Today’s Scripture Reading (February 13, 2020): Isaiah 15
& 16
For a while, during
my late teen years, I worked at a department store as a night porter. The job was
essentially a cross between a janitor and a security guard. We cleaned, and we
made our rounds. Often the nights were long, and there was little to do. The cleaning
job was usually completed in the first portion of the shift. The rest of the
night was spent walking the aisles and checking doors, and there was also a lot
of card playing. My shift started at 11:00 p.m. and ended at 7:00 am. There was
no leeway in those times. I had to be at work at 11:00 to enter the building,
and I had to leave at precisely 7:00 in the morning. I remember those mornings.
There were usually four or five of us working the shift, and just before 7:00,
we would gather at the front door of the store. At precisely 7:00, my boss
would phone security to tell them that we were leaving the building. After the
7:00 hour, the day staff would begin to trickle in, but our shift was done, and
we were gone.
We really don’t
know what happened to Moab “within three years.” Part of the problem is that we
do not know when the prophecy was written. The concluding paragraph appears to
have been added at a later date, after the main part of the prophecy in Isaiah
15 and 16 was written. Something happened, and Isaiah or one of his disciples
added the words, “But now the Lord says.” Something had changed.
The other part
of the problem is that there is a scarcity of information about Moab herself.
And the reality is that the area was called Moab long after the original
inhabitants were gone. But a line had been drawn, and that line was three years
down the road.
The hope of this
prophecy is that word of doom would reach the Moabites and that there would be
course change. If that happened, then there was a way back from the disaster
that was approaching. But this prophecy was also a note of justice directed
toward the people of Israel. God may judge them for their sin, but they were
not alone. He also lays judgment on the rest of the nations of the world. Sin
carries a cost, and it does not matter who you are, at some point, the price
has to be paid.
It is also
interesting how Isaiah describes the coming deadline. It is “three years, as a servant bound by contract would count them.”
The meaning of the phrase here is that it is exactly three years. The Bible
often counts time a little differently from the way that we count time. Three
years could mean less than two years because the portion of the first and last
year count as one year each. For instance, was Jesus in the tomb for three days?
The Bible says so, but by modern timekeeping, it was less than two days. Jesus
died at three in the afternoon. The day ended at six, only three hours later.
So, the maximum Jesus was in the tomb on Friday was three hours. He spent
Saturday in its entirety in the grave, and then from six Saturday evening,
until at the latest six Sunday morning, or twelve hours. The Bible says three
days, but the absolute maximum amount of time that Jesus could have spent in
the grave was one day and fifteen hours.
Three years, as a servant bound by
contract would count them, means precisely three years. Because the master
would make sure that it was not a day less, and the worker would make sure that
it was not a day more. When 7:00 comes, it is time to go home.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Isaiah
17
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