A Painful Restoration……………….

“And I will bring My hand again upon you and thoroughly purge away your dross [as with lye] and take away all your tin or alloy.

 And I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning; afterward you shall be called the City of Righteousness, the Faithful City.

 Zion shall be redeemed with justice, and her [returned] converts with righteousness (uprightness and right standing with God).”  Isa. 1: 25-27 AMP

 

Just as time for punishment came again and again for God’s chosen people, we may well see a turn in our conditions, too.

Look at the description of God’s impending actions in the above verses:
• God will turn His hand against Judah
• He will burn off the dross
• He will remove the alloy or the impurities

This is a description of God taking the matters that should have been easy decisions for His people and taking care of business Himself.  Instead of His hand of protection, He will heat things up in an effort to purify His people. The description of the purifying process can be frightening when we consider He is talking about His chosen people that will be put through this process. 

He is talking about our nation as well. It is through the extreme heat that the impurities of an ore is separated and then at an appropriate time scrapped off and discarded. The alloy can be seen as things that are added in that seemingly add to the strength but are considered impurities by God.  If it is contrary to God’s Word then it must be removed from our lives.

There is hope in this section of Scripture, and it is this hope that I wish for us to focus in on. After the cleansing, as difficult and horrible as it may seem, there is restoration ahead.

We know that at a time in the future Jesus is going to return and the final restorations will commence, but in the meantime, we cannot sit idly by and just wait.

We need to cry out in repentance and it needs to begin now before the consequences of our separation as a nation from God becomes even greater than it already is.