Isaiah 8:10-12
The Voice
10 Go ahead, devise your plans, but they will fail;
your proclamations won’t matter because God is with us.
No one wants to believe that God would use foreign power to wreak destruction on other lands and peoples. Yet, as God is holy, so God’s place must be holy. He simply cannot dwell where holiness is not. He cannot make a larger-than-life Zion out of an earthly Jerusalem, unless that place (and its people, of course) are right. At best, these people seem to think that paying lip service to God is enough; at worst, they don’t even care about God. A simple explanation is the people must be clean and holy. And this condition of rightness, holiness, and cleanliness is a product of how they are—in relation not only to God, but also to each other and the very land itself; these things are inseparable. The consequences of their failure to ensure the holiness of this sacred place by being right with God, land, and others are dire indeed. God must cleanse His people and place because He determines to be represented within and by them. So, better days will come again, and His covenant people will be set right and be happy and prosperous again.
11 See, this is what the Eternal told me. God leaned in close—His strong hand on me—to keep me from following these people.
12 Eternal One: Don’t call for an alliance, like all the rest of this people do.
Don’t fear what they fear, or dread what they dread.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
