you’ll be looking for when that sixth seal is broken, but you won’t find any refuge then. Flee now. When I began, I prayed that God would give you faith. Now is the time. Believe that these things are coming. And flee to Jesus. Jesus died not for his own sin—he committed no sin, there was no deceit in his mouth—he died in our place, he bore, he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live for righteousness. By his wounds, we have been healed. That’s what Jesus has done. He is our refuge. This is the gospel, for “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as [a propitiation,] a sacrifice of atonement, [in our place] through faith in his blood.” Trust in him, come to him. Flee the wrath to come.

And if you’ve already fled the wrath to come, if you have already listened to that and your heart was moved with fear, and you know that you early, long time ago, perhaps even fled, the wrath to come, then know this, you have fled successfully. The wrath will not come on you, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. But you are surrounded by people who haven’t fled yet, you live among them every day, you work with them, they may be relatives, they may be neighbors, warn them to flee the wrath to come. Tell them about it.

Understand this, understand the universality of God’s wrath against all nations, all nations, and all their armies. Now, where does that leave? Patriotism and nationalism. Oh, now Pastor, don’t go there. Don’t touch that one. I mean, this sermon is already too long anyway, and you’re gonna start patriotism and nationalism, I just wanna say this one thing, if Isaiah 34:2 is true, don’t exempt the United States of America from it, don’t. I do believe that there are incredibly powerful witnesses, godly men and women infiltrating—and that’s a good word for it—the federal, state, and local governments of this country and are salts in a very corrupt place and light in a very dark world and are doing an awesome job. Like Daniel, they are messengers of the king, like Daniel said, “Therefore, O king, be pleased to accept my advice: Renounce your sins by doing what is right and your wickedness by being kind to the oppressed. It may be that [God will let you] continue.” That’s a great witness for a government official who loves Jesus, but I’m speaking of the political entity, the nation itself. I think there is a right place and a right scope for patriotism and love for your country, but idolatry usually takes a proper affection and pushes it beyond boundaries, you see what I’m saying? Don’t go too far. Don’t go too far. Our citizenship is in heaven, and we’re waiting for our true king to come from heaven, and that’s Jesus, and we’re waiting for the city that he’s building right now. The city that is to come with whose architect and builder is God? This end is coming. It’s coming. All right, let’s do the work that God’s called us to do. Put sin to death by the power of the Spirit and share the gospel with lost people. Close with me in prayer.

Father, we thank you for the warning that we’ve had in Isaiah 34 of what is to come. I pray that we would tremble with it, that we would take it seriously. I pray that it would bring us to tears as Jesus wept over Jerusalem. I pray that we would be deeply troubled by the concept of just the bloodshed that is coming, and Father, I pray that you would please give us power to put sin to death as Peter put it, “Since everything [is going to end] in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed it’s coming.” O God, help us to be pure and holy and to speed the day of God by evangelism, by missions, by proclamation of the message. In Jesus’ name, I pray, Amen.

2012 is over, and apparently God did not communicate His purposes concerning the end of the world to the Mayans. That should not surprise us at all, for God has chosen to speak to the human race by means of His word, for the church is built upon the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus Himself as the chief cornerstone.

But the speculation comes from a deep-seated yearning to know what the future holds… where are we going? What’s to become of us? Even deeper is the fear that the end that is coming will not be a good one… a doomsday scenario, in which some huge meteorite will hit the planet and make the human race instantly extinct… or, radiation blasts from solar flares will heat up the earth’s core to such a level that life on earth will be impossible… or a gamma-ray burst from elsewhere in the galaxy which is the most powerful cosmic event could make its way to earth and end it all…or the destruction of the earth’s ozone layer will produce rampant global warming that will lead to the extinction of the human race… or perhaps the eruption of a supervolcano which could disrupt the earth’s climate enough to wipe out humanity

All of these scenarios basically come from physicists, cosmologists, and environmentalists generally operating in the atheistic framework they’re accustomed to

But doomsday scenarios come from other realms as well: such as politics…

In my childhood, when the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union was in full swing, the doomsday scenarios were usually related to nuclear war; when I was an infant, the great terror was the Cuban Missile Crisis, and students were trained to crawl under their desks or run to nearby fallout shelters… in 1983, there was a powerful TV event called “The Day After” in which tensions between Warsaw Pact and NATO forces escalate to the point of a full nuclear exchange… the TV drama vividly portrayed what would happen to the citizens of two communities: Lawrence, Kansas, and Kansas City, Missouri. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, doomsday scenarios involving thermonuclear explosions usually relate to terrorists capturing weapons and detonating them

