The Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, said, "In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust" is your strength. But you were unwilling (a paraphrase of Isaiah 30:15).

God told the Israelites that they would receive salvation and strength simply by repenting and trusting Him — not by planning and striving, but by resting quietly in His providence. But they refused. They preferred to trust in their horses. They preferred to trust in their alliance with Egypt. What Israel failed to understand was that to trust in themselves was to reject the Lord, and to trust in Egypt was to rebel against Him.

Friends, often our immediate response to hardship is to take matters into our own hands. Instead of examining our hearts, we analyze our situation. Instead of humbling ourselves in repentance, we try to become more resourceful. Rather than praying to God, we seek other avenues of help.

Yet Israel had this promise from the Lord: the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and He exalts Himself to show mercy to you, for the Lord is a God of justice; "blessed are all those who wait for him" (a paraphrase of Isaiah 30:18).

God desired to be gracious to Israel. He was eager to show them compassion. He wanted to bless them if only they would turn to Him rather than to their own ingenuity and the help of foreign nations.

Friends, the Lord is for us even more now than in the past. He gave us His own most precious and only Son! How will He not also give us all things with Him? This is what Paul proclaims: "If God is for us, who can be against us?" (Romans 8:31–32).

So let us rest in the Lord. Let us simply live by faith in Christ and obedience to His Word. Let us stop striving to make things work out exactly as we want. Let us acknowledge that God is sovereign over every circumstance and every outcome. And let us worship Him in every circumstance.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Isaiah 30 addresses Judah's attempt to secure itself against Assyria by sending envoys and treasure to Egypt — "to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh" (30:2). Isaiah calls Egypt "Rahab who sits still" (30:7), a mocking name for a power that promised much and would do nothing. God's alternative — "in returning and rest you shall be saved" — was not passivity but trust: turning back to God rather than running to Egypt. The people's reply is candid: "No! We will flee upon horses" (30:16).

Yet the chapter's most beautiful verse follows their refusal: "Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you" (30:18). Even after their unwillingness, God waited to show mercy. The chapter goes on to promise that their Teacher would no longer hide Himself, and they would hear a word behind them: "This is the way, walk in it" (30:20–21). The comment's link to Romans 8:32 is apt: the God who waited to be gracious to rebellious Judah has now given His Son, which is the surest proof that He will withhold nothing truly good from His people.

God has laid in Zion "a stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone," a sure foundation: "Whoever believes will not be in haste" (a paraphrase of Isaiah 28:16).

God's "tested stone" is contrasted with the lies on which Israel's leaders were basing their hope (cf. Isaiah 28:18). Rather than embracing God's provision and following His commands, these leaders tried to forge their own security through man-made traditions and rituals. They even made a "covenant with death" to escape destruction (cf. Isaiah 28:15), but God declared that this covenant would not stand and that they would be swept away in judgment (cf. Isaiah 28:18).

We understand this "tested stone" to be Jesus (cf. 1 Peter 2:4–7), the "living stone," through whom believers are "being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood" offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God (1 Peter 2:5). There is a definite contrast between what is man-made and what is spiritual, between tradition and God's Word, between mere ritual and true obedience.

It is in aligning with God's truth and His provision in Christ that we find a sure foundation and freedom from everything that would make us afraid and panic.

In the very next chapter, Isaiah elaborates on this contrast between what is man-made and what is spiritual, between human rules and God's truth. The Lord says that this people draw near with their mouth and honor Him with their lips, while their hearts are far from Him, and their fear of Him is "a commandment taught by men" (a paraphrase of Isaiah 29:13).

Jesus brought this indictment against the religious leaders when they criticized His disciples for not following "the tradition of the elders" (Mark 7:5). He quoted Isaiah 29 and applied it: they had left the commandment of God to hold to human tradition, rejecting God's commandment to establish their own, "thus making void the word of God by your tradition" (a paraphrase of Mark 7:8–13).

The religious leaders of Jesus' day had added hundreds of rules on top of God's Law. While these may originally have been intended to help people obey the Law, in many cases they became an unbearable burden, and over time they came to be treated as equal to, or even greater than, God's commands.

