You Have Not Remembered The Rock

In that day people will look to their Maker and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel. They will not look to the altars, the work of their hands, and they will have no regard for the Asherah poles and the incense altars their fingers have made.

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

You have forgotten God your Savior; you have not remembered the Rock, your fortress. Therefore, though you set out the finest plants and plant imported vines, though on the day you set them out, you make them grow, and on the morning when you plant them, you bring them to bud, yet the harvest will be as nothing in the day of disease and incurable pain.

Isaiah 17:7-11

The work of our hands is different than the work of our Father’s hands. We can drive through the country side in the spring and see the flowers and fruit sprouting up. We can drive by a junkyard and see the rusting relics of man-made cars. The metal produces nothing. Fruit, on the other hand, grows, ripens, and nourishes hungry humans.

The contrast between the fruit and metal should remind us of God’s prophesies against ancient cities like Damascus. We are reminded in Isaiah “all will be desolation.” The harvest will be like a heap of ruins, all man-made. But the fruits just keep on coming.

When we join with God in the work of His hands, God multiplies our effort and provides spiritual nourishment for many.

Without Jesus, we can do nothing. Without Jesus, we can be nothing.

Our Daily Bread – July 26, 2014