Sin is a swindler. It covers its deceit with kindness and sweet promises. We sin because we believe the lies. We gossip because the gossip whispers to us that we’re in the know and that people will appreciate us. We envy because we believe that if we only had what others have, we’d be content. We take undue pride in our accomplishments because pride assures us that we’ll feel better about ourselves. But in the end, sin never makes good on its promises.

Years ago, some friends and I were swindled out of $70 shortly after arriving in Paris. We were at the train station, puzzling through the French display on the ticket machine. A friendly man appeared, popped his credit card into the machine, and told us he was purchasing two-day train passes for each of us and we could pay him back with cash. It happened fast, and our French wasn’t good enough to double-check him. Besides, he seemed kind and reliable. So we forked over the money. Several minutes later, after boarding the train, we discovered that he had in fact bought us single-use tickets worth $2 each. By then he was long gone. I felt angry and ashamed for the rest of the day.

That experience is a parable of sin and its ways. Sin is a swindler. It covers its deceit with kindness and sweet promises. We sin because we believe the lies. We gossip because the gossip whispers to us that we’re in the know and that people will appreciate us. We envy because we believe that if we only had what others have, we’d be content. We take undue pride in our accomplishments because pride assures us that we’ll feel better about ourselves. But in the end, sin never makes good on its promises. Instead, it leaves us unsatisfied and ashamed.

That’s why the Bible consistently unmasks the falsehoods of sin, warning us that whenever we trust in something or someone other than God, we will be ashamed. One of the most powerful and dramatic instances of this in all of Scripture is an often-overlooked story recounted in Isaiah 20. It contains a stark warning and a sweet promise for God’s people.

Naked Prophet

The year is 711 BC. Ashdod, a city in Philistia, has been part of a multiyear rebellion against the mighty nation of Assyria — a rebellion encouraged by Egypt to the south. The prophet Isaiah has already warned that Philistia’s rebellion will fail. And that’s exactly what now happens, according to Isaiah 20:1. Ashdod is captured by Assyria. We know that the king of Ashdod subsequently fled to Egypt and that, when Assyria came looking for him, Egypt didn’t protect him. They gave him up.

As Assyria crushes Ashdod, God speaks to his prophet Isaiah: “At that time the Lord spoke by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, ‘Go, and loose the sackcloth from your waist and take off your sandals from your feet,’ and he did so, walking naked and barefoot” (Isaiah 20:2).

This is surely one of the least desirable prophetic commissions ever received. God commands him to strip naked, not in the privacy of his own home, but in public (that’s the implication of the word go, and of Isaiah’s response of walking) and not just for a short time, but for three years (Isaiah 20:3). Perhaps Isaiah wonders why God couldn’t have asked him instead to do the things other prophets were told to do: lay siege to a brick (Ezekiel 4:1–3), cut some of his hair with a sword (Ezekiel 5:1), or anything else, for that matter. In any case, Isaiah obeys God, apparently without protest. He is, after all, God’s servant (Isaiah 20:3).

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