Beyond that come the fears of some kind of biological threat… like the bubonic plague… an airborne contagion that could wipe out the entire human race

Amazingly, some movies even depict ROBOTS rebelling against their creators, the human race, and waging war again us and winning, thus ending the human race

Now… all these doomsday scenarios (and many others) have been depicted in popular movies and TV programs… and the advent of computer graphics has made these depictions extremely realistic

They show that the human heart is fixated on the future, and in some sense terrified of it

What the popular depictions fail to account for is GOD in all of this… that the biggest threat to the continued unfolding of human history as we know it is the WRATH OF GOD

The fear of the future stems from the rebellion of man in the Garden of Eden… God swore that the penalty for eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil was DEATH…

Adam ate, and heard the sound of God walking in the cool of the day He was terrified, so he hid from God

God did not kill him immediately, but promised that he would die someday And he cursed the ground because of Adam

God thus set the human race on a course of history in which a FUTURE RECKONING WITH DEATH was coming

And amazingly, the most detailed and comprehensive doomsday scenarios in human culture come from the Bible you carried to church today

The end of the story is the Book of Revelation… and that book is filled with the outpouring of the wrath of God both on mankind and on the surface of the earth

One judgment after another on the cosmos and on the earth are effected: the sun is darkened, the moon forbears to shine, the stars fall from the sky, the waters of the oceans, seas, rivers, lakes and ponds are all poisoned, the earth convulses and writhes in massive earthquakes… and, simply put, PEOPLE DIE

Chapter after chapter of this future is detailed for us in the Book of Revelation; but many of those themes are unfolded in Isaiah 34

In this chapter, we see in microcosm… in miniature… the themes of the future wrath of God on all nations unfolded

In the next chapter, Isaiah 35, the delights of the Redemed

I.   God Summons the Nations to Listen (vs. 1)

Isaiah 34:1 Come near, you nations, and listen; pay attention, you peoples! Let the earth hear, and all that is in it, the world, and all that comes out of it!

A.   God’s Grace to His Enemies

1.  God doesn’t have to warn them at all… He can merely wipe them out if He wants to

2.  But God is gracious and wants the earth and all its inhabitants to know what is coming

3.  Also, we can see the incredible patience of God; this warning came through Isaiah 27 centuries ago, and God is still waiting to pour out His wrath on His enemies on earth

B.   Warning: In the Words of John the Baptist

Matthew 3:7-8 “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.

C.   The Power of the Word of God… Hearing this Message is Sufficient to Save You

1.  He calls on all nations to LISTEN… to PAY ATTENTION to His words

2.  Faith comes by hearing God’s word

3.  It is enough warning, enough to save you from the coming wrath

4.  Faith in Christ is the only refuge for what is to come

1 Thessalonians 1:10 Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

II.   God’s Wrath is On All Nations and Their Armies (vs. 2-4)

Isaiah 34:2-4 The LORD is angry with all nations; his wrath is upon all their armies. He will totally destroy them, he will give them over to slaughter. 3 Their slain will be thrown out, their dead bodies will send up a stench; the mountains will be soaked with their blood. 4 All the stars of the heavens will be dissolved and the sky rolled up like a scroll; all the starry host will fall like withered leaves from the vine, like shriveled figs from the fig tree.

A.   Two Shocking Issues Displayed in Isaiah 34

1.  God as a God of Overpowering Wrath

2.  The Fact that God is Angry with ALL NATIONS… NO EXCEPTIONS

B.   The Lord is Angry with ALL NATIONS… His Wrath is Against All their Armies

1.  Why? Biblical answer is clear:

Romans 3:23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

2.  Why no exceptions?? What nation on earth exists solely to advance the Kingdom of Jesus Christ? What nation on earth

3.  Completely BLACK and WHITE…

Matthew 12:30 “He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters.

John 11:51-52 Jesus would die for the Jewish nation, 52 and not only for that nation but also for the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one.

Ephesians 1:10 to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.

