Isaiah 14 begins with a promise that Israel will return from their Babylonian captivity:

For the LORD will have compassion on Jacob and will again choose Israel, and will set them in their own land, and sojourners will join them and will attach themselves to the house of Jacob. And the peoples will take them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess them in the LORD’s land as male and female slaves. They will take captive those who were their captors, and rule over those who oppressed them. (Isaiah 14.1, 2, ESV)

There follows a series of judgments on nations:

• Babylon (Isaiah 14.3 – 23, 21.1 – 17)
• Assyria (Isaiah 14.24 – 27)
• Philistia (14.28 – 32)
• Moab (Isaiah 15.1 – 16.13)
• Damascus (17.1 – 14)
• Cush (Isaiah 18.1 – 7, 20.1 – 6)
• Egypt (Isaiah 19.1 – 15, 20.1 – 6)
• Jerusalem (Isaiah 22.1 – 25)
• Tyre and Sidon (Isaiah 23.1 – 18)
• “The earth” (Isaiah 24.1 – 23)

In the middle, there’s a section of blessing on Egypt and Assyria(?!) (Isaiah 19.19 – 25). We’ll talk about that next week.

Isaiah 14 also contains another double-meaning paragraph, a peek into the distant past, and a warning against pride. For context, Isaiah is talking about the demise of the king of Babylon:

All of them will answer and say to you: ‘You too have become as weak as we! You have become like us!’ Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, the sound of your harps; maggots are laid as a bed beneath you, and worms are your covers. (Isaiah 14.10, 11, ESV).

Then this:

“How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.’ But you are brought down to Sheol, to the far reaches of the pit. (Isaiah 14.12 – 15, ESV)

The five “I will” of “Day Star” = “Lucifer” in some translations:

You said in your heart,

• I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God
• I will set my throne on high;
• I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north;
• I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
• I will make myself like the Most High

Navigator Skip Gray used to say that Jesus died so that we could become like God. What was Satan’s problem? Pride.

Pastor and Seminary Professor David Wyrtzen wrote on January 15:

The Jewish prophet Isaiah uses the fall of an arrogant ancient ruler in Babylon to give us a glimpse of an angel who believed he was like the “morning star, the son of the dawn” (Isaiah 14:13-15). This angel pridefully declared himself divine, claimed the right to God’s throne, and became the ultimate antagonist in God’s Story from Genesis to Revelation. In Genesis 3 he is simply the “serpent.” In Job 1 he is Satan, the “adversary,” and in the Gospel of John, Jesus exposes him as a liar and murderer from the beginning (John 8:44).

Later this year, we’ll see a similar passage in Ezekiel. Here’s a sample:

Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor… (Ezekiel 28.17, ESV)

An antidote to pride is daily time in the Word:

And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers… (Deuteronomy 17.18 – 20, ESV)

Through the Word, we are reminded that God is in charge. Stay tuned.