The Strand Study Bible

ISAIAH

ISAIAH

1052

5:22-23). 5:8 God divided up the land during Joshua’s day so that everyone could benefit from it. Sadly, many of the greedy landowners gobbled up the land ( Woe unto them that join house to house ) via unjust foreclosures. Meaning: Money (the temporal perspective) became more important than the Master (the eternal perspective). 5:10 God reminded Israel that once judgment fell, due in part to their love for money (I Tim 6:9-10), the yield of their fields would be barely a “tenth of the amount sown” ( shall yield one bath ). Serving self instead of the Savior is like putting money in pockets with holes (Hag 1:1-6). 5:18 The people of God were “parading their sin” in front of God, as one would pull a “ cart rope ” in order to parade some idol. Because Israel’s sin was so open, God would place a banner above her saying, “Attention all nations: Israel is yours for the taking” (vs 26-30). 5:20 No verse describes America today better than this verse does. United Methodist Donald Wildmon, president of the American Family Association (AFA), said in a 1998 article, called Who Would Have Thought? :

Who would have thought, 30 years ago, that our country would be in the moral mess it is now in? Not me. Not anyone I know. But the truth of the matter is that we are now in an extreme moral mess. We have abandoned our roots, told God He is irrelevant, and called good evil and evil good. In the past 30 years we have killed more than 30,000,000 innocent unborn children. We have allowed hardcore pornography into nearly every aspect of our society. We have encouraged millions of individuals to beat the system and live off the state. We have accepted and even approved of the homosexual lifestyle with all the misery which goes with it. We have brought racial division to a deeper level than it was during the days of segregation. We have watched as divorce has become the norm. And on and on the problems go. 1

Billy Graham in StormWarning agrees. He notes:

While government takeovers of American industry and banking should cause us great concern, nothing should burden our hearts more than the outrageous immorality that is welcomed into homes and minds around the world via television and the Internet. 2

Television and newspaper commentator Pat Buchanan adds:

America has ceased to be a moral community. We do not agree on whether God exists, whether there is a higher moral law, whether abortion is killing a child, whether gay is good, whether drugs should be a matter of choice. And a country that ceases to be a moral community will eventually cease to be a country. 3

Joe Dallas in The Gay Gospel notes:

When God is alleged to sanction the abominable, a religious travesty is being played out, and boldly. The travesty is twofold. Not only are believers falling into homosexual sin and legitimizing it but uninformed heterosexual Christians are applauding them as they do! Prominent religious figures and Christian organizations are giving a friendly nod to gay ideology, making Isaiah’s famous warning more relevant than ever: “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness” (Isaiah 5:20 KJV). 4

Who’d a thought… ( Prov 14:34 and Isa 19:14 ). 5:23 There are a number of things that can destroy a nation ( Gen 13:13 ), and the love of money ( Which justify the wicked for reward ), otherwise known as greed ( I Tim 6: 6- 10 ), just happens to be one of them. Billy Graham in StormWarning notes:

The great flaw in the American economic system has finally been revealed: an unrealistic faith in the power of prosperity rather than in the ultimate power and benevolence of God. The American Dream became America’s god; wealth and abundance have become the measure of America’s success. But–as recent events have shown–we have been living an illusion. Journalist Robert J. Samuelson summarized this well in Newsweek magazine. He wrote: Every age has its illusions. Ours has been this fervent belief in the power of prosperity. Our pillars of faith are now crashing about us. We are discovering that we cannot, as we had once supposed, create prosperity at will… Worse, we are learning that even great amounts of prosperity won’t solve all our social problems. Our Good Society is disfigured by huge blemishes: entrenched poverty, persistent racial tension, the breakdown of the family, and staggering budget deficits. We are being rudely disabused of our vision of the future. The result is a deep crisis of spirit that fuels American’s growing self-doubts, cynicism with politics, and confusion about our global role. 2

At this present moment, the world is in the grip of the most devastating economic crisis since the Great Depression, and as one economist put it, “Our economy is on life support.” Why? Because of our love of money. God destroyed His own nation because of greed (vs 24). Don’t think He won’t destroy us.

1 AFA Journal. Who Would Have Thought? , February 1998 . Print. 2 Graham, Billy. StormWarning , Nashville, TN, Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, 1992 and 2010. Print. 3 Buchanan, Pat. Los Angeles Times , June 10, 1997. Print. 4 Dallas, Joe. The Gay Gospel ?, Eugene, OR, Harvest House Pub., 1996/2007. Print.