Text Questions: "The Role of Prophetic Foreknowledge in Isaiah" by Jason Jackson

April 25, 2025 - Equipped 2025 - Day 2 - 1:30PM Session

 

Jason leads a bible study reflecting on free will and how God may know the future while still allowing free will amongst men.

 

Isaiah 3-5 -Judgment on Judah and Jerusalem

3 For behold, the Lord, the Lord of hosts,
Takes away from Jerusalem and from Judah
The stock and the store,
The whole supply of bread and the whole supply of water;
² The mighty man and the man of war,
The judge and the prophet,
And the diviner and the elder;
³ The captain of fifty and the honorable man,
The counselor and the skillful artisan,
And the expert enchanter.

⁴ “I will give children to be their princes,
And babes shall rule over them.
⁵ The people will be oppressed,
Every one by another and every one by his neighbor;
The child will be insolent toward the elder,
And the base toward the honorable.”

⁶ When a man takes hold of his brother
In the house of his father, saying,
“You have clothing;
You be our ruler,
And let these ruins be under your power,”
⁷ In that day he will protest, saying,
“I cannot cure your ills,
For in my house is neither food nor clothing;
Do not make me a ruler of the people.”

⁸ For Jerusalem stumbled,
And Judah is fallen,
Because their tongue and their doings
Are against the Lord,
To provoke the eyes of His glory.
⁹ The look on their countenance witnesses against them,
And they declare their sin as Sodom;
They do not hide it.
Woe to their soul!
For they have brought evil upon themselves.

¹⁰ “Say to the righteous that it shall be well with them,
For they shall eat the fruit of their doings.
¹¹ Woe to the wicked! It shall be ill with him,
For the reward of his hands shall be given him.
¹² As for My people, children are their oppressors,
And women rule over them.
O My people! Those who lead you cause you to err,
And destroy the way of your paths.”

Oppression and Luxury Condemned

¹³ The Lord stands up to plead,
And stands to judge the people.
¹⁴ The Lord will enter into judgment
With the elders of His people
And His princes:
“For you have eaten up the vineyard;
The plunder of the poor is in your houses.
¹⁵ What do you mean by crushing My people
And grinding the faces of the poor?”
Says the Lord God of hosts.

¹⁶ Moreover the Lord says:

“Because the daughters of Zion are haughty,
And walk with outstretched necks
And wanton eyes,
Walking and mincing as they go,
Making a jingling with their feet,
¹⁷ Therefore the Lord will strike with a scab
The crown of the head of the daughters of Zion,
And the Lord will uncover their secret parts.”

¹⁸ In that day the Lord will take away the finery:
The jingling anklets, the scarves, and the crescents;
¹⁹ The pendants, the bracelets, and the veils;
²⁰ The headdresses, the leg ornaments, and the headbands;
The perfume boxes, the charms,
²¹     and the rings;
The nose jewels,
²²     the festal apparel, and the mantles;
The outer garments, the purses,
²³     and the mirrors;
The fine linen, the turbans, and the robes.

²⁴ And so it shall be:

Instead of a sweet smell there will be a stench;
Instead of a sash, a rope;
Instead of well-set hair, baldness;
Instead of a rich robe, a girding of sackcloth;
And branding instead of beauty.
²⁵ Your men shall fall by the sword,
And your mighty in the war.

²⁶ Her gates shall lament and mourn,
And she being desolate shall sit on the ground.

Jerusalem’s Glorious Future

4 And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying,
“We will eat our own food and wear our own apparel;
Only let us be called by your name,
To take away our reproach.”

The Renewal of Zion

² In that day the Branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious;
And the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and appealing
For those of Israel who have escaped.

³ And it shall come to pass that he who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be called holy—everyone who is recorded among the living in Jerusalem. ⁴ When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and purged the blood of Jerusalem from her midst, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning, ⁵ then the Lord will create above every dwelling place of Mount Zion, and above her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night. For over all the glory there will be a covering. ⁶ And there will be a tabernacle for shade in the daytime from the heat, for a place of refuge, and for a shelter from storm and rain.

God’s Disappointing Vineyard

5 Now let me sing to my Well-beloved
A song of my Beloved regarding His vineyard:

My Well-beloved has a vineyard
On a very fruitful hill.
² He dug it up and cleared out its stones,
And planted it with the choicest vine.
He built a tower in its midst,
And also made a winepress in it;
So He expected it to bring forth good grapes,
But it brought forth wild grapes.

³ “And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,
Judge, please, between Me and My vineyard.
⁴ What more could have been done to My vineyard
That I have not done in it?
Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes,
Did it bring forth wild grapes?
⁵ And now, please let Me tell you what I will do to My vineyard:
I will take away its hedge, and it shall be burned;
And break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down.
⁶ I will lay it waste;
It shall not be pruned or dug,
But there shall come up briers and thorns.
I will also command the clouds
That they rain no rain on it.”

