Trust in God alone
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| Oil painting of a young John Calvin. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Isaiah declared that the Jews were not allowed to make any alliance with the Egyptians. He emphasized this for two reasons. First, to trust in anything other than God for their salvation was to despise the power and goodness of their Lord. Second, God had said in Deuteronomy 17:16 that they were not allowed to make alliances with the Egyptians. But the Jews stubbornly resolved to provide for their own safety, despising God and disobeying His will.
Though it might seem that God was being too hard on the Jews for trusting in Egypt, He had very good reasons for being angry. He wanted to keep them from forgetting that He had redeemed them from Egypt, and He wanted to protect them from being corrupted by the superstitions and idolatry of the Egyptians. But the Jews didn’t heed His commands and turned to Egypt anyway.
Isaiah proclaimed to the Jewish nation that this was an extremely foolish thing to do, because the power of men cannot be compared to God’s. John Calvin wrote that men have no power in themselves except what God has granted to them, so to look to men for comfort and help is foolish and irrational: “If we were reasoning about the nature and excellence of man, we might bring forward the singular gifts which he has received from God; but when he is contrasted with God, he must be reduced to nothing; for nothing can be ascribed to man without taking it from God.”
This is why it is such an offense to the Lord when we trust in our own works instead of relying solely on His grace in our salvation. To say we trust in the righteousness of Christ, but then to add our own works to His, is to rob God of His glory in redemption. Our salvation rests solely on the grace and power of God, not our own decisions, choices, or “good works.” Those who believe that they came to faith by their own will do not realize how sinful they are being in robbing God of the glory that is His due.
God was the one who delivered the Jews from their bondage in Egypt. It was by His power alone and not by their choice. For them to turn back to Egypt, to look to man for their salvation, was an affront to the grace of God. May we not do the same. May we give God the glory by relying solely on His power and trusting in Him alone.
Read Ephesians 2:1–10. Are you trusting in your works or in the grace of God alone for your salvation? Do you really believe that God is the one who can protect you or do you seek the shelter of the world? Spend some time today confessing to the Lord those ways in which you trust in things other than Him. Repent of your sin.
