Isaiah 22

Today's Passage: Isaiah 22

In that day the Lord God of hosts
    called for weeping and mourning,
    for baldness and wearing sackcloth;
13 and behold, joy and gladness,
    killing oxen and slaughtering sheep,
    eating flesh and drinking wine.
“Let us eat and drink,
    for tomorrow we die.”

Verse 13 paints a picture of hopelessness. It is a picture that Paul references in 1 Corinthians 15:32 in context of the resurrection:

32 What do I gain if, humanly speaking, I fought with beasts at Ephesus? If the dead are not raised, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”

R.C. Sproul, in reference to this, writes, “if all we have is a religious experience and a religious hope that is confined and restricted to this world, then we are of all of the people in this world the most to be pitied. Because here we are throwing our lives away to a delusion. As Paul goes on to say, “If Christ does not raise, then let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” Let’s be unrestrained hedonists. Don’t laugh at this generation of kids who are doing everything in their power to intoxicate their senses and to find some means of escape from the grim reality of the world we show them every day. That’s not stupid; that’s wisdom. If there is no resurrection, let’s eat, let’s drink, let’s be merry, let’s party until we’re drunk as we can be, until we die. Because tomorrow it’s all over.”

The hope that God offers in the Old Testament finds its fulfillment in the future resurrection of Christ. We have this hope and we know this hope.

This hope must be the anchor of our souls. It can’t be simply a truth that we agree with—it must be a truth that defines us.

Written By: Graham Withers