C.   Stark Pictures of Judgment and Wrath

1.  Armies “given over to slaughter”

2.  Literally “dedicated to destruction”

a.  Like God told Joshua before the Battle of Jericho

Joshua 6:17-19 The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the LORD. … keep away from the devoted things, so that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and bring trouble on it. 19 All the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron are sacred to the LORD and must go into his treasury.”

b.  Like God told Saul w.r.t. the Amalekites

1 Samuel 15:3 Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.

c.  Vs. 3 is HORRIBLE… dead bodies giving up a STENCH; mountains SOAKED WITH BLOOD

D.   Even the Host in the Heavens Will Come Under Judgment!

ESV Isaiah 34:4 All the host of heaven shall rot away, and the skies roll up like a scroll. All their host shall fall, as leaves fall from the vine, like leaves falling from the fig tree.

1.  Possibly the stars in the heavens come to an end… “rot away” or “dissolved”

2.  Or perhaps speaking of Satan’s heavenly armies

Ephesians 6:12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

3.  God has spiritual enemies as well as human ones… and Isaiah 34 speaks in climactic tones of the final battle between God and all His foes

4.  The heavens themselves are coming to an end, as God says elsewhere

Hebrews 1:11-12 They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. 12 You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed.

III.   Edom Represents God’s Human Enemies (vs. 5-15)

A.   The Prophecy Goes from Universal to Focused

1.  Verse 2 speaks of God’s wrath against ALL nations and ALL their armies

2.  Verses 5-15 focus in particular on Edom

Isaiah 34:5 My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; see, it descends in judgment on
Edom, the people I have [devoted to destruction].

Isaiah 34:6 The sword of the LORD is bathed in blood, it is covered with fat– the blood of lambs and goats, fat from the kidneys of rams. For the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah and a great slaughter in Edom. [Bozrah is the capital city of Edom]

Isaiah 34:9 Edom’s streams will be turned into pitch, her dust into burning sulfur; her land will become blazing pitch!

B.   Edom as BOTH a Historical Nation and a Representative Nation

1.  Edom was made up of the descendents of Esau

2.  Esau was the twin brother of Jacob; in the Bible, a symbol of the REPROBATE individual; the godless man who sold his birthright for a bowl of stew

3.  Many prophecies of judgment come against Edom

Amos 1:11-12 This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Edom, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because he pursued his brother with a sword, stifling all compassion, because his anger raged continually and his fury flamed unchecked, 12 I will send fire upon Teman that will consume the fortresses of Bozrah.”

All of Obadiah is a prophecy against the pride of Edom… dwelling arrogantly in a lofty crag of rock, thinking they were completely safe… they had MOCKED Israel’s misfortune when God sent nations to plunder Judah; they even waited at the crossroads and slaughtered Jewish fugitives as they were running for their lives

4.  Most significant of all: Malachi 1

Malachi 1:2-4 “I have loved you,” says the LORD. “But you ask, ‘How have you loved us?’ “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?” the LORD says. “Yet I have loved Jacob, 3 but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals.” 4 Edom may say, “Though we have been crushed, we will rebuild the ruins.” But this is what the LORD Almighty says: “They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Wicked Land, a people always under the wrath of the LORD.

5.  Quoted by Paul in Romans 9 to refer to REPROBATES, non-elect sinners whom the Lord has devoted to destruction

Romans 9:10-13 Not only that, but Rebekah’s children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. 11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad– in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls– she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

6.  So… here in Isaiah 34, Edom is a REAL NATION, facing REAL JUDGMENTS from God, but also a REPRESENTATIVE NATION standing in the place of all of God’s HUMAN ENEMIES

C.   The Sword of God’s Wrath (vs. 5-7)

Isaiah 34:5-7 My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens; see, it descends in judgment on Edom, the people I have totally destroyed. 6 The sword of the LORD is bathed in blood, it is covered with fat– the blood of lambs and goats, fat from the kidneys of rams. For the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah and a great slaughter in Edom. 7 And the wild oxen will fall with them, the bull calves and the great bulls. Their land will be drenched with blood, and the dust will be soaked with fat.

1.  The sword of the Lord first wins His battle in the heavenly realms, then DESCENDS in judgment on the earth as well

2.  The sword of the Lord is His instrument of wrath and judgment

3.  The sword of the Lord is saturated in blood… it is achieving a SACRIFICE for Him

a.  Vs. 6 “bathed in blood, covered with fat”

b.  The sacrifice language… like the blood of lambs and goats, fat from the kidneys of rams…

c.  Vs. 7 “wild oxen”, “bull calves” “great bulls”

d.  The land is drenched in the blood of these sacrifices

e.  BUT it is clear the sacrifice offered to the Lord are human beings, slaughtered in His wrath

4.  It is a GREAT SACRIFICE, a terrible slaughter… performed by the sword of God’s wrath

D.   The “Day of the Lord” is to Uphold Zion’s Cause

Isaiah 34:8 For the LORD has a day of vengeance, a year of retribution, to uphold Zion’s cause.

