The Sign of Immanuel
7: 1-25

These verses speak of the difference between God’s long-term view and our short-term view of our lives. The short-term view will always plunge us into fear and instability, just as it did Ahaz. The king could only see the immediate danger and therefore thought that he would find a way out by entrusting himself to what was a much greater danger – Assyria. If he had taken the time to listen to ADONAI’s perspective on the matter, he would have known that the extreme measures he thought he had to take were in fact unnecessary. Because he refused to trust the LORD and look at the situation from God’s perspective as Isaiah urged him to do, he was ruled by fear and made a tragic decision. Decisions made out of fear will almost always be disastrous ones. Decisions that grow out of the calmness borne of trust, however, can be thoughtful and reasoned.24 Isaiah prophesied about a child to be born who, in some way, would relate to the nation’s deliverance. The birth of the baby, to be named Immanuel, would have great significance for the line of David.