⁷ For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel,
And the men of Judah are His pleasant plant.
He looked for justice, but behold, oppression;
For righteousness, but behold, a cry for help.

Impending Judgment on Excesses

⁸ Woe to those who join house to house;
They add field to field,
Till there is no place
Where they may dwell alone in the midst of the land!
⁹ In my hearing the Lord of hosts said,
“Truly, many houses shall be desolate,
Great and beautiful ones, without inhabitant.
¹⁰ For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath,
And a homer of seed shall yield one ephah.”

¹¹ Woe to those who rise early in the morning,
That they may follow intoxicating drink;
Who continue until night, till wine inflames them!
¹² The harp and the strings,
The tambourine and flute,
And wine are in their feasts;
But they do not regard the work of the Lord,
Nor consider the operation of His hands.

¹³ Therefore my people have gone into captivity,
Because they have no knowledge;
Their honorable men are famished,
And their multitude dried up with thirst.
¹⁴ Therefore Sheol has enlarged itself
And opened its mouth beyond measure;
Their glory and their multitude and their pomp,
And he who is jubilant, shall descend into it.
¹⁵ People shall be brought down,
Each man shall be humbled,
And the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled.
¹⁶ But the Lord of hosts shall be exalted in judgment,
And God who is holy shall be hallowed in righteousness.
¹⁷ Then the lambs shall feed in their pasture,
And in the waste places of the fat ones strangers shall eat.

¹⁸ Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of vanity,
And sin as if with a cart rope;
¹⁹ That say, “Let Him make speed and hasten His work,
That we may see it;
And let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near and come,
That we may know it.”

²⁰ Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil;
Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

²¹ Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes,
And prudent in their own sight!

²² Woe to men mighty at drinking wine,
Woe to men valiant for mixing intoxicating drink,
²³ Who justify the wicked for a bribe,
And take away justice from the righteous man!

²⁴ Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble,
And the flame consumes the chaff,
So their root will be as rottenness,
And their blossom will ascend like dust;
Because they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts,
And despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
²⁵ Therefore the anger of the Lord is aroused against His people;
He has stretched out His hand against them
And stricken them,
And the hills trembled.
Their carcasses were as refuse in the midst of the streets.

For all this His anger is not turned away,
But His hand is stretched out still.

²⁶ He will lift up a banner to the nations from afar,
And will whistle to them from the end of the earth;
Surely they shall come with speed, swiftly.
²⁷ No one will be weary or stumble among them,
No one will slumber or sleep;
Nor will the belt on their loins be loosed,
Nor the strap of their sandals be broken;
²⁸ Whose arrows are sharp,
And all their bows bent;
Their horses’ hooves will seem like flint,
And their wheels like a whirlwind.
²⁹ Their roaring will be like a lion,
They will roar like young lions;
Yes, they will roar
And lay hold of the prey;
They will carry it away safely,
And no one will deliver.
³⁰ In that day they will roar against them
Like the roaring of the sea.
And if one looks to the land,
Behold, darkness and sorrow;
And the light is darkened by the clouds.

 

Isaiah 46 - Dead Idols and the Living God

46 Bel bows down, Nebo stoops;
Their idols were on the beasts and on the cattle.
Your carriages were heavily loaded,
A burden to the weary beast.
² They stoop, they bow down together;
They could not deliver the burden,
But have themselves gone into captivity.

³ “Listen to Me, O house of Jacob,
And all the remnant of the house of Israel,
Who have been upheld by Me from birth,
Who have been carried from the womb:
⁴ Even to your old age, I am He,
And even to gray hairs I will carry you!
I have made, and I will bear;
Even I will carry, and will deliver you.

⁵ “To whom will you liken Me, and make Me equal
And compare Me, that we should be alike?
⁶ They lavish gold out of the bag,
And weigh silver on the scales;
They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god;
They prostrate themselves, yes, they worship.
⁷ They bear it on the shoulder, they carry it
And set it in its place, and it stands;
From its place it shall not move.
Though one cries out to it, yet it cannot answer
Nor save him out of his trouble.

⁸ “Remember this, and show yourselves men;
Recall to mind, O you transgressors.
⁹ Remember the former things of old,
For I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like Me,
¹⁰ Declaring the end from the beginning,
And from ancient times things that are not yet done,
Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand,
And I will do all My pleasure,’
¹¹ Calling a bird of prey from the east,
The man who executes My counsel, from a far country.
Indeed I have spoken it;
I will also bring it to pass.
I have purposed it;
I will also do it.

¹² “Listen to Me, you stubborn-hearted,
Who are far from righteousness:
¹³ I bring My righteousness near, it shall not be far off;
My salvation shall not linger.
And I will place salvation in Zion,
For Israel My glory.

 

 

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jULCdmcyq9o

 

Duration 34:11