1.  God is very patient with the “Edoms” of the world

2.  He does not bring His wrath on the rebels immediately

3.  As a matter of fact, the long delay makes people think God does not exist and that He will take no action

4.  But nothing could be further from the truth… there is a “DAY OF THE LORD”, a day when God sets all accounts straight, a day when He takes vengeance for His oppressed people

5.  The motive here: to “uphold Zion’s cause”

a.  Zion represents Jerusalem… more specifically the “city of God” where God dwells with His people in fellowship

b.  Here, it represents God’s suffering people, persecuted by these godless nations and their terrifying armies

c.  The people of God are usually downtrodden, oppressed by the wicked nations, their wicked kings and their wicked armies

d.  But God has a day of vengeance in which His people are vindicated by God’s intervention

Daniel 7:21-22 As I watched, this horn was waging war against the saints and defeating them, 22 until the Ancient of Days came and pronounced judgment in favor of the saints of the Most High, and the time came when they possessed the kingdom.

Daniel 7:23-26 ‘The fourth beast is a fourth kingdom that will appear on earth. It will be different from all the other kingdoms and will devour the whole earth, trampling it down and crushing it. 24 The ten horns are ten kings who will come from this kingdom. After them another king will arise, different from the earlier ones; he will subdue three kings. 25 He will speak against the Most High and oppress his saints and try to change the set times and the laws. The saints will be handed over to him for a time, times and half a time. 26 “‘But the court will sit, and his power will be taken away and completely destroyed forever

Revelation 6:9-11 hen he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. 10 They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?” 11 Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed.

Revelation 16:4-7 The third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water, and they became blood. 5 Then I heard the angel in charge of the waters say: “You are just in these judgments, you who are and who were, the Holy One, because you have so judged; 6 for they have shed the blood of your saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink as they deserve.” 7 And I heard the altar respond: “Yes, Lord God Almighty, true and just are your judgments.”

E.   Edom’s Judgments are a Foretaste of Hell (vs. 9-10)

Isaiah 34:9-10 Edom’s streams will be turned into pitch, her dust into burning sulfur; her land will become blazing pitch! 10 It will not be quenched night and day; its smoke will rise forever. From generation to generation it will lie desolate; no one will ever pass through it again.

Revelation 14:10-11 he, too, will drink of the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. 11 And the smoke of their torment rises for ever and ever. There is no rest day or night

[So, an unquenched fire, the smoke rising forever; the burning sulfur; the unresting aspect day and night… Isaiah 34 is reflected in Revelation 14, a clear picture of hell]

F.   The Once Flourishing Land of Edom Turned into Chaos and Emptiness… a Picture of Complete Desolation and Rejection by the Lord (vs. 11-15)

Isaiah 34:11-15 The desert owl and screech owl will possess it; the great owl and the raven will nest there. God will stretch out over Edom the measuring line of chaos and the plumb line of desolation. 12 Her nobles will have nothing there to be called a kingdom, all her princes will vanish away. 13 Thorns will overrun her citadels, nettles and brambles her strongholds. She will become a haunt for jackals, a home for owls. 14 Desert creatures will meet with hyenas, and wild goats will bleat to each other; there the night creatures will also repose and find for themselves places of rest. 15 The owl will nest there and lay eggs, she will hatch them, and care for her young under the shadow of her wings; there also the falcons will gather, each with its mate.

1.  Many times Isaiah speaks of the judgments of God on a Gentile nation in this kind of natural language

2.  The wild animals, the unclean animals will inhabit it, and no human will

3.  No human will even pass through it

4.  (vs. 11) God’s CAREFUL MEASURING work: God stretches out a measuring line of CHAOS and the plumb line of DESOLATION

a.  The Hebrew words are the same as in Genesis 1:2

Genesis 1:2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep
God then step by step brings order out of chaos in the six days of creation

b.  The idea is the God is reversing their creation orderliness

c.  The measuring line and plumb line language mean this is a careful work by God, not a random act of mindless passion on His part

5.  (Vs 12) Nobles and princes have nothing left in the land and themselves will vanish away; the land is left TOTALLY DESOLATE

6.  (vs. 13) briers and thorns come back into Isaiah’s prophecy… He uses this image frequently to speak of the curse of God on the land

Vs. 13 Thorns will overrun her citadels, nettles and brambles her strongholds.

