All of us are called to discern the times, and it doesn’t take a spiritual giant to see that the hour is perilous. God, however, never leaves his people without hope. In times of darkness, it’s easy to forget he is always at work in mighty ways. Right now, as things seem hopeless, he is calling his people to live zealously.
So, is there any hope for America? We can ask if there was any hope for Israel. The prophet Isaiah was given a vision for a nation whose condition was much like ours. He witnessed a once-godly nation turn from God completely and walk in gross immorality and rebellion.
Seven centuries later, another prophet had a troubling vision. Jesus said, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate” (Matthew 23:37-38, ESV).
The next verse reads, “…his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. But he answered them… ‘Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down’” (Matthew 24:1-2). These aren’t the words of some kindly Mister Rogers figure. Jesus preached judgment and spoke of hell more than the biblical prophets. He knew Israel would reject his message, and in Matthew 22:37, he prophesied a generational consequence, essentially saying, “I wanted to give your children a new vision, but you refused. You pulled them into your own rebellion, thwarting their faith. Their generation will be stauncher in sin than you.”
America is descending into a similar cauldron of wickedness. Thankfully, both Jesus’s and Isaiah’s prophecies are meant for times like ours.
Jesus’s and Isaiah’s prophecies for the nation were almost identical.
Isaiah wrote, “My beloved (God) had a vineyard on a very fertile hill” (Isaiah 5:1). This fertile vineyard represented Jerusalem, a light to the surrounding nations. Similarly, some have called America “a city on a hill.” Although the U.S. Constitution does not overtly mention God or quote the Bible, the Judeo-Christian tradition so informed those who crafted it that godly principles became part of our country’s fabric, a beacon shining through generations of missionaries and unmatched generosity.
As for Israel, God cleared every obstacle for the fertile growth of blessings. Yet when “…he looked for it to yield grapes…it yielded wild grapes” (Isaiah 5:2). The Lord asked, “What more was there to do for my vineyard, that I have not done in it? …why did it yield wild grapes?” (Isaiah 5:4).
Israel responded to God’s blessings with covetousness. So the Lord said, “And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste” (Isaiah 5:5-6). The protective walls fell, and the vineyard became desolate.
Like Isaiah, Jesus used a vineyard to prophesy to Jerusalem. He described a landowner who leased a vineyard to tenants and began sending servants to check on its growth. Each time, the tenants beat the servant savagely. Finally, the owner decided, “I will send my beloved son; perhaps they will respect him” (Luke 20:13). But the tenants killed him to keep the vineyard for themselves.
Jesus asked, “‘What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others.’ When they heard this, they said, ‘Surely not!’ But he looked directly at them and said, ‘What then is this that is written: “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone”?’” (Luke 20:15-17).
Quoting Psalm 118:22, Christ was speaking of his own death at the hands of Israel’s leaders, but his prophecy about the temple in Jerusalem was literal. Within one generation, in AD 70, Rome destroyed it.
Make no mistake, I am not prophesying about America, and the United States is not a new Israel, the Church or God’s chosen country. I am only sharing scriptural precedence for a nation in a condition like ours. But how would you respond if you heard a similar prophecy about our country or the church in America? You might say as Jesus’s listeners did, “Surely not!” (Luke 20:16). It happened in 700 BC, it happened in AD 70, and God’s question then is the same for us now: What more could he do to bless a nation or a people who continuously turn from him?
Also, I have great concern over a church that rejects a God of justice and judgment. God always raises up faithful voices to preach judgment, from Anselm to Martin Luther to the Puritans to Billy Graham and my own father, David Wilkerson. Each preached the love, grace and mercy of God alongside his justice, wrath and judgment. Revival can’t come without repentance, and repentance doesn’t come without knowing God’s justice.
Why is judgment coming?
Isaiah pronounced woes upon Israel because of its tragic pride, beginning with the pride of prosperity. “Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room… The Lord of hosts has sworn in my hearing: ‘Surely many houses shall be desolate, large and beautiful houses, without inhabitant’” (Isaiah 5:8-9).
A similar pride is crippling scores of Christians today. False teachers make idols of material gain, saying, “You can have everything. God wants it all for you, if you only have faith.” These aren’t promises of blessings; they’re demonic idolatry that destroys lives. Jesus and Isaiah prepared us for storms to come, but their messages aren’t being preached today.
What about megachurches whose messages are no more than self-help TED Talks? A day is coming when churches’ compromise will be exposed. The Holy Spirit will open people’s eyes so they realize, “This is just a feel-good gospel. It isn’t truth for life.” God won’t stand for it, and as Jesus prophesied of Jerusalem’s beloved temple, it will all come down.
A second pride we see is a party spirit—life as nonstop sensual pleasure, just as it was in Noah’s time. The mindset is, “Life is hard with bad things happening, but we deserve happiness.” This spirit has engulfed scores of Christians who have no soberness about the hour.
Isaiah spoke of God’s judgment bringing people low. “Woe to those who rise early in the morning, that they may run after strong drink, who tarry late into the evening as wine inflames them! …the nobility of Jerusalem and her multitude will go down… Man is humbled, and each one is brought low” (Isaiah 5:11, 14-15).
A third pride in our culture is perversion. “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness” (Isaiah 5:20). When people confuse good and evil, their minds become depraved and God gives them up “to a debased mind to do what ought not be done” (Romans 1:28).
To me, this is the worst judgment. A debased mind is when God wipes his hands of people, saying, “I’m giving you over to your perverted desire.” They no longer think straight, putting a veil over wickedness so it doesn’t seem evil. Adultery is called an affair. The murder of unborn babies is called pro-choice. We’re even seeing severe gender confusion, with some saying children can and should decide their own gender.
This message may sound as if America is hopeless, but God is charging his church with a message of hope.
Jesus quoted Isaiah when he told the disciples, “…to them it has not been given…. But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear” (Matthew 13:11, 16). Then he explained to them the parables, messages of judgment but also hope. “‘Have you understood all these things?’ They said to him, ‘Yes.’ And he said to them, ‘Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old’” (Matthew 13:51-52). In other words, “Your hearts leap at good news, and I’m giving you that news now.”
Isaiah pointed to this hope. He said that after pulling up the vineyard, God would allow “a tenth (to) remain in it” (Isaiah 6:13). This meant a living remnant would be left, “…like a terebinth or an oak, whose stump remains when it is felled.’ The holy seed is its stump” (Isaiah 6:13).
Here is the promise of a future for all who follow Jesus. As judgment falls, we are called to speak truth in love, to make clear God’s justice and bring hope to the lost. Therein lies hope for America, through the transformative power of the church. The grand tree may fall, but the stump that remains holds the seed of promise, which is Christ. “In that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land shall be the pride and honor of the survivors of Israel” (Isaiah 4:2).
What a picture of God’s merciful grace. Here is the reward of the faithful: “He who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be called holy, everyone who has been recorded for life in Jerusalem” (Isaiah 4:3). None of this will happen without God’s cleansing judgment (Isaiah 4:4). Afterward, the Lord will restore his glory in mercy (Isaiah 4:6).
Have you given up on America? Has the light of the church failed to influence our nation? God has not abandoned us; he has called us. He is stirring a remnant—the Church—to go forth with truth that sets hearts free. May he put his fire in you for that work today. In this hour of darkness, you can cast your cares on him. Amen.