Inspired by Isaiah 27, two friends talk over coffee about a God who finally kills the chaos, flips the vineyard story on its head, and ends four chapters of worldwide wreckage with a trumpet and people finding their way home.
Tom and Ray, same corner table, coffee going cold.
Ray: “Okay, Leviathan. What even is that?”
Tom: “The Devil behind those that kept crushing Israel.”
Ray: “And God just kills it?”
Tom: “With a sword.”
Ray: “So it’s like evil itself finally getting dealt with.”
Tom: “Yeah, some think it’s Satan getting dealt with directly.”
Ray: “I mean, that’s understandable.”
Tom: “And then comes the vineyard, which I loved.”
Ray: “Because of chapter 5?”
Tom: “Absolutely, you recall that in chapter 5, God gave up on his vineyard. Judged it good.”
Ray: “And here He’s what, tending it again?”
Tom: “Watering it every moment. Standing guard day and night.”
Ray: “That’s a complete turnaround.”
Tom: “And He says, I have no wrath against it now.”
Ray: “That’s a big deal.”
Tom: “Yeah. Like the discipline is over and he’s just watching over them and protecting them.”
Ray: “What was the discipline even for?”
Tom: “To burn out the idolatry. That was the thing rotting Israel from inside.”
Ray: “So the exile, the suffering — it had a point.”
Tom: “God says he dealt with Israel differently than he dealt with the enemy nations. Theirs was destruction. Israel’s was more like surgery.”
Ray: “Huh. That’s a different way to think about suffering.”
Tom: “I don’t know if I’d feel that way going through it, though.”
Ray: “No, probably not.”
Tom: “And then the end of the chapter, the great trumpet.”
Ray: “The regathering.”
Tom: “Everyone scattered — Assyria, Egypt, wherever — they all hear it and come home.”
Ray: “To Jerusalem.”
Tom: “To worship.”
Ray: “That’s how the whole thing ends. Just people coming home.”
Tom: “After all the wreckage in chapter 24. Earth falling apart, and it ends with a trumpet.”
Ray: “I like that ending a lot more than I expected.”
Tom: “Yeah. Me too.”
Ray: “You think there’s a trumpet for regular people? Like, not just Israel.”
Tom: “Absolutely, Paul talks about a trumpet, too. First Thessalonians.”
Ray: “Same idea maybe.”
Tom: “Maybe. I don’t know exactly how it all lines up.”
Ray: “Yeah, me neither.”
Tom: “But somebody’s blowing something at the end.”
Ray: “Ha. Yeah.”
Tom: “And people are heading somewhere good.”
Ray: “I’ll take it.”
Tom: “Same.”
Ray: “You good? I gotta get going.”
Tom: “Yeah, go ahead.”
Created by Steve
God’s Word…
Holman Christian Standard Bible
Isaiah 27
Leviathan Slain
27 On that day the Lord with His harsh, great, and strong sword, will bring judgment on Leviathan, the fleeing serpent—Leviathan, the twisting serpent. He will slay the monster that is in the sea.
The Lord’s Vineyard
2 On that day
sing about a desirable vineyard:
3 I, Yahweh, watch over it;
I water it regularly.
I guard it night and day
so that no one disturbs it.
4 I am not angry,
but if it produces thorns and briers for Me,
I will fight against it, trample it,
and burn it to the ground.
5 Or let it take hold of My strength;
let it make peace with Me—
make peace with Me.
6 In days to come, Jacob will take root.
Israel will blossom and bloom
and fill the whole world with fruit.
7 Did the Lord strike Israel
as He struck the one who struck Israel?
Was he killed like those killed by Him?
8 You disputed with her
by banishing and driving her away.[a]
He removed her with His severe storm
on the day of the east wind.
9 Therefore Jacob’s iniquity will be purged in this way,
and the result of the removal of his sin will be this:
when he makes all the altar stones
like crushed bits of chalk,
no Asherah poles or incense altars will remain standing.
10 For the fortified city will be deserted,
pastures abandoned and forsaken like a wilderness.
Calves will graze there,
and there they will spread out and strip its branches.
11 When its branches dry out, they will be broken off.
Women will come and make fires with them,
for they are not a people with understanding.
Therefore their Maker will not have compassion on them,
and their Creator will not be gracious to them.
12 On that day
the Lord will thresh grain from the Euphrates River
as far as the Wadi of Egypt,
and you Israelites will be gathered one by one.
13 On that day
a great trumpet will be blown,
and those lost in the land of Assyria will come,
as well as those dispersed in the land of Egypt;
and they will worship the Lord
at Jerusalem on the holy mountain.
Footnotes
- Isaiah 27:8 Hb obscure