7.  (vs. 13-15) Desert creatures will take over and live there undisturbed from generation to generation

G.   Summary: Edom represents not merely one nation of God’s enemies but ALL nations ultimately; nations that fought against the people of God and persecuted them and opposed God’s glory in this world; God will judge them completely, in effect speaking them out of orderly, created existence; their land will become desolate, because all of them will be dead.

IV.   God’s “Book” is Written, and Every Line Shall Be Fulfilled (vs. 16-17)

Isaiah 34:16-17 Look in the scroll of the LORD and read: None of these will be missing, not one will lack her mate. For it is his mouth that has given the order, and his Spirit will gather them together. 17 He allots their portions; his hand distributes them by measure. They will possess it forever and dwell there from generation to generation.

A.   God’s “Scroll” = His Sovereign Plan

1.  God has a carefully determined plan that covers all details

2.  The “scroll” represents that sovereign plan, determined before the foundation of the world

Psalm 139:16 All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

3.  Closely connected with the “scroll” representing the plan is the sovereign power of God to carry it out through His Spirit:

For it is his mouth that has given the order, and his Spirit will gather them together. 17
He allots their portions; his hand distributes them by measure.

4.  In Isaiah 14, it is “plan” + “hand” = final end

Isaiah 14:26-27 This is the plan determined for the whole world; this is the hand stretched out over all nations. 27 For the LORD Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him? His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?

B.   Immediate Context: The Wild Animals of vss. 13-15

1.  The “scroll” has written out that the wild animals will possess Edom’s previously allotted land

2.  Furthermore, the land is allotted to the animals from that time on till the end… from that time on from generation to generation

3.  He makes it a wasteland that no one will want to dwell in but these wild animals

C.   Big Picture: All the Details of Human History Were Written in God’s Book Before One of them Came to Be

1.  God had allotted that land to the descendents of Esau and forbidden the Jews to violate it

Deuteronomy 2:2-5 Then the LORD said to me, … Give the people these orders: ‘You are about to pass through the territory of your brothers the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. They will be afraid of you, but be very careful. 5 Do not provoke them to war, for I will not give you any of their land, not even enough to put your foot on. I have given Esau the hill country of Seir as his own.

2.  But now, because of Edom’s sin, He takes it away forever and gives it to the animals

3.  Paul made this plain

Acts 17:26 From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.
But the larger issue is: ALL nations (not just Edom) are under God’s wrath, and will come to the same end!!

V.   How Isaiah 34 Prepares Us for the Second Coming of Christ

A.   Many Aspects of Isaiah 34 are Repeated In Connection with the Second Coming of Christ and the End of the World

B.   The Signs in the Heavens… the “Falling of the Stars”

Matthew 24:29-31 “Immediately after the distress of those days “‘the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’ 30 “At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. 31 And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.

2 Peter 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.

2 Peter 3:12 That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat.

C.   Revelation 6 in Particular

Revelation 6:12-17 I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red, 13 and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as late figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind. 14 The sky receded like a scroll, rolling up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. 15 Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and every slave and every free man hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. 16 They called to the mountains and the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! 17 For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?”

D.   The Gathering of the Kings of the Earth and their Armies for Slaughter

1.  Revelation 12: War in the heavens, Satan cast down

2.  Revelation 13: The Dragon stands by the shore of the sea and summons the “Beast” (Antichrist) to rule over the nations and wage war against the people of God

3.  Revelation 17: The sub-rulers (the ten kings) assemble to give their power to the one ruler (the Antichrist)

Revelation 17:13-14 [The ten kings] have one purpose and will give their power and authority to the beast. 14 They will make war against the Lamb, but the Lamb will overcome them because he is Lord of lords and King of kings– and with him will be his called, chosen and faithful followers.

4.  Revelation 19: the kings of the earth take their stand against Christ and the armies of heaven; He slaughters them all with the sword coming out of His mouth

Revelation 19:19-21 Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to make war against the rider on the horse and his army. 20 But the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who had performed the miraculous signs on his behalf. With these signs he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshiped his image. The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur. 21 The rest of them were killed with the sword that came out of the mouth of the rider on the horse, and all the birds gorged themselves on their flesh.

