Isaiah 30:8 Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come for ever and ever:
9 That this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the LORD:
10 Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits:
11 Get you out of the way, turn aside out of the path, cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us.
12 Wherefore thus saith the Holy One of Israel, Because ye despise this word, and trust in oppression and perverseness, and stay thereon:
13 Therefore this iniquity shall be to you as a breach ready to fall, swelling out in a high wall, whose breaking cometh suddenly at an instant.

There are multitudes of people who can see there is a problem in our country. They know things are not as they should be. They prove that there is a God. God made man with a conscience. Man knows right from wrong. Adam did not need to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil to know that. God told Him not to eat of that tree because the day He would eat of that fruit, he would die. Adam had never seen death up to that point. There was no death. However, Adam was created with intelligence. He knew what God was telling him. He chose not to believe it. He discovered spiritual death at the moment that he ate of that forbidden fruit. He was shocked by what he discovered. He did not need to be shocked. All he needed to do was to trust God. He did not want to do that. He witnessed his son Cain, murder his own brother because he chose not to follow God and wanted God to be pleased with him even though he was a rebel.
In our opening verses we have an account from the New Testament and one from the Old Testament. Both of them speak to the age old problem facing fallen man. There are things in the natural world that we can know. It is interesting to observe the drastic change in weather forecasting from 30+ years ago and now. Back in those days the weather men studied the sky and other things and they observed certain things that helped them to be able to have some accuracy with the forecasting. Now, everything is done with computer models that are set up by ungodly people who do not know up from down and thus the forecasting is just like that.
In the passage from Isaiah, God addressed the attitude of the people whom He called rebellious. They did not want to hear the law of the LORD. They were so “wise” that they wanted to tell the seers, the prophets, what they should say. They did not want to know what God says. They wanted to tell God what to say.
The true prophets did not speak off the cuff. They were directed by God in what to say. They were men of God who knew the fear of the LORD and they had no interest in leading people astray.
I heard a person speaking about one of their relatives recently. They said their relative did not like the convicting work of the Holy Spirit, and so he told the Holy Spirit to leave him alone. We know from the Scriptures that it is possible to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. It is possible to discredit His work in the heart of a lost person. Jesus warned that there is no forgiveness for the sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit. The reason for that is that a person who does that will die as a lost sinner and thus cannot be forgiven and saved.
You cannot reject the Holy Spirit’s convicting work and be saved. That is an impossibility. It is a dangerous thing to reject God’s loving work of helping a lost person know they are going the wrong way.
Jesus warned the Pharisees of that danger. They were trained in some things that have some importance. It is good to know what the weather might be for the next day. A good farmer wants to know if it is a good time to cut down his hay. He wants to have some sense of whether he can get it into the barn in good shape. He also wants to know if it is a good time to get the combine out to do some harvesting. The fisherman wants to know if there is a storm brewing or if he can get out there and do some fishing and get back to shore safely.
Jesus reminded us that the weather can be very unpredictable. He sent His disciples out on the water when a storm was going to come up. He wanted them to understand the importance of trusting Him in the midst of a storm.
The Jews of His day wanted signs to move them to prepare for danger. God had given many signs in the Old Testament. The Ninevites were wiser than the Jews of Jesus’ day. They were also wiser than the Jews of Isaiah’s day.
We as people have no right to tell God what to think and what to do. We need to humble ourselves and submit to His authority and trust Him to lead and direct us.
I spoke with a person recently who expressed great concern with the direction that education is moving in. This person is right to express this concern. This person is also right in being able to see that the ‘system’ is moving in the wrong direction. The only way to change this is for adults to wake up and get right with God. It is important to see the problem. It is of greater importance to do the right thing about the problem.
There is a reason why Jesus asked His disciples an important question about Himself in Matthew 16. He wanted them to understand the ramifications of that question. He declared the solution unto them:

Matthew 16:17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.
18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.