It’s Ash Wednesday…

It’s the time we remember that our time here is limited. Last week, while we were at a local resort celebrating (pre) Valentine’s, we had to take a break for a memorial service.

Our friend Rich Hughes, retired Air Force Brigadier General, our age exactly, born 9 days after June, went to church on Sunday, January 11. A friend of mine saw him in Sunday School. He came home with his wife, Georgeann, and collapsed. EMTs rushed him to the hospital. Dead within two hours. First class guy, in apparent good health. Dead.

Which of us is next?

Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return. – God to Adam, Genesis 3.19

As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass; he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more. (Psalm 103.13 – 16, ESV)

I don’t think we recognize as much as we should that righteousness is a good thing. That recognition is certainly not always the case “out there.” I don’t keep up with all the details of the seemingly never-ending Epstein affair, but there are folks resigning from high-profile positions because of their association with him. I expect some of them might be thinking, “I wish I had been a bit more interested in doing the right thing than in indulging in the wrong thing.”

Righteousness is not only God’s requirement, it’s his recipe for the good life. It’s right there in Isaiah 32:

…until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is deemed a forest. Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field. And the effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever. (Isaiah 32.15 – 17, ESV)

“The effect of righteousness will be peace”

“The result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever.”

The section concludes with:

My people will abide in a peaceful habitation, in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places. (Isaiah 32.18, ESV)

Not, “Who wouldn’t want righteousness?” but “Who wouldn’t want the effects of righteousness?”

If righteousness is obedience to God and his laws, wouldn’t we better off righteous? Like a father trying to direct the family, doesn’t life run smoother when the kids cooperate?

God made us and gave us a maintenance manual. If we run the creature according to the manual, we get a minimum of friction and a maximum of joy and peace. – Skip Gray

You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore. (Psalm 16.11, ESV)

We considered yesterday how the Israelites were bound and determined to go “down to Egypt” (it’s always “down to Egypt” in the Bible) even when God told them not to. Why? What’s so bad about Egypt?

Chapter 31 gives us a clue. It’s not Egypt so much as the people’s trust in Egypt (which they can see) versus trusting and consulting the LORD (whom they can’t see except by faith):

Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help and rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or consult the LORD! (Isaiah 31.1, ESV)

The psalmist captured it:

Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God. (Psalm 20.7, ESV)

In the U.S., our money proclaims, “In God we trust.” Do we?

Isaiah 30 takes on a journey from rebellion to blessing. It opens with a warning not to go down to Egypt, a warning the people do not pay attention to:

“Ah, stubborn children,” declares the LORD, “who carry out a plan, but not mine, and who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin; who set out to go down to Egypt, without asking for my direction, to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt! (Isaiah 30.1, 2, ESV)

The people do what they want, and they don’t want to be told otherwise.

And now, go, write it before them on a tablet and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come as a witness forever. For they are a rebellious people, lying children, children unwilling to hear the instruction of the LORD; who say to the seers, “Do not see,” and to the prophets, “Do not prophesy to us what is right; speak to us smooth things, prophesy illusions, leave the way, turn aside from the path, let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.” (Isaiah 30.8 – 11 ESV)

Jeremiah experienced the same rejection over the same issue. During the exile to Babylon, the people left in the land asked Jeremiah whether or not they should go to Egypt. Jeremiah said, no, don’t go. (See Jeremiah 42). So Jeremiah 43 opens:

When Jeremiah finished speaking to all the people all these words of the LORD their God, with which the LORD their God had sent him to them, Azariah the son of Hoshaiah and Johanan the son of Kareah and all the insolent men said to Jeremiah, “You are telling a lie. The LORD our God did not send you to say, ‘Do not go to Egypt to live there.’… (Jeremiah 43.1, 2, ESV)

Back to Isaiah 30, the promise and warning are clear

This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it. (Isaiah 30.15, NIV)

But then a change of heart: after God punishes them, he promises clear direction to which the people will listen:

For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left. (Isaiah 30.19 – 21, ESV)

And the people will get rid of their idols, and God will bless them:

Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images. You will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, “Be gone!” And he will give rain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread, the produce of the ground, which will be rich and plenteous. In that day your livestock will graze in large pastures, and the oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder… (Isaiah 30.22 – 24, ESV)

They will turn to God, from idols, just as the Thessalonians did under Paul’s ministry:

…you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything. For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God… (1 Thessalonians 1.7 – 9, ESV)

It’s Valentine’s Day, and June and I have just returned from a pre-Valentine’s getaway to a local resort. I hope your day was blessed.

