Isaiah 7:1-9
A couple of years back, there was an explosive trend that one would see everywhere, and I mean everywhere. That trend involved posters that said Keep Calm and ______. Even now, there are a whole lot of them. You've probably seen them. I did a little research and apparently it started when an old World War II poster saying Keep Calm and Carry On was found. Soonafter people online started making parodies of this sign that varied greatly, as you can see. Some kept the general theme of coping with stress, and others (not pictured) go way off the deep end and refer to different things..
That brings us to my devo this morning. Though this trend started in 2000 (Meme Database) and was based off of a WWII poster encouraging people to stay calm in the midst of war, I found that the theme goes back much farther, to the first half of Isaiah chapter 7.
In this passage, Syrian King Rezin and the Pekah, the son of Israelite King Remaliah teamed up to go to war against Judah's King Ahaz. The Bible says that when they found out about this, "the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shook before the wind. (v. 2)" They were pretty terrified.
So God sends Isaiah and his son to deliver a message to Ahaz. "Be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint... (v. 4)" Then, through prophecy, God explained that Syria and Israel will not succeed and won't even stand in the future. The end of verse 9 says "If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all." So after assuring Ahaz that everything was going to be ok, He told him to trust in Him. If they were to put it on a poster, it might look like this.
I also believe that this poster is for us too. A lot of us might not be in the midst of war or in a time of emergency (although some of us are), but in the everyday struggles and worries of life, we should remember that God wants us to be firm in faith in order to be firm at all. We should keep calm and trust God.
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