“Behold, my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights: I have put my Spirit on him. He will bring justice to the nations.
He will not shout, nor raise his voice, nor cause it to be heard in the street.
He won’t break a bruised reed. He won’t quench a dimly burning wick. He will faithfully bring justice.
He will not fail nor be discouraged, until he has set justice in the earth, and the islands wait for his law.”
God Yahweh, he who created the heavens and stretched them out, he who spread out the earth and that which comes out of it, he who gives breath to its people and spirit to those who walk in it, says:
“I, Yahweh, have called you in righteousness. I will hold your hand. I will keep you, and make you a covenant for the people, as a light for the nations,
to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6 He shall declare himself governor over the Gentiles, and…
He shall declare himself governor over the Gentiles, and call them by his word, and rule them by his Spirit.
That is, Christ, who in respect of his manhood is called here servant. The Prophets used to make mention of Christ after that they have declared any great promise, because he is the foundation whereupon all the promises are made and ratified.
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For I have committed all my power to him, as to a most faithful steward: Some read, I will establish him: to wit, in his office by giving him the fullness of my Spirit.
He only is acceptable to me, and they that come unto me by him: for there is no other means of reconciliation, Matt. 12:18; Eph. 4:1.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–7 Isa 42:1 Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine…
Isa 42:1 Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, [in whom] my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
Ver. 1. Behold my servant.] Cyrus partly, but Christ principally {Mat 12:18} {See Trapp on "Mat 12:18"} {Php 2:7} A servant he was, yet not menial, but magisterial; that he was one or other is admirable, and well deserveth an Ecce Behold.
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Whom I uphold.] That he faint not under the weight of his Mediatorship, and the importable burden of my wrath, which he must suffer for a season. Some render it "whom I lean upon." See 2Ki 5:18; 2Ki 7:2; 2Ki 7:13.
Mine elect, or choice one.] Cyrus was so. {Isa 43:10 Joh 6:27; Joh 6:29; Joh 10:36} See the notes on Mat 12:18. Cyrus was so singular a man, saith Herodotus, {a} that no Persian ever held himself worthy to be compared unto him. And of his court Xenophon {b} hath this memorable saying, that though a man should seek or choose blindfold, he could not miss of a good man. How much more truly may this be spoken of the Lord Christ and his people?
In whom my soul delighteth.] ευδοκησε. God affected Cyrus, {Isa 45:3-4; Isa 44:28} but nothing so well as Christ. {Mat 3:17; Mat 17:5} Once God repented him that he had made man; but now it is otherwise.
He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.] Who shall all cry, "Grace, grace unto it," to see mercy rejoicing against judgment. See on Mat 12:18.
{a} Herod., lib. iii.
{b} Xenoph. Cyrop., lib. viii.
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Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1–7 The prophet, having in the former chapter detected the…
The prophet, having in the former chapter detected the vanity of idols, by their gross ignorance of future things, and having given one eminent instance of God’s certain foreknowledge of things to come, in the prediction of the destruction of Babylon, and the deliverance of the Jews out of it by Cyrus, he now addeth another more eminent and remote example of it, and foretelleth the coming of the Messiah, and several great effects or consequences thereof; which he rather doth, because this was the person by whom the idols were to be utterly abolished, as was foretold, Isa 2:18, compared with Isa 42:2-4, and as it fell out in the event; this having been observed not only by Christians, but even by the learned heathens, not without astonishment, that at that time when Christ came into the world idols were generally struck dumb, and the oracles ceased. My servant; the person of whom he here speaketh is by some supposed to be Cyrus, and by others Isaiah himself, and by others the people of the Jews. But the most and best interpreters understand this place of Christ. And although I am sensible that some learned men have done wrong to the sacred text, and to the Christian cause, by expounding some places of Christ without sufficient evidence, yet this is one of the many places in this prophecy which cannot without manifest violence be applied to any other; which is so evident, that not only the generality of Christians, but divers of the most learned Jews, understand it of the Messiah, and of him alone; and pass a severe censure upon their brethren that expound it of any other person, and affirm that they are smitten with blindness in this matter. Moreover this place is expressly interpreted of Christ, Mat 12:18, &c.; and to him, and to him only, all the particulars here following do truly and evidently belong, as we shall see.
Whom I uphold; whom I will assist and enable to do and suffer all those things which belong to his office to do.
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Mine elect; chosen by me to this great work of mediation and redemption, to which he is said to be sealed and sent, Joh 6:27,29, and predestinated, 1Pe 1:20, and chosen of God, 1Pe 2:4.
Delighteth; or, as this same word is oft rendered, is well-pleased, both for himself and for all his people, being fully satisfied with that sacrifice which he shall offer up to me.
I have put my Spirit upon him; I have furnished him with that abundance and eminency of gifts and graces which are necessary for the discharge of his high and hard employment.
Shall bring forth; shall publish or show, as this word is translated, Mat 12:18; shall bring to light what before was hid in his breast, or in his Father’s bosom.
Judgment: this word is very ambiguous, and elsewhere is put for punishment, which cannot be meant here, because the whole context speaks of his mercy and sweetness, and not of his severity; but here it is clearly put for God’s law, as this very word is expounded here below, Isa 42:4, and as it is frequently used in the Holy Scriptures, as Psa 119, and elsewhere: which also best agrees with the bringing forth or publishing of it here mentioned, publication being necessarily required and constantly used about laws. And this interpretation is confirmed by the following words,
to the Gentiles. For the great things which Christ published unto all the world, both Jews and Gentiles, was nothing else but the law, and will, and counsel of God concerning man’s salvation, and the way and means of obtaining it.
To the Gentiles; not only to the Jews, to whom the knowledge of God’s laws had been hitherto appropriated, but to the heathen’ nations of the world.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 5 We are sure that these verses are to be…
We are sure that these verses are to be understood of Christ, for the evangelist tells us expressly that in him this prophecy was fulfilled, Mat 12:17-21. Behold with an eye of faith, behold and observe, behold and admire, my servant, whom I uphold. Let the Old Testament saints behold and remember him. Now what must we behold and consider concerning him?
I. The Father's concern for him and relation to him, the confidence he put and the complacency he took in him. This put an honour upon him, and made him remarkable, above any other circumstance, Isa 42:1. 1. God owns him as one employed for him: He is my servant. Though he was a Son, yet, as a Mediator, he took upon him the form of a servant, learned obedience to the will of God and practised it, and laid out himself to advance the interests of God's kingdom, and so he was God's servant. 2. As one chosen by him: He is my elect. He did not thrust himself into the service, but was called of God, and pitched upon as the fittest person for it. Infinite Wisdom made the choice and then avowed it. 3. As one he put a confidence in: He is my servant on whom I lean; so some read it. The Father put a confidence in him that he would go through with his undertaking, and, in that confidence, brought many sons to glory. It was a great trust which the Father reposed in the Son, but he knew him to be par negotio - equal to it, both able and faithful. 4. As one he took care of: He is my servant whom I uphold; so we read it. The Father bore him up, and bore him out, in his upholding him; he stood by him and strengthened him. 5. As one whom he took an entire complacency in: My elect, in whom my soul delights. His delight was in him from eternity, when he was by him as one brought up with him, Pro 8:30. He had a particular satisfaction in his undertaking: he declared himself well pleased in him (Mat 3:17; Mat 17:5), and therefore loved him, because he laid down his life for the sheep. Let our souls delight in Christ, rely on him, and rejoice in him; and thus let us be united to him, and then, for his sake, the Father will be well pleased with us.
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II. The qualification of him for his office: I have put my Spirit upon him, to enable him to go through his undertaking, Isa 61:1. The Spirit did not only come, but rest, upon him (Isa 11:2), not by measure, as on others of God's servants, but without measure. Those whom God employs as his servants; as he will uphold them and be well pleased with them, so he will put his Spirit upon them.
III. The work to which he is appointed; it is to bring forth judgment to the Gentiles, that is, in infinite wisdom, holiness, and equity, to set up a religion in the world under the bonds of which the Gentiles should come and the blessings of which they should enjoy. The judgments of the Lord, which had been hidden from the Gentiles (Psa 147:20), he came to bring forth to the Gentiles, for he was to be a light to lighten them.
IV. The mildness and tenderness with which he should pursue this undertaking, Isa 42:2, Isa 42:3. He shall carry it on, 1. In silence, and without noise: He shall not strive nor cry. It shall not be proclaimed, Lo, here, is Christ or Lo, he is there; as when great princes ride in progress or make a public entry. He shall have no trumpet sounded before him, nor any noisy retinue to follow him. The opposition he meets with he shall not strive against, but patiently endure the contradiction of sinners against himself. His kingdom is spiritual, and therefore its weapons are not carnal, nor is its appearance pompous; it comes not with observation. 2. Gently, and without rigour. Those that are wicked he will be patient with; when he has begun to crush them, so that they are as bruised reeds, he will give them space to repent and not immediately break them; though they are very offensive, as smoking flax (Isa 65:5), yet he will bear with them, as he did with Jerusalem. Those that are weak he will be tender of; those that have but a little life, a little heat, that are weak as a reed, oppressed with doubts and fears, as a bruised reed, that are as smoking flax, as the wick of a candle newly lighted, which is ready to go out again, he will not despise them, will not plead against them with his great power, nor lay upon them more work or more suffering than they can bear, which would break and quench them, but will graciously consider their frame. More is implied than is expressed. He will not break the bruised reed, but will strengthen it, that it may become a cedar in the courts of our God. He will not quench the smoking flax, but blow it up into a flame. Note, Jesus Christ is very tender toward those that have true grace, though they are but weak in it, and accepts the willingness of the spirit, pardoning and passing by the weakness of the flesh.
V. The courage and constancy with which he should persevere in this undertaking, so as to carry his point at last (Isa 42:4): He shall not fail nor be discouraged. Though he meets with hard service and much opposition, and foresees how ungrateful the world will be, yet he goes on with his part of the work, till he is able to say, Is is finished; and he enables his apostