I’ve been waiting nearly half a year for this - to get to Isaiah, the big daddy of all the prophets. The longest book, the most read, the least understood? Possibly.
Pekaniah killed
2 Kings 15:25-26
Pekah
2 Kings 15:27-28
Uzziah’s death
2 Kings 15:6-7, 2 Chronicles 26:22-23
Isaiah sees the Lord
Isaiah 6:1-13
Jotham
2 Chronicles 27:1-2, 8 2 Kings 15:32-35
The promise
Isaiah 2:1-5
Chastisement before blessing
Isaiah 2:6-3:26
Coups and assassinations continue in Israel, as evil king follows evil king - their names so unmemorable that I feel like I’m reading about them for the first time.
But our focus is switching to the south, where Uzziah reigned well, except for his disastrous episode when he thought he was important enough to burn incense in the Temple himself, and had to be hustled out by the priests as leprosy broke out on his forehead.
Conceivably this event was witnessed by Isaiah, or he heard about it by those who were there, because he grew up in the inner privileged circles of the priests of the Temple. His call to be a prophet is set in the Temple, but in a vision in which the Lord is inhabiting, and filling the Temple, and Isaiah is humbled by the awareness of his sin, and the sin of his people. Nevertheless, he accepts a commission to go to the people with a message that disaster is going to overtyaske the land, like a forest cut down to its stumps.
Judah had prided themselves that they were much less naughty than Israel to the north, but Isaiah has stern words of judgement for them nevertheless. You’re not going to listen! He tells them. And it will be terrible for you.
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