A Devotional Thought From Isaiah

Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honorable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst. Therefore as the fire devoureth the stubble, and the flame consumeth the chaff, so their root shall be as rottenness, and their blossom shall go up as dust: because they have cast away the law of the LORD of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.     Isaiah 5:13, 24

The punishment for God’s ancient people was captivity. The invading armies of the Assyrian horde would conquer and carry away the population of the northern kingdom of Israel, and Babylon would do the same to Judah. Many would die in the invasion, many would be enslaved, and many would be deported to the lands that had defeated them.

After that, when anyone looked at the land of Israel, or viewed the situation of the poor captives, it would give the appearance of having been burned over by fire. Fire that burned up the chaff and stubble and undergrowth of the land. The land and the lives would be blossomless, no flowers, no beauty, and the roots of the trees and plants would look as though they were rotted out. It would be a desolation.

This is a sad and terrible thing. Why? Why would God punish His people in such a dreadful way? There is an answer in this passage. Here it is: because they have cast away the law of the LORD of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.

Modern nations take note. The people of God, His beloved people, were punished for despising the word of God. Societies anywhere who despise the word of God found in the Bible may be playing a dangerous game of “Russian roulette.”