Friends, we must be careful not to fall into this trap ourselves. It is sufficient to preach the Word of God and exhort believers to follow the law of Christ. We must not add to God's Word our own traditions, rituals, and rules that compete with its singular authority. We must also resist the temptation to revive the Old Covenant Mosaic Law as though its regulations were still binding on believers today. From Christ's fullness we have all received grace upon grace, "For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ" (John 1:16–17). The former commandment is set aside because of its weakness and uselessness (cf. Hebrews 7:18); if the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion for a second; and in speaking of a new covenant, God makes the first obsolete (cf. Hebrews 8:7, 13).

When we understand this, we can see why I believe it is wrong to insist that people tithe when they carry personal debt or need that money to support their parents or family. I believe the tithe is an Old Covenant regulation, never commanded of Christians.

I also believe it is wrong to scold people for missing Sunday "church," as if Sunday were a Christian Sabbath, which is never commanded of believers. In my view, the exhortation to meet regularly is often based on a mistaken understanding of Hebrews 10:25, where I believe the expression "meeting together" (literally "our assembling together") refers not to church meetings but to the gathering of believers to Christ at His coming (cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:1, which uses the same word).

It is wrong to try to command Christians to follow the Old Covenant dietary laws, or regulations concerning clothing or the management of slaves, and so on. Remember, we are no longer under law but under grace (cf. Romans 6:14). We have been released from the law, having died to what held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code (cf. Romans 7:6).

Friends, instead of trying to reinstate the Law, let us encourage one another to study God's Word and rightly handle the word of truth (cf. 2 Timothy 2:15). Then every believer will know God's Word for themselves and be personally accountable to God for rightly understanding and applying its truths to their lives.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Isaiah 28:16 is one of the most important Old Testament texts in the New Testament. Paul quotes it twice in Romans (9:33; 10:11) to show that "everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame," and Peter weaves it together with Psalm 118:22 and Isaiah 8:14 to present Christ as the cornerstone — precious to believers, a stone of stumbling to those who reject Him (1 Peter 2:6–8). The comment is right to see Christ as the fulfillment. The phrase "will not be in haste" (or "will not panic") contrasts sharply with the frantic alliances Judah's leaders were making with Egypt (Isaiah 30:1–2); faith in God's foundation brings steadiness.

The comment offers a distinctive reading of Hebrews 10:25. The Greek word for "assembling" (episynagōgē) does appear in 2 Thessalonians 2:1 for the gathering of believers to Christ at His return, and Hebrews 10:25 does go on to mention "the Day drawing near." Most interpreters, however, understand the verse as exhorting believers not to abandon their regular gatherings for worship and mutual encouragement — noting that the preceding verse calls them to "stir up one another to love and good works" (10:24) and that "as is the habit of some" describes a present practice of neglect. The early church met regularly on the first day of the week (Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2). Christians agree with the comment that no one should be burdened with man-made rules, and most would also see regular fellowship as a gift God gives for believers' good. On tithing and the Mosaic Law, see #1983 and #1943.

Certain Bible passages can be confusing because it is unclear who is speaking. For example, Isaiah 28:9–10 asks to whom He will teach knowledge and explain the message — to those just weaned from milk, taken from the breast? — for it is precept upon precept, line upon line, "here a little, there a little" (a paraphrase of Isaiah 28:9–10).

Who is speaking here — God, Isaiah, or someone else? I believe the speakers are the drunken priests and prophets just described in Isaiah 28:7. I like the way the New Living Translation renders it, in which the leaders complain, in effect: Who does the Lord think we are? Why does He speak to us like this, as if we were little children just weaned, telling us everything over and over, one line at a time, a little here and a little there?

The religious leaders of Israel complain that God is treating them and speaking to them like children, and they refuse to pay attention to what the prophet says. In fact, the Hebrew literally reads tsav latsav, tsav latsav, qav laqav, qav laqav, ze'er sham, ze'er sham — a series of Hebrew monosyllables that imitate the babbling of a child, and so mock the prophet's teaching.

