We read the Scripture and see some great promises, but then we look around us. What we read and what we see don't correspond very closely.

But headlines and circumstances are not legitimate grounds for doubting God. In order to see fuller truth, we have to read Scripture more closely and look around us more carefully. Isaiah 25:4  praises God as "a refuge for the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm." It couldn't have looked that way to his hearers, a city waiting for the army of a ruthless enemy.  In my Bible the previous chapter is headed "The Lord's Devastation of the Earth." God reveals his wrath against sin. Isaiah 24:6 says, “Therefore a curse consumes the earth; its people must bear their guilt. Therefore earth's inhabitants are burned up, and very few are left.”

Yet for every expression of God’s wrath, nearby there is an expression of his love and his intention to restore his people to his covenant. That’s what the 25th chapter is.