There was a big competition last week – not the Super Bowl, which Seattle won handily – but the 150th annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, held in New York City. On February 3, World Magazine reported:

Historically, the breed most likely to walk away with the top award is the wire fox terrier, which has won 15 times—almost twice that of any other type of dog.

The wire fox terrier, who would know? Asta, in the 1930s detective comedy The Thin Man, was a wire fox terrier:

Skippy, the dog actor who plays Asta, apparently brushing up on his lines…

But no, this year’s winner was NOT a wire fox terrier. Meet Penny the dog, a Doberman:

I don’t even like Dobermans, but that is a magnificent dog. Chest out, ears up. “You can take my picture if you like.”

Penny weighs about four times as much as a wire fox terrier, who weights about four times as much as the average chihuahua. On the other hand, the St Bernard is twice as big as Penny!

Such variety!

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. (1 Corinthians 12.4 – 7 ESV)

And most people’s dogs will never even compete at a local dog show, must less win at Westminster. But they love them just the same. Most of us won’t win any prizes either…

And seekest thou great things for thyself? Seek them not. (Jeremiah 45.5, KJV)

…and God loves us:

John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. (Revelation 1.4 – 6, ESV, emphasis mine)

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2.4 – 7, ESV)

Wow. We ended on a Valentine’s Day theme!

A chilling paragraph in Isaiah 29 that can be applied to scripture:

Astonish yourselves and be astonished; blind yourselves and be blind! Be drunk, but not with wine; stagger, but not with strong drink! For the LORD has poured out upon you a spirit of deep sleep, and has closed your eyes (the prophets), and covered your heads (the seers).

And the vision of all this has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed. When men give it to one who can read, saying, “Read this,” he says, “I cannot, for it is sealed.” And when they give the book to one who cannot read, saying, “Read this,” he says, “I cannot read.” (Isaiah 29.9 – 12, ESV)

This picture of the sealed book has always impressed me (or depressed me). There are a lot of folks who believe that they can’t read the Bible for themselves. To them, it’s a sealed book. For example, when a friend tried to encourage his father to read the Bible to hear from God, his father replied, “If the priest wants me to know something from the Bible, he’ll tell me!”

It’s sad because…

Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. (1 Corinthians 2.12, ESV)

The warning about the sealed book is followed immediately by another warning:

And the Lord said: “Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men, therefore, behold, I will again do wonderful things with this people, with wonder upon wonder; and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden.” (Isaiah 29.13, 14, ESV)

From The Message:

The Master said: “These people make a big show of saying the right thing, but their hearts aren’t in it. Because they act like they’re worshiping me but don’t mean it, I’m going to step in and shock them awake, astonish them, stand them on their ears. The wise ones who had it all figured out will be exposed as fools. The smart people who thought they knew everything will turn out to know nothing.” (Isaiah 29.13, 14, MSG)

The chapter closes with a promise that things will turn around:

Is it not yet a very little while until Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field, and the fruitful field shall be regarded as a forest? In that day

• the deaf shall hear the words of a book, and
• out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind shall see.
• The meek shall obtain fresh joy in the LORD, and
• the poor among mankind shall exult in the Holy One of Israel. (Isaiah 29.17 – 19, ESV)
• …
• And those who go astray in spirit will come to understanding, and those who murmur will accept instruction. (Isaiah 29.17 – 19, 24, ESV)

PS Happy Friday 13th! I hope you don’t have paraskevidekatriaphobia.