"By people of strange lips and with a foreign tongue" the Lord will speak to this people (Isaiah 28:11).

Isaiah writes that since the people will not listen to God but mock His teaching as childish babbling, God will speak to them in the very way they mock Him: "by people of strange lips and with a foreign tongue." These strange lips and foreign tongue would come in the form of the Assyrian invaders sent to judge Israel.

God had said to them, "This is rest; give rest to the weary; and this is repose" — yet they would not hear (a paraphrase of Isaiah 28:12).

So God's words were not childish babbling. They only sounded that way to Israel's leaders because they were intoxicated by their own pride, ideas, and indulgence. God clearly told them to trust in Him, to promote justice, and to wait for His provision, but they refused to listen. Since they would not trust the Lord and chose to mock His Word rather than carefully listen and obey, Isaiah writes that the word of the Lord to them would be "tsav latsav, tsav latsav, qav laqav, qav laqav, ze'er sham, ze'er sham" (cf. Isaiah 28:13).

God would speak to them in the very way they mocked Him. So they would not perceive or understand or turn from their error. Rather than finding rest and refreshing, they would encounter the opposite: they would "go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken" (Isaiah 28:13).

Since the people refused to listen to what God had to say, God would speak to them in a way they could not understand. Since they refused His clear word of mercy, they would be blindsided by His word of judgment. This is in keeping with Isaiah's original prophetic commission, in which God told him to go and tell the people to keep hearing but not understand, keep seeing but not perceive; to make their hearts dull, their ears heavy, and their eyes blind, lest they see, hear, understand, turn, and be healed (a paraphrase of Isaiah 6:9–10).

God told Isaiah to preach a message the people would not understand or accept. The message would simply harden their already hard hearts, dull their already dull ears, and darken their already clouded vision. God sent Isaiah with a message that would have been glorious news of healing and salvation to repentant hearts, but to the stubborn and rebellious hearts of Israel it would be only a message of judgment and destruction.

Friends, let us take this warning from Isaiah. Let us not mock God's Word by reading it however we want, pulling verses and passages out of context to validate our own misguided ideas or experiences. The fearful thing is not so much that God will immediately correct such error, but that He might not. As in Isaiah, He might turn such irreverence for His Word back on the people who made a mockery of it. He might give them over to their error and sin until they and those who listen to them are finally judged without hope of restoration.

What, then, should we do? Let us humble ourselves. Let us refuse to think more highly of ourselves or our ideas than we ought. Let us submit to God's Word as our first and final authority in all things. Let us heed this instruction: do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, "rightly handling the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15).

AI-Expanded Reflection

Paul quotes Isaiah 28:11 in 1 Corinthians 14:21 in his discussion of speaking in tongues: by people of strange tongues and foreign lips God will speak to this people, "and even then they will not listen to me." His point is striking and fits the comment's reading: in Isaiah, foreign speech was a sign of judgment on those who had refused God's clear word. Paul uses it to argue that in the church, intelligible speech that builds others up is to be preferred to uninterpreted tongues (14:19, 22–25). Isaiah's lesson about the danger of refusing clear words carries into the New Testament's instruction on worship.

The same chapter also contains one of Isaiah's great promises of hope, set right in the middle of the judgment: God lays in Zion "a tested stone, a precious cornerstone," a sure foundation, and whoever believes will not be in haste (28:16). Peter and Paul both apply this to Christ (1 Peter 2:6; Romans 9:33; 10:11). The same Word that hardens those who mock it becomes a sure foundation for those who trust it.

