Notes on Isaiah: Let the Onslaught of Tyranny Do Its Worst

The rulers of the people 

• are the expression of the life and ambition of the people. 
• We fix on the mountain-peak characters and say they are to blame, 
• but God holds the people themselves responsible also. 
• The people are never exonerated for having bad rulers; 
• the reason they have bad rulers is that they are bad people. 

Those who rule the people do not autocratically crush them, 

• the people are their inspirers; 
• they are the rulers the people deserve. 

The children of God 

• have to vicariously take on themselves
• the suffering under the providential order of tyranny.
• They are right in the midst of it all, 
• yet they are to stand like a rock, 
• perfectly confident in God, 
• and let the onslaught of tyranny do its worst.

The paralyzing effect of the last few years of confusion and cultural upheaval... 

• can make people lose their faith in God. 
• God has found our church leaders wanting, 
• He has found His people wanting. 

So He gathers together the remnant that stands true, 

• and the hope persistently crops up, 
• born in us by the Spirit of God, 
• that what God has shown in His Word will yet be fulfilled, 
• and the church will be one with God.

Fear is apt to make us atheistic 

• and in our outlook we enthrone the devil, not God. 
• God is behind it all, not a thing happens but He knows all about it. 

When the tyrannizers crow 

• and think they have the right by their own power, 
• suddenly the message of God comes—
• Wherefore it shall come to pass, 
• that when the Lord hath performed His whole work upon the earth, 
• He will punish the fruit of the stout hearts of the wicked rulers, 
• and the glory of their high looks . . .(Adaptation of Isaiah 10:12).

Adapted Excerpt From

Notes on Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel

Oswald Chambers