Yesterday, I promised one more important lesson from Isaiah 28, which ends with a lovely metaphor on the disciple-making process that I mentioned last week. I wrote about the lessons from Isaiah 28.23 – 29 in detail back in 2021. Here’s the summary with links to the original blogs, which I urge you to read for more detail:

Give ear, and hear my voice; give attention, and hear my speech. Does he who plows for sowing plow continually? Does he continually open and harrow his ground? (Isaiah 28.23, 24, ESV)

Repentance is important, but it’s not ongoing.

When he has leveled its surface, does he not scatter dill, sow cumin, and put in wheat in rows and barley in its proper place, and emmer as the border? For he is rightly instructed; his God teaches him. (Isaiah 28.25, 26, ESV)

We sow different kinds of seed according to individual differences, led by the Holy Spirit.

Dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge, nor is a cart wheel rolled over cumin, but dill is beaten out with a stick, and cumin with a rod. Does one crush grain for bread? No, he does not thresh it forever; when he drives his cart wheel over it with his horses, he does not crush it. This also comes from the LORD of hosts; he is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom. (Isaiah 28.27 – 29, ESV)

There are individual differences in bringing people to maturity also, and God is standing by to lead us in this area, too.

Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. (Colossians 1.28, ESV)

A hodge-podge today from Isaiah 27 and 28.

Isaiah 27 opens with a short paragraph on Leviathan:

In that day the LORD with his hard and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea. (Isaiah 27.1, ESV)

And once again, I wasted time thinking about Leviathan, something only a few verses of scripture mention, and none of us really understands. “Punish Leviathan” here in Isaiah could mean that Isaiah is using Leviathan as a metaphor for the nations wreaking havoc on Israel: Assyria and Babylon. And the “dragon that is in the sea” could be Satan.

Turns out I wrote about Leviathan last April and concluded it was primarily a distraction. I need to remember lessons learned!

On to Isaiah 28, which has several lessons. The first is about the dangers of alcohol:

Ah, the proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim, and the fading flower of its glorious beauty, which is on the head of the rich valley of those overcome with wine! Behold, the Lord has one who is mighty and strong; like a storm of hail, a destroying tempest, like a storm of mighty, overflowing waters, he casts down to the earth with his hand. The proud crown of the drunkards of Ephraim will be trodden underfoot; and the fading flower of its glorious beauty, which is on the head of the rich valley, will be like a first-ripe fig before the summer: when someone sees it, he swallows it as soon as it is in his hand…These also reel with wine and stagger with strong drink; the priest and the prophet reel with strong drink, they are swallowed by wine, they stagger with strong drink, they reel in vision, they stumble in giving judgment. For all tables are full of filthy vomit, with no space left. (Isaiah 28.1 – 4, 7 – 8, ESV)

I know alcohol is fashionable these days. I just read a piece on why we should use real wine in our Communion celebrations, and it included the sentence, “All the evangelicals I know now drink—and so do their parents, who once abstained.” I guess he doesn’t know us…

Alcohol may be fashionable and OK in moderation, but according to Isaiah, it can get ugly. Solomon agrees:

Wine is a mocker, strong drink a brawler, and whoever is led astray by it is not wise. (Proverbs 20.1, ESV)

Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has strife? Who has complaining? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness of eyes? Those who tarry long over wine; those who go to try mixed wine. Do not look at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup and goes down smoothly. In the end it bites like a serpent and stings like an adder. Your eyes will see strange things, and your heart utter perverse things. You will be like one who lies down in the midst of the sea, like one who lies on the top of a mast. “They struck me,” you will say, “but I was not hurt; they beat me, but I did not feel it. When shall I awake? I must have another drink.” (Proverbs 23.29 – 35, ESV)

And right after Isaiah’s diatribe on “the drunkards of Ephraim,” we have this nugget:

To whom will he teach knowledge, and to whom will he explain the message? Those who are weaned from the milk, those taken from the breast? For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little. (Isaiah 28.9, 10, ESV)

How does God teach us?