So now God will have to speak to his people through foreign oppressors who speak a strange language! (Isaiah 28:11 NLT)

Did you know that this verse in Isaiah is cited by Paul in his letter to the Corinthians? It is cited in the context of his discussion on the gift of speaking in tongues. Why is this significant? To understand Paul's use of this text in Corinthians, one must understand it in the context of Isaiah. In Isaiah it speaks of God's judgment, whether by the Assyrians or the Babylonians, who are foreign nations speaking a foreign tongue. Because God's people, and especially the leaders, have rejected God's message, He will speak to them again, but in a language they will not understand, by a foreign nation that will kill and destroy them and take the rest into exile. Now, consider how Paul uses this text in his argument in 1 Corinthians 14:

Dear brothers and sisters, don’t be childish in your understanding of these things. Be innocent as babies when it comes to evil, but be mature in understanding matters of this kind. It is written in the Scriptures: “I will speak to my own people through strange languages and through the lips of foreigners. But even then, they will not listen to me,” says the LORD. So you see that speaking in tongues is a sign, not for believers, but for unbelievers. Prophecy, however, is for the benefit of believers, not unbelievers. (1 Corinthians 14:20–22 NLT)

First, Paul rebukes the Corinthians for their ignorance and childishness with respect to tongues. He wants them to understand the reason why the gift of tongues was given in the first place. It was given as a witness against unbelieving Jews, even as a sign of judgment by the hands of foreign-speaking Gentiles. It was not, therefore, particularly when uninterpreted, meant for believers but for unbelievers, even unbelieving Jews. Therefore, it is not a gift that they should glory in and practice, especially in the congregation of believers. And I believe that this witness against Jewish unbelief was fulfilled in the first century; therefore, the gift ceased of itself. Therefore, what is practiced today is not the biblical gift but something else, and has been more the cause of false spirituality, division and a wrongful focus in the church.

AI-Expanded Reflection

Isaiah 28:11–13 places unfamiliar speech within a judgment on people who have refused the Lord's message. Leaders who would not receive intelligible instruction will encounter foreigners whose language they cannot readily understand. The irony is severe: the clarity they despised gives way to the bewilderment of foreign domination. Reading that setting helps explain why Paul cites Isaiah during a discussion of tongues rather than treating the quotation as an isolated proof text.

In 1 Corinthians 14:20–25, Paul is concerned with what happens when an outsider enters the gathered church. Uninterpreted speech can leave that person alienated and conclude that the assembly is out of its mind. Intelligible prophetic speech, by contrast, can expose the heart and lead the visitor to acknowledge God's presence. The sign language in verse 22 is therefore not a simple statement that every impressive spiritual manifestation will attract unbelievers. A sign can expose distance and judgment rather than convey immediate benefit.

The original interprets this as a witness specifically against unbelieving Jews that ended in the first century. That is a cessationist conclusion drawn from a larger theological argument; it is not an explicit chronological statement in this passage. Paul also regulates interpreted tongues for the congregation, allows a limited number of speakers, requires silence when no interpreter is present, and says not to forbid speaking in tongues (14:27–28, 39). A complete account of his instruction must incorporate those commands alongside the Isaiah quotation.

Christians disagree over the continuation and present identification of spiritual gifts. The disagreement should be argued from the relevant texts without assuming that every modern claim is authentic or that this one quotation by itself proves all such claims false. First Corinthians supplies criteria that remain morally important in either framework: intelligibility, order, love, truthful discernment, and the building up of the church. Claims to spiritual power do not exempt anyone from those responsibilities.

The passage also challenges forms of unintelligibility beyond tongues. Technical theological speech, unexplained rituals, or insider vocabulary can communicate status while leaving visitors unable to understand the gospel. Paul is concerned with people actually receiving a message, not merely observing the speaker's experience. Mature ministry therefore considers the listener's capacity and need.

A congregation can ask whether its practices make truth understandable and whether personal display has displaced service. The goal is not to remove every difficult idea or unfamiliar element, but to explain faithfully and act in love. Whatever one's position on the gifts, a meeting that magnifies the speaker while confusing the hearer has missed Paul's emphasis on the good of others.

The Lord says these people come near Him with their mouths and honor Him with their lips, while their hearts stay far away — their worship built on merely human rules they've been taught (a paraphrase of Isaiah 29:13). Jesus quoted this verse in Matthew 15:8–9 while confronting the Pharisees over their hypocritical traditions. They'd added rule upon rule, tradition upon tradition, on top of the Law of Moses, so no one would accidentally break it — but in doing so, the people ended up simply following rules and customs without any real heart of worship for the LORD. So God says He'll again astound them with wonder upon wonder, and the wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish (a paraphrase of Isaiah 29:14). What is this wonder the wise and intelligent won't grasp? It's the message of the cross, on which Jesus died. Paul says the message of the cross is foolishness to those perishing, but the power of God to those being saved — since God said He'd destroy the wisdom of the wise and frustrate the intelligence of the intelligent (a paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 1:18–19, quoting Isaiah 29:14). Where's the wise person now? The teacher of the law? The philosopher of this age? Hasn't God made the world's wisdom look foolish? Since the world, in its wisdom, didn't come to know God through wisdom, God was pleased to save those who believe through the "foolishness" of what was preached instead. Jews demand signs, Greeks look for wisdom, but the message preached is Christ crucified — a stumbling block to one and foolishness to the other (a paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 1:20–23). God gave some a spirit of stupor, eyes that couldn't see, ears that couldn't hear (a paraphrase of Romans 11:8, quoting Isaiah 29:10) — yet the LORD says He'll still call some to believe: in that day, the deaf will hear the words of the scroll, and the eyes of the blind will see out of gloom and darkness (a paraphrase of Isaiah 29:18). For those God calls, both Jews and Greeks, Christ becomes the power and wisdom of God — since God's "foolishness" is wiser than human wisdom, and His "weakness" stronger than human strength (a paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 1:24–25). When the world calls us "fools," maybe that's actually a good sign — it's when we're comfortably accepted by society that we should worry whether our faith has been quietly watered down. Are we just following rules and traditions without a genuine heart of worship? But the wonder in all of this is that the LORD longs to be gracious, rising up to show compassion, since He's a God of justice — blessed are all who wait for Him (a paraphrase of Isaiah 30:18). Whether in seasons of peace and joy or adversity and hardship, let's stay faithful, giving Him wholehearted worship, since He longs to eternally bless those who wait on Him.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The reversal this comment traces — worldly wisdom made foolish, worldly foolishness revealed as God's actual wisdom — is worth noting for how directly it echoes Isaiah's own rhetorical strategy centuries earlier: Isaiah doesn't merely criticize the wise and intelligent of his own day; he predicts their specific categories of confidence (wisdom, intelligence) will be the very things God overturns. Paul's use of Isaiah in 1 Corinthians isn't simply borrowing a convenient prooftext — he's identifying the cross as the ultimate instance of a pattern Isaiah had already named as characteristic of how God operates: consistently working in ways that confound whatever a given culture considers self-evidently wise, precisely so that human confidence has nothing to stand on except God Himself.

Regarding Isaiah 28:10–13: to those without a heart for God, or who are spiritually immature, God's commands can feel like nothing more than a list of rules — precept upon precept, do's and don'ts. But the Word, those same "precepts upon precepts," is meant to sink into the heart and grow. Those who treat it only as a rulebook may be like the rocky soil Jesus described; the spiritually immature may be like the seeds choked by thorns and thickets, also from that same parable. These are the same kinds of hearts God describes in the next chapter — people who draw near with their mouths and honor God with their lips, while their hearts stay far from Him, their reverence for Him nothing more than a rule taught by other people (a paraphrase of Isaiah 29:13). Giving lip service, maybe even doing "good things," without any genuine fear of God underneath it. Do you have any branches actually growing from God's seed in you? If so, are they thin and frail, or could they feed many? As Jesus said of the seed sown on good soil: this is the one who hears the word and understands it, and produces a crop — a hundred, sixty, or thirty times what was sown (a paraphrase of Matthew 13:23).

AI-Expanded Reflection

The connection this comment draws between Isaiah's warning and Jesus's parable of the sower is worth noting as more than a loose thematic echo — Isaiah 29:13 is one of the very passages Jesus quotes directly, centuries later, to describe the exact same problem in the religious leaders of His own day (Matthew 15:8–9; Mark 7:6–7). That direct citation suggests the danger this comment names — outward religious form without inward reality — isn't a problem unique to any one era or culture, but a recurring temptation serious enough that Jesus reached back to Isaiah's own words as the clearest existing description of it, rather than needing to coin a new one.