We have been convicted and we are now awaiting final sentence. Some citizens who have followed Him closely will be spared the severity of the punishment but notwithstanding; we are all going to be affected to some degree, as the judgments laid out centuries ago are imposed.

While I was reviewing Isaiah 5: 20, “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil….,” I decided to study the entire chapter to determine in my own mind if the total content represented both a prophecy for the time it was uttered (as it surely was), as well as a double fulfillment (as I think it is). In pursuit of the answer, I viewed, among other reference material, The Wycliffe Bible Commentary, and was not surprised to see the parallel between the Judgment and Exile in store for Israel at the time of Isaiah’s writing and the conditions existing today. The first of three sections of the chapter begins, “Evil Yield of the Lord’s Vineyard” and goes on to describe Israel as the vineyard. Certainly, when we look at the Israel nations today, the unmistakable stench of evil, often wrapped up in the guise of goodness, is easily spotted. This is certainly the first clue to Isaiah 5 being a dual prophetic fulfillment.

The second section deals with the seven counts of transgression and while the circumstances behind each charge may differ slightly, think of the decline of your Israel nation, particularly over the past fifty years, and ask yourself how you would vote as a jury member. You might even add to the charges, for example, to the 5th charge how our modern society denigrates Jesus Christ or drug use to the sixth.

1. Guilty of selfish greed.
2. Guilty of frivolous pleasure-seeking and vicious dissipation.
3. Guilty of cynical materialism.
4. Guilty of reversing the standards of morality.
5. Guilty of intellectual pride and self-sufficiency.
6. Guilty of alcoholic indulgence.
7. Guilty of corruption.

God’s sentence in the first fulfillment was “Defeat and Devastation by a Foreign Foe.” Israel is described in a most appropriate way, “As a withered plant, rotten at the root, suddenly crumbles away in a breeze, or as dry stubble roars up in sudden flame at the slightest spark, so quickly would Israel fall. Her spiritual dry rot stemmed from her contemptuous rejection of God’s Word.” God used Assyria or Babylon to administer the punishment the first time around as they dispatched Israel into exile. Isaiah suggested their attack would be spectacularly sudden. While there is nowhere left to exile today’s Israel nations, it is interesting that in reading Ezekiel 38, God identifies the nations that will attack True Israel in the final days and it seems very likely that the two prophesied attacks will indeed be sudden. The first from the north could well be against True Israel fighting forces in the Mid-East and the second will surely be against the land of the unwalled villages, that is, North America, as Gog comes up across the North Pole swooping down on an unsuspecting people.

The defeat and devastation and the resulting exile of the first fulfillment led to the movement of the Israel peoples to the appointed lands. In the second fulfillment there will also be defeat and devastation (otherwise there would be no need of the Lord returning) but His return will lead to great joy in the Kingdom lands and a return of those lands in the mid-east promised to Abraham almost twenty centuries ago. Perhaps this may appear as a reward for contemptuous behaviour but it must be remembered that some seventy years ago, True Israel gave over her dominion to Esau and as sheep, have been easily led ever since.

Still, to sum up, the rot in True Israel lands has brought forth an evil yield. Our nations are guilty on all accounts and the world is poised as never before for the final reckoning. Our power has been scattered and God’s Law has been all but abandoned. The only question in doubt is about the actual timing of the sneak attacks. We can but wait and see!