Isaiah 7:1 (TPT)
During the reign of Ahaz, the son of Jotham and grandson of Uzziah, two kings launched an attack against Jerusalem: Rezin, the king of Syria, and Pekah, the son of Remaliah, the king of Israel. But they failed to conquer it.
Ahaz was the king of Judah, whose capital was Jerusalem.
He took the throne at the age of twenty and reigned sixteen years; and here he is, a young leader facing his first major test as king.
{For more details on the story, see See 2 Kings 16.}
This section of Isaiah (7–11) is known as the “Book of Immanuel.”
· Rezin means “wicked pleasure,” and he’s a prophetic picture of a carnal, fleshly life.
· Pekah means “open-eyed, seeing,” a picture of human reasoning.
Two kings (two principalities), Rezin and Pekah, rose up against the king of Judah.
This was an alliance between carnal, sense-based thinking, which pursues passion over purpose, and human reasoning, which operates apart from the wisdom and perspective of God.
This unholy alliance of two kings threatened to invade if King Ahaz didn’t agree to surrender his throne, compromise and join their plan.
-The northern kingdom of Israel (Rezin) and Syria (Pekah) joined each other to overthrow Ahaz and put “the son of Tabeel” on the throne in his place.
-The pressure was on King Ahaz to join this united front against the Assyrian expansion, which was a larger threat to them all.
I’m inviting you to use spiritual insight with me and picture the similarities between what’s happening in this story, what was still happening when Jesus was born – and what’s happening currently in our time:
· Political unions were being made, that were not born of God, but were born of self-preservation.
· The men and women behind them were not living with an awareness of Godly purposes for their nations, as much as they were being driven by carnal desires and grabs for power.
· Human reasoning was attempting to dethrone “faith, prayer, trust in God, and staying in patient covenantal alignment and partnership with the development of His kingdom structure in the earth.”
It’s not that politics don’t have a place, because in a society like ours, with the government we have, they’re important.
However, remember this:
“They’re an anemic substitution for the transformational message of the Gospel and the ever-increasing kingdom of God in the earth!”
They play a role, but they cannot be the foundation on which the church builds, or the source from which our wisdom flows; KINGDOM THINKING has to be the influencer of our politics, not the other way around.
For access to my full notes, click the link...and as always, feel free to comment and leave your thoughts.