E.   Deeper Issue: Deliverance from Hell

1.  Isaiah 34 depicts the horrors of God’s wrath, the terrors of hell

2.  It is a terrifying thing to have God as your enemy, the sword of His wrath coming after you

3.  Many struggle with this picture of God

a.  They wonder how can a God who condemns people to an eternity in hell be morally righteous?

b.  They wonder if such a God is not more of a monster than One worthy of eternal praise

c.  They stumble badly over the doctrine of God’s wrath, and are utterly repulsed

d.  BUT they forget several things

i)  First, the perfection of God’s holiness… that

1 John 1:5  God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.

Therefore, God cannot tolerate evil; for Him to have a mild or passive reaction to evil would make Him evil

ii)  Second, that all sin is directly an affront to His glory… and sin is always measured in proportion to what is owed or appropriate to the person… the greater the person’s position, the more significant the sin; thus a sin against a parent is more significant than the exact same sin against a total stranger

iii)  Third, that Christ Himself drank the cup of God’s wrath for us, standing in our place; the “sword of the Lord’s wrath” was bathed in HIS blood so that we could escape

F.   Thus… Christ is the ONLY ESCAPE from the Wrath of God Expressed in Hell

G.   This is the GOSPEL:

Romans 3:23-25 all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.

VI.   Applications

A.   Come to Christ!!!

1.  We should fear the God that is displayed in this chapter

2.  That fear should be the beginning of wisdom

3.  The end of wisdom is CHRIST… the one who ALONE can rescue us from the coming wrath

B.   Understand the Universality of God’s Wrath Against All Nations

1.  There is not a single nation on earth that does its business for the glory of God

2.  There is not a single nation on earth that does not pursue a worldly agenda of pursuing power, possessions, pleasures, personal glory

3.  All nations are in some way serving Satan as they purse these things

4.  Thus all nations are under the wrath of God

5.  That includes their armies

a.  When Hitler’s Nazi army was facing off against Stalin’s Soviet Army, both armies were under the wrath of God… no matter who won this or that battle

C.   What About Patriotism? What About Nationalism? What is the Proper Level of Love for and Commitment to Our Own Nation?

1.  This brings a reasonable question about our loyalty to the United States of America

2.  Surely, you may say, the USA is exempt from this statement?

3.  But why would it be?

a.  It is very possible that many politicians and political appointees and public servants are genuine Christians who are like Daniel: godly advisors to the king of Babylon, faithfully carrying out their ministries for God’s glory

b.  BUT Daniel was not able to set policy… merely to influence it

c.  It may also be that many soldiers or sailors or airmen or Marines are genuine Christians who are seeking to serve in a way that glorifies Christ

d.  They can act like salt in a very corrupt place and light in a very dark place

e.  BUT not every mission they go on or battle they fight or war they seek to win is necessarily set out by godly policy makers for the glory of God and of His Christ

4.  Nationalism and even patriotism can be forms of idolatry…

a.  Natural affections are reasonable: we should love our native land

b.  BUT many forms of idolatry come from taking a reasonable natural affection and pushing it beyond God-ordained boundaries

c.  Truly our citizenship is not ultimately USA… but heaven, the city that is to come!!

Philippians 3:20 But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ

Hebrews 11:13-16 And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. 14 People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country– a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

d.  We should be grateful for the freedoms we have here in America, and thankful for the sacrifices that have been made to give them; we should seek to preserve them and use them for the glory of God; but realize, America is not and never has been a truly Christian nation… rather it is a MIXTURE… and in heaven, there will be NO MIXTURE

D.   Understand the Future As Revealed in Isaiah 34 and Revelation

1.  The world will go from bad to worse, with ever-increasing persecution against believers

2.  Satan will continue to dominate nations and afflict God’s people

3.  The Antichrist will come, as 1 John 2, 2 Thessalonians 2, and Revelation 13 predict

4.  He will arrogantly seek to take God’s place; and (according to Daniel 7) will wage war successfully against God’s people

5.  The armies of his wicked world-wide rule will be gathered together against God’s people, and against Christ

6.  Christ will come back and crush that army, slaughtering those soldiers with the sword coming from His mouth

7.  The heavens will disappear with a roar and the stars will fall from heaven like figs from a fig tree

8.  The new heavens and new earth will take the place of the old one