In that day their strong cities, which they left because of the Israelites, will be like places abandoned to the thickets and underbrush. All will be desolation. 

You have forgotten God your Savior; you have not remembered the Rock; your fortress.

Isaiah 17: 9-10, NIV 

 

In Isaiah we read not only of the promised punishment of Israel and Judah, but also of the nations surrounding them. From Moab to Damascus, from Egypt to Babylon, God warns that their day of reckoning is coming... but why? Now, it may not seem that important to know the reasons that God does what He does, but if we can answer that question it might help us understand the way God works in our day and age. And, the reason that God punished the nations in days gone by was that they had forgotten the LORD!

 

It is helpful to remember that nations are different than individuals. It's true that nations are made up of individuals, but there is an important distinction: People will someday be called to account on the Day of Judgment, but nations as a collective have always been rewarded and punished during the era in which they existed.

 

Knowing this will help you to understand the nation in which you live, right now. For example, most of you who are reading this live in America. America, despite all of the revisionist attempts to suggest otherwise, was founded on Godly principles - Christian principles in fact. As a result, God has richly blessed this nation. You might say that the momentum of these blessings has carried all the way to the point of history in which we find ourselves living right now.

 

We are blessed, but if we are not careful we will lose those blessings. As we see more and more men and women put into positions of authority who do not acknowledge God, we draw closer and closer to a day of reckoning here on earth. Now I want you to know that this is not some sort of attempt at prophecy by a delusional man, it is just an observation that God has punished nations in the past who forgot that He was their rock and fortress.

 

Do you think from what you have observed that this very thing might be going on in the nation in which you live today? Then do something about it! If you and I were to start living as if we really believed that God and Jesus were in charge of our lives, then we just might help to save the country we live in from that day of reckoning that has always come to nations that do not remember God.

 

Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.

But you said, "We will not walk in it."

Jeremiah 6:16, NIV 

 

Today is the 3rd day of the 30 day challenge to read through the writings of the prophets of God, with Isaiah 15-21 being the reading for today. May God richly bless you as you seek He and His Son with all of your heart!