• Precept upon precept
• Line upon line
• Here a little, there a little

Gradually. One thing at a time. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other. Daily time with God. Bible study. Reading good books. Paying attention to sermons… And, as always:

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. (James 1.22, NIV)

PS There’s one more important lesson from Isaiah 28. Stay tuned.

Back to Isaiah, we left off with Isaiah 25, a chapter of hope, and go right to Isaiah 26, with a message of peace.

In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: “We have a strong city; he sets up salvation as walls and bulwarks. Open the gates, that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in. You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you. Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock. (Isaiah 26.1 – 4, ESV)

“You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you…” The idea comes up again:

The path of the righteous is level; you make level the way of the righteous…O LORD, you will ordain peace for us, for you have indeed done for us all our works. (Isaiah 26.7, 12, ESV)

Growing up, we memorized verse 3 in the King James:

Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on thee: Because he trusteth in thee.

And we learned a lovely song:

Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace,
whose mind is stayed on Thee:
When the shadows come and darkness falls,
He giveth inward peace;
Oh, He is the only perfect resting place.
He giveth perfect peace;
Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace,
whose mind is stayed on Thee.

You can hear the song here: https://youtu.be/8fOZJBCXrBs

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world. (John 16.33, ESV)

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (John 14.27, ESV)

We closed yesterday’s blog with observations on John 3.36:

Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. (ESV)

We noted that “believes” in contrasted with “does not obey” and concluded that “believe” is stronger than we think, and its opposite is “does not obey.” This is why Scott Adams’ deathbed “conversion” probably isn’t.

Scott Adams is the brilliant creator of the comic strip Dilbert which did a marvelous job capturing the absurdity of life in the modern corporation. He died on January 13 of cancer. Before his death he said in a widely reported quote:

You’re going to hear for the first time today that it is my plan to convert. I’ve not been a believer. I am now convinced that the risk-reward is completely smart. If it turns out that there’s nothing there, I’ve lost nothing… If it turns out there is something there, and the Christian model is the closest to it, I win.

He closed with…

Many of my Christian friends have asked me to find Jesus before I go. I’m not a believer, but I have to admit the risk-reward calculation for doing so looks so attractive to me, so here I go: I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and look forward to spending an eternity with him. The part about me not being a believer should be quickly resolved if I wake up in Heaven. I won’t need any more convincing than that. I hope I still qualify for entry.

I’m not his judge, but many of us are questioning whether his “acceptance” is “enough.” When my son Mark sent me word of this, he observed, “It’s not my part to figure out what’s going to happen between God and Scott Adams, but I don’t think this actually works.”

Mark is not alone. A lot of people have weighed in (not that it makes any difference to God what we think!). A Catholic website explains that Scott’s reasoning comes from Pascal:

Hardly the words of a man deeply converted. Instead, his posture echoes an application of Blaise Pascal’s famous wager. Pascal argued that reason alone fails to deliver certainty regarding God’s existence, yet reason still presses man toward a necessary decision. The wager is a pragmatic argument, suggesting that it is rational to bet on God’s existence; in a nutshell, if God doesn’t exist, you’ve only lost a little and would have lived a good life, but if God does exist and you don’t believe, you lose everything.

In short, Pascal’s wager is a decision theory argument, not a positive proof. It does urge a life of faith, albeit for the best possible outcome even if God doesn’t exist. – Marcus Peter, January 15, 2026

It’s a good article: I recommend it in its entirety. Marcus makes many of the same points that non-Catholic articles do, namely, it’s not a good strategy to wait until one’s deathbed to convert. One might not even have a “death bed.” A friend of mine, my age, went to church a couple of weeks ago, came home, dropped dead. Others are killed in car accidents, or lose their mental capacities. So waiting until the last minute is not a good idea.

Last-minute conversions do occur, of course, but repentance should accompany confession, and I don’t see any sign of that in Scott Adams’ experience. His “confession” contained neither belief nor obedience (from John 3.36).

One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him, saying, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23.39 – 43, ESV)

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 7.21, ESV)