When the Palace is Forsaken

“Tremble, you women who are at ease,
    shudder, you complacent ones;
strip, and make yourselves bare,
    and tie sackcloth around your waist.
Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields,
    for the fruitful vine,
for the soil of my people
    growing up in thorns and briers,
yes, for all the joyous houses
    in the exultant city.
For the palace is forsaken,
    the populous city deserted;
the hill and the watchtower
    will become dens forever,
a joy of wild donkeys,
    a pasture of flocks;
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.
My people will abide in a peaceful habitation,
    in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places.” Isaiah 32:11-18

Isaiah’s warning of judgment jerks sights and mindsets from things to thinking, the earth to heaven, people in palaces to the pouring of His Spirit. His words alarm, calling for drastic action. Too long and too wrongly had they put their trust in human fruitfulness and institutions, and the Lord would upend and revamp their security.

Too often we too put our trust in palaces, either of our own making or of who’s in charge. We fashion fortresses of financial or physical security, family, education, or image, falsely thinking we can in our strength and wits keep nestled safely and ward off the enemy. We place our hope in elected officials or appointed political leaders, trusting the government to function as benevolent ruler and good father. But the Lord ordains all of life that we would see and accept Him as Lord and fall under the outpouring of His Spirit over the spirit of the age. He is the one to redeem the wilderness of our hearts and bring fruitfulness to industry. He is our peace and security. His Spirit gives righteousness, rightness of perspective, and hope. (2 Corinthians 4:4; Ephesians 2:1-3)

Have we become smug hiding in joyous houses, putting our hope in natural verdant hills and manmade watchtowers? Whom and what do we trust to keep life pleasant and frictionless, and from where comes that expectation in the first place? Have we lowered our spiritual horizon and fallen to horizontal thinking in the world’s domain?

In what areas have we seen our palaces forsaken, the achievements and resources we counted on come to ruin or irrelevance? Do we resent the disruption, the intrusion of our complacency and ease? What is the Lord trying to teach? Is He calling us to shudder and tremble at our own folly?

What if we daily sought the Spirit’s full outpouring, and came empty and bowed, eager to be filled? What if we regarded the attributes of God’s righteousness and justice as our palace and strong fortress? What if we settled within His peace, trusting Him alone for security and rest? How different would be our outlook and our days! Anxiety and fretting are swallowed in hope as we abide in the heavenly Almighty here on earth. (Ephesians 5:18)

Lord, keep Yourself as my only sure trust, Your Spirit my soul’s palatial habitation.