Hi, this is Kerry Mulestein, and this is a special episode of my podcast, The Scriptures are Real, the podcast where we try to look at things that help the scriptures become more real so that we can gain more power from them.

In these special editions, I'm posting videos that I made for my classes in order to help them get more out of class than what we could cover in class.

And I've decided to make them available to you so that you can also get a little bit of extra more beyond what I'd be able to do in the normal podcast.

I just want to help people understand Isaiah.

So they're very video oriented frequently, not all the time, but frequently.

And my apologies to my audio audience, which is my largest audience.

But when I made these, I wasn't thinking of audio. I was just thinking of my classes, but I think you'll still get plenty out of them. If you're just on audio and you can always go to the YouTube video, if there's one that you felt like, I'd just like to see that part. And they're kind of hokey. They're just what I do for my classes, although the whole podcast is kind of hokey, so that's fine.

I've just done this because I hope it's helpful for you.

Okay.

Just a very short video to talk through a concept that we've mentioned a few times in class,

but I want to, it's important enough and we'll play a role enough both in the class, but I hope in your life that it seemed worth making sure we were getting this by having this little video. There is a phrase or a verse at the very beginning of Isaiah 27 that I think is really important and helps us create an image that's worth understanding.

All right.

So what it reads, it draws on some imagery, the supreme chaos imagery of the ancient world,

which is that chaos was always embodied or incarnate in some kind of horrific monster,

typically a snake or a sea monster, sea snake, really. So in Egypt, it's a popfus, this giant snake.

For the Israelites and some of their neighbors, it was Leviathan, which was pictured as a huge sea snake or serpent, but that was

chaos embodied. And so in many ways, embodies Satan and his trying to undo everything that God has

done. That's really what it embodies. And so with that in mind, let's read this verse that I'm sure you've already read by now,

but it says, in that day the Lord, excuse me, in that day the Lord with his sore and great and

songs, I'm having a hard time. In that day, the Lord with his sore and great and strong sword

shall punish Leviathan, the piercing serpent. Even Leviathan, that crooked serpent,

and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea. Now, this idea of, remember, this is Jehovah,

...