Isa 51:21

Isa 51:21  Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with wine.                                                                                                                                                              Isaiah 51 is God’s assurance that He will comfort Jerusalem. God says He will make her wilderness like the Garden of Eden again (v.3). God says He will save the people swiftly (v.6). He calls on Zion not to be discouraged by the insults and hurtful things said by the unbelievers. He calls on Zion to remember who He is and He will silence their enemies (v.12). That said, Israel has itself to blame for its miseries: “Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with wine” (v.21). We see there is more than one way of getting drunk. One does not have to drink wine to become drunk. Israel was drunken but not with wine. How? 1. Intoxicated with ONESELF. The Chinese idiom is:自我陶醉 (zì wǒ táo zuì). The English meaning is narcissism. Narcissism is showing too much interest in and admiration for one’s own physical appearance and abilities. A narcissist is intoxicated with himself. He has lots of self-satisfaction, self-complacency, and self-glorification. He is proud! Look at this Pharisee: “The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess” (Luke 18:11, 12). In his eyes, there is no one better than him – self-intoxication! Look at this king: “For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High” (Isaiah 14:13, 14). He even thinks he is better than God – self-intoxication! A narcissist is immersed in his own pride. God would not have created Eve if Adam could do everything by himself. But, God in His infinite wisdom saw long ago that man needs one another. He created the woman to be a help-meet for man (Genesis 2:18). Today, He created the families so that we can bear one another’s burden and encourage one another (Galatians 6:2; Hebrews 10:24). 2. Intoxicated with SIN. Revelations 18 mentions a spiritual Babylon. What was its sin? “For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her” (Revelation 18:3). The phrase, “drunk with the wine of her fornication” appears first in Revelation 17:2. The nations were intoxicated, albeit, with the sin of sexual immoralities. Sexual sins are getting worse each day. Every day in the papers, we read of sexual crimes being committed. What about those that many have perceived as not sin anymore? Such as, sex before marriage (popularise by Hollywood), same sex marriages, divorce and remarriage, adultery, and display of near nudity in public, etc. What does God have to say about them: “They which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God” (Galatians 5:21b). 3. Intoxicated with the wrath of God. Isaiah tells Israel: “Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the LORD the cup of his fury” (v.17). It is a call to awake out of the sleep of sin or face the wrath of God. God’s people sometimes spiritually “fall asleep” and need to be awakened. Romans 13:11-12 says: “And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.” Brethren, if we continue to remain drunk in our self-love and sin, we shall be drunk in God’s fury too. Let us heed the exhortation of Paul: “Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.”