The Book of Isaiah

Hebrew Study

Explanation

The new movement of the book opens with a flood of tenderness: "Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God." The exiles are to be told three things: "her warfare is accomplished" (the term of suffering is done), "her iniquity is pardoned," and she has received "double for all her sins", full and more than full dealing with the past. Then a herald's voice rings out: "Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God." Every obstacle is leveled, valleys raised, mountains lowered, crooked made straight, so that "the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together." Then a second voice calls "Cry," and when the prophet asks "What shall I cry?" the answer contrasts the frailty of humanity with the permanence of God's word: "All flesh is grass... The grass withereth, the flower fadeth... but the word of our God shall stand for ever." Human life and glory are fleeting; God's word is not.

Gospel Focus

This passage is soaked in the gospel, and the New Testament claims it plainly. "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD" is quoted in all four Gospels of John the Baptist, who came to prepare the way for Jesus (Matthew 3:3; Mark 1:3; Luke 3:4-6; John 1:23). Note what this means: John prepared the way for "the LORD," for "our God," and the One who came was Jesus. The coming of the LORD that Isaiah announced was the coming of God to us in Christ, "Behold your God!" And "the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it" was fulfilled when "the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory)" (John 1:14). The comfort of the chapter is the gospel comfort: our warfare is accomplished and our iniquity pardoned, not by our works but by the One who bore our sins. And the foundation of it all is the word that outlasts the grass: Peter quotes verses 6-8 exactly and adds, "this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you" (1 Peter 1:24-25). Your life is grass; the world's glory is a fading flower; but the gospel word of God stands for ever. Build your comfort there.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Zion is commissioned as a herald: "get thee up into the high mountain... lift up thy voice with strength... Behold your God!" The message is the coming of God, and it holds two truths that seem opposite but are not. First, His power: "the Lord GOD will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him." Second, His gentleness: "He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young." The same God who rules with a strong arm carries the weakest lamb against His chest. Then Isaiah magnifies this God with a series of unanswerable questions: "Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span?" He holds all the oceans in His cupped palm and measures the sky with a handspan. No one counseled Him or taught Him. Before Him "the nations are as a drop of a bucket," and "all nations... are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity." The Shepherd who carries the lamb is the Almighty who cradles the seas.

Gospel Focus

"Behold your God!" is the heart of the gospel proclamation, and the God whom Isaiah told Zion to announce came to us in Jesus Christ. See how perfectly the two pictures of verses 10-11 meet in Him. He is "the Lord GOD" whose "arm shall rule," the mighty King before whom the nations are dust; and He is the Shepherd who "shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom." Jesus said, "I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep" (John 10:11), and He is the One who "shall gently lead those that are with young", tender with the weak, the weary, the struggling. You are not too small or too weak for this Shepherd; He specializes in carrying lambs that cannot walk. And the greatness of verses 12-17 is not cold philosophy but comfort: the God who holds you is the God who holds the oceans in His hand and weighs the mountains in scales. The nations that frighten us are "a drop of a bucket" to Him. So lift up your voice and proclaim the good tidings: "Behold your God!", strong enough to rule the universe, gentle enough to carry you.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Isaiah drives home the uniqueness of God with a challenge: "To whom then will ye liken God?" The answer exposes the absurdity of idolatry. An idol is only a bit of metal a workman casts and plates with gold, or, for a poor man, "a tree that will not rot" carved into an image "that shall not be moved", the pitiful god that has to be nailed down so it will not topple over. How could such a thing be compared to the living God? "Have ye not known? have ye not heard?" It is God "that sitteth upon the circle of the earth," before whom people are grasshoppers, who "stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain," and who "bringeth the princes to nothing." The mighty rulers of the earth are barely planted before He blows on them and the whirlwind carries them off "as stubble." Then the Holy One asks again, "To whom then will ye liken me, or shall I be equal?" and points to the stars: "Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things... he calleth them all by names." The God who names every star is beyond all comparison.

Gospel Focus

"To whom then will ye liken God?" is the great Oneness question of the chapter. There is one God, the Holy One, and He is beyond all comparison; every idol, whether carved of wood or built in the imagination, is a lie. Notice the folly Isaiah mocks: a man makes a god and then must fasten it down "that it shall not be moved." Every false god we construct, whether an image, a philosophy, or a life built on money or self, is like that, propped up and going nowhere, while the true God "sitteth upon the circle of the earth." And this transcendent Creator is astonishingly personal. The same God who "bringeth out their host by number" and "calleth them all by names" also calls His people by name, "fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine" (Isaiah 43:1). The One who keeps every star in its place, so that "not one faileth," keeps you too. If He never loses a star out of the billions, He will not lose you. Do not liken God to anything less than Himself, and do not imagine the Maker of the stars has forgotten your name. He who numbers the host of heaven knows you, and holds you, by name.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Isaiah turns to a discouraged people whose complaint is quiet despair: "My way is hid from the LORD, and my judgment is passed over from my God", they feel overlooked, as if God no longer sees or cares. His answer is to preach God's greatness back to them: "Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary?" The God who never tires is not too busy or too spent to notice them. And here is the wonderful exchange: "He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength." Even the strongest human resources fail, "the youths shall faint... and the young men shall utterly fall", but "they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength." The promise rises in three movements: "they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint." Soaring, running, and, hardest of all, the daily plodding walk, all sustained by the strength of God for those who wait on Him.

Gospel Focus

This is the tender close of a mighty chapter, and it is pure gospel for the weary. God's people had said, "My way is hid from the LORD", the ache of every believer who has felt forgotten. But the God who names the stars and never faints has not lost sight of you. And His answer to our exhaustion is not "try harder" but "wait", not the frantic effort of the flesh, which fails even in the young and strong, but the trusting dependence that receives His strength in exchange for our own. "They that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength." Notice the order of the promise: mounting up as eagles, then running, then walking. We often long for the eagle heights, the soaring seasons of the Spirit, but the deepest miracle is the last one, to "walk, and not faint", to keep going in the long, ordinary road of obedience without collapsing. That steady endurance is God's gift to those who wait on Him. Jesus said, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28), and "they that wait upon the LORD" find that rest and renewal in Him. If you are faint today, stop straining in your own strength. Wait on the Lord, exchange your spent strength for His, and He will lift you to soar, sustain you to run, and hold you up to walk and not faint.