OUR LORD WHO PRESERVES A REMNANT

Isaiah chapter 17 verses 3 - 9 reads this way;

The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim, and royal power from Damascus; the remnant of Aram will be like the glory of the Israelites,” declares the Lord Almighty.  “In that day the glory of Jacob will fade; the fat of his body will waste away.

It will be as when reapers harvest the standing grain, gathering the grain in their arms—as when someone gleans heads of grain in the Valley of Rephaim. Yet some gleanings will remain, as when an olive tree is beaten, leaving two or three olives on the topmost branches, four or five on the fruitful boughs,” declares the Lord, the God of Israel. 

In that day people will look to their Maker and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel. They will not look to the altars, the work of their hands, and they will have no regard for the Asherah poles  and the incense altars their fingers have made.

 In that day their strong cities, which they left because of the Israelites, will be like places abandoned to thickets and undergrowth. And all will be desolation.

The passage  speaks of a remnant of God's people who remain after the strength and power of their kingdoms waste away and fade from their former glory.

The text graphically illustrates how the remnant will be like a handful of olives  that are left  clinging to the tips of the branches after the harvest.

This remnant will look to the Lord their creator and will abandon their false altars that they made with their hands.

This tiny remnant of people will be what the Lord God gathers out of the desolation and they will be singularly devoted to Him.

When the nations rage and roar, they are rebuked by the Lord and they flee and the nations are met by a sudden terror and by morning they are gone, as it says in verse 13 - 14. 

The remnant of the Lord will retain the glory of Israel.

Amen.