Isaiah 25

As a Christian, I have often come across clichés. Well, not clichés as such, more things that people say whenever there is a situation that they feel needs it. These are often trite and pithy but essentially unhelpful phrases and ideas. You know the sort of thing,
‘Whenever God closes a door he opens a window!’
‘The Lord moves in mysterious ways!’
That sort of stuff. It sounds good but isn’t necessarily helpful or even biblical. 
One of those things that I used to think was a cliché was whenever someone would say to me ‘Don’t worry, it is all part of God’s plan’ as I was suffering another setback. God’s plans for me usually seem difficult to fathom and difficult to see.
Then, earlier this year, I went to a different church where the sermon was all about God’s plan and I realised that it was far from a cliché! I had, as is my usual way, merely misunderstood what it was all about.
What follows is an outline of my notes I made that day. I hope it makes sense to anyone who reads it!

The passage was Isaiah 25

LORD, you are my God;
    I will exalt you and praise your name,
for in perfect faithfulness
    you have done wonderful things,
    things planned long ago.
2 You have made the city a heap of rubble,
    the fortified town a ruin,
the foreigners’ stronghold a city no more;
    it will never be rebuilt.
3 Therefore strong peoples will honour you;
    cities of ruthless nations will revere you.
4 You have been a refuge for the poor,
    a refuge for the needy in their distress,
a shelter from the storm
    and a shade from the heat.
For the breath of the ruthless
    is like a storm driving against a wall
5     and like the heat of the desert.
You silence the uproar of foreigners;
    as heat is reduced by the shadow of a cloud,
    so the song of the ruthless is stilled.
6 On this mountain, the LORD Almighty will prepare
    a feast of rich food for all peoples,
a banquet of aged wine—
    the best of meats and the finest of wines.
7 On this mountain, he will destroy
    the shroud that enfolds all peoples,
the sheet that covers all nations;
8     he will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears
    from all faces;
he will remove his people’s disgrace
    from all the earth.
The LORD has spoken.
9 In that day they will say,
“Surely this is our God;
    we trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the LORD, we trusted in him;
    let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.”
10 The hand of the LORD will rest on this mountain;
    but Moab will be trampled in their land as straw is trampled down in the manure.
11 They will stretch out their hands in it,
    as swimmers stretch out their hands to swim.
God will bring down their pride
    despite the cleverness[a] of their hands.
12 He will bring down your high fortified walls
    and lay them low;
he will bring them down to the ground,
    to the very dust.

Right at the start, we see that God has a plan. It is a plan that he has had for a long time. Ever since the start of mankind’s journey with God we have tried to outdo him, to do things our way. However, God will bring all these cities down. They will fall. Our strongholds will not stand up to the power of God. Isaiah means Babylon as this is where the Israelites were headed but he also means Jerusalem. The City of God was anything but and the protection the Israelites thought they had there had long gone.

In verses 3-5 we see that this doesn’t matter because God makes a better refuge than any city possibly could. It is a shelter from the storm and fire and a refuge for the poor and the lost. No matter how big we build our cities, no matter how much we plan to do what we want, His plans are bigger and better than ours.

There the follows (verses 6-8) a description of where this refuge will be. It will be on the Mountain of the Lord. This is the mountain of Abraham and Isaac where God provided the sacrifice. It is the Mountain of Jesus where He provided the ultimate sacrifice. It is Mount Zion, the Holy Mountain.

In these verses, we see the word “all” repeated 5 times. This is not a limited promise. Everyone can come and everyone can eat at the banquet. Young, old, Jew, Gentile, rich, poor, black or white it doesn’t matter; all are welcome. However, it is only available on one mountain.

It is often said that all religions lead to God, they are, in effect, paths up the same mountain. This isn’t true. The Mountain of God has a crucified Christ on the top and not all religions lead there.

God will provide a feast. The Bible is full of parallels. Feasts are all over the place. Feasts often come in the shadow of death (see Psalm 23 for, perhaps, the best-known example).

This feast is for everyone but there will be some people who do not want to eat at this feast. The Parable of the Wedding Feast in Luke 14 is a New Testament example of this. Remember that in the end we will be with God and there will be no more worrying or want (Revelation 21).

On this Mountain (v7) God has destroyed the shroud that covers all people. What is this shroud? It is death. When Christ died on the cross and when he came back to life it was death itself that was defeated. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, death has lost its sting. Remember where Jesus left his shroud! He left it behind him when he walked out into his new life. We too should do this when we become Christians. Paul talks about the wages of sin being death and it is possible to put the shroud back on when we continue to sin. We need to try our best not to.

This is a feast, not a snack! As Isaiah 55 points out, it’s a feast we didn’t have to pay for (Isaiah 55:1-2). As the writer of the passage puts it, “The Lord has spoken”. This is all fact.

We may still be waiting but it will come.

We need to remember that there are some who will not like this message. There are enemies of the Gospel but look what happens to them. God will trample them low, they will have their high fortified walls brought down and they will have to swim through dung. No matter what the enemies of the gospel do, the Victory has already been won, the feast has been prepared and the day of the Lord will come.


I hope that this all made sense. I may have a read and a pray about this post and edit it later but for now, that’s it.