The Hard Way
FIRST QUARTER 2021
SABBATH SCHOOL INSIGHT #4
JANUARY 23, 2021
“THE HARD WAY”
Our lesson title this week, sums up the choices of Israel and Judah - and far too often us also - in choosing the "hard way". This is illustrated clearly in our lesson this week in the choices of wicked king Ahaz. The "hard way" was to trust to Assyria for deliverance from Syria (Aram) and Israel (10 tribes of northern kingdom). The "easy way" was to believe the promises of God as communicated through Isaiah (7:3-9) and validated by sign of the coming son called Immanuel which means "God with us" (Isaiah7:10-17). This pattern of taking the "hard way" epitomized so much of Israel and Judah's history from the Exodus until Pentecost.
Unique to the 1888 message is the belief that when someone UNDERSTANDS and BELIEVES the gospel, following the Lord becomes the "easy way", while following the world, or our fallen nature, or our own inclinations, or, as in Ahaz's case, depending on Assyria, becomes the "hard way". Remember, Jesus said that His yoke is EASY and His burden is LIGHT (Matthew11:28-30). Remember how Jesus described Saul's (later Paul) experience of being a zealous Pharisee as the hard life of "kicking against" a cactus. Remember how Ellen White describes the "hard way" that one encounters if they proceed through the wide gate that leads to destruction (Matthew 7:13-14):
"All along the road that leads to death there are pains and penalties, there are sorrows and disappointments, there are warnings not to go on. God's love has made it hard for the heedless and headstrong to destroy themselves. It is true that Satan's path is made to appear attractive, but it is all a deception; in the way of evil there are bitter remorse and cankering care." MB139.1
"The way of the transgressor is HARD!" Proverbs 13:15.
Yet even when we have chosen the "hard way", God is faithful to us. Even when we are unfaithful to God, GOD IS FAITHFUL TO US!
"If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself." 2Timothy 2:13
We see this in the story of Ahaz and Isaiah for this week. At the time when most of us would have said about Ahaz, "Leave him alone, he is joined to his idols" (Hosea 4:17 - Hosea was a contemporary of Isaiah up in the northern kingdom of Israel), God instead is faithful to Ahaz and sends Ahaz a miraculous sign - even after Ahaz says he doesn't want the sign! Talk about God being faithful in spite of our unfaithfulness!
Notice how the sign that God sends to unfaithful Ahaz accomplishes two things.
It proves that God knows the future - God predicts a child and along comes a child.
It demonstrates that God has not abandoned Ahaz because the child's name is Immanuel - "God with us", or God with Ahaz - still!
Don't forget how wicked Ahaz was. He had sunk to the degenerate moral level of burning his own children alive as a sacrifice to pagan gods - who were actually demons. (Deuteronomy 32:17). If God hadn't abandoned Ahaz in his condition of moral degeneracy, can we ever doubt, or lose hope, that God is still Immanuel, God with US?? No - may we never doubt His faithfulness and presence with us.
"At all times and in all places, in all sorrows and in all afflictions, when the outlook seems dark and the future perplexing, and we feel helpless and alone, the Comforter will be sent in answer to the prayer of faith. Circumstances may separate us from every earthly friend; but no circumstance, no distance, can separate us from the heavenly Comforter. Wherever we are, wherever we may go, He is always at our right hand to support, sustain, uphold, and cheer." {DA 669.4}
May we learn the lessons of Israel and Judah's history - of Ahaz's history - of our own individual and corporate histories - that:
God will NEVER leave us or forsake us – Hebrews 13:5
When we are faithless, He remains faithful – 2 Timothy 2:13
NOTHING can separate us from the love of God – Romans 8:38-39
His mercies are new every morning – Lamentations 3:22-23