The Book of Isaiah

Hebrew Study

Explanation

God turns again to comfort His servant, whom He tenderly calls "Jesurun" (an affectionate name for Israel, "upright one"). He promises help and, most wonderfully, the outpouring of His Spirit on the next generation: "I will pour water upon him that is thirsty... I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring." The result is fresh life and open confession: "One shall say, I am the LORD'S... another shall subscribe with his hand unto the LORD." Then God states His own identity in the highest terms: "I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God." No one else can declare the future and bring it to pass as He does. And He enlists His people as evidence: "ye are even my witnesses. Is there a God beside me? yea, there is no God; I know not any." God, who knows all things, says He knows of no other God, because there is none.

Gospel Focus

Two great gifts of the gospel meet in this passage. First, the promise of the Spirit: "I will pour my spirit upon thy seed." This is the Pentecostal hope, fulfilled when God poured out His Spirit on all flesh (Joel 2:28; Acts 2:17), and it flows from the thirst Jesus answers, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink... ( this spake he of the Spirit)" (John 7:37-39). The Spirit is poured on the thirsty; come thirsty, and He will fill you. And notice the fruit: people confessing openly, "I am the LORD'S," and even writing His name on their hand. The Spirit produces bold, glad belonging. Second, the great confession of the one God: "I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God." This is the ground of Apostolic faith, and the risen Jesus claims this very title as His own, "I am the first and the last" (Revelation 1:17). There is one God, and He came to us in Christ. When God says "beside me there is no God... I know not any," He forever shuts the door on every rival. Be His witness. Receive His poured-out Spirit, confess "I am the LORD'S," and testify that there is one God, the first and the last, and no other.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Isaiah unmasks idolatry with unforgettable satire. Those who make idols "are all of them vanity," and the idol is "profitable for nothing." He walks through the whole process. The blacksmith hammers away, growing "hungry" and "faint", the maker weaker than the thing he makes. The carpenter carefully measures and carves a block of wood "after the figure of a man." Then Isaiah zeroes in on the absurdity. The man takes a tree; with part of it "he warmeth himself" and "baketh bread" and roasts his meat, ordinary firewood, and with the leftover chunk "he maketh a god... he falleth down unto it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me; for thou art my god." The same log that cooked his dinner becomes his deliverer. And the reason he cannot see the folly is spiritual blindness: "he hath shut their eyes, that they cannot see." No one stops to reason, "I burned half of this, and shall I fall down to the stock of a tree?" The verdict is devastating: "He feedeth on ashes: a deceived heart hath turned him aside," so blind he cannot see "a lie in my right hand."

Gospel Focus

Isaiah's satire is funny until we realize it is about us. Idolatry is not only bowing to carved wood; it is giving the worship due to God to anything we ourselves make or manage, money, career, pleasure, image, self. And the pattern is the same: we take good things God gave us, our work, our resources, our gifts, and instead of using them, we bow to them and cry, "Deliver me." Anything we look to for salvation that we ourselves created is a stock of wood. And the deepest tragedy is the blindness: "he hath shut their eyes, that they cannot see... a deceived heart hath turned him aside." Sin blinds us to the obvious, so that intelligent people bow to things that cannot save. Paul describes the same descent: they "became vain in their imaginations... and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image" (Romans 1:21-23). And the result is always the same: "He feedeth on ashes." Idols never satisfy; they leave the soul living on emptiness. Only the living God can feed the soul, "he that cometh to me shall never hunger" (John 6:35). Examine your own right hand: is there a lie in it, some idol you are trusting to deliver you? Turn from the ashes to the God who alone can save, and let Him open your eyes.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

God calls His people to remember who they are: "thou art my servant... O Israel, thou shalt not be forgotten of me." Then comes the heart of the gospel in this chapter: "I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins: return unto me; for I have redeemed thee." Notice the astonishing order: God has already blotted out their sins and already redeemed them, and on that basis He says, "return." The forgiveness is not a reward for returning; the return is the response to forgiveness already given. And such redemption calls for a universal song: "Sing, O ye heavens... break forth into singing, ye mountains, O forest, and every tree therein: for the LORD hath redeemed Jacob." Heaven, earth, mountains, and trees are all summoned to rejoice over what God has done, because "the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified himself in Israel."

Gospel Focus

"I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions... return unto me; for I have redeemed thee." Here is the gospel's own logic, and it is the opposite of every religion of works. God does not say, "Return to me, and then I will forgive you." He says, "I have already blotted out your sins; therefore return." Grace comes first and draws us home. This is exactly how Jesus deals with sinners, and how Paul preaches: "God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8); "we love him, because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19). The blood of Christ has swept our sins away like a storm-cloud driven from the sky, gone without a trace, and it is that finished forgiveness that calls us to turn to Him. If you have been staying away from God because you feel too sinful, hear this: the sin is already blotted out; come home. And such grace should make us sing. When creation itself is called to "break forth into singing" over redemption, how much more should the redeemed. Do not feed on the ashes of idols; return to the God who has blotted out your sins, and join the song of the redeemed.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

The chapter closes with God magnifying Himself as sole Creator and Lord of history. "I am the LORD that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself." He made everything with no helper. He "frustrateth the tokens of the liars," overturning the diviners and the so-called wise, and He "confirmeth the word of his servant," keeping every prophecy His messengers speak. Then He gives the proof: He "saith to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be inhabited," and He "saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure," decreeing that Jerusalem will be rebuilt and the temple's foundation relaid. This is astonishing: God names Cyrus by name generations before his birth, the Persian king who would in fact release the Jews from Babylon and authorize the rebuilding of the temple. The God who blots out sin and pours out His Spirit is the same God who writes history in advance and calls pagan kings by name to serve His people.

Gospel Focus

Two truths crown the chapter. First, God is the sole Creator, "that stretcheth forth the heavens alone... by myself." He had no co-creator and no rival, which is the death of every idol and the ground of all worship: only the One who made all things by Himself deserves it. And the New Testament tells us that "all things were made by him" who came to us in Christ, the Word by whom the worlds were framed (John 1:3; Hebrews 1:2), so the LORD who made the heavens alone is the same Lord we worship in Jesus. Second, God rules history so completely that He names His instruments before they are born. "That saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd." If God could name a pagan king a century and a half in advance and bend him to free His people, then no ruler, no empire, no circumstance of your life is outside His control. He is writing the story, and He writes even hostile powers into the service of His people. Cyrus, God's appointed shepherd who set the captives free, is also a shadow of the greater Shepherd and Anointed to come, Jesus Christ, who sets us free from a greater bondage. Trust the God who stretches the heavens alone and names kings before they are born. Your life is in the hands of the One who has already written the ending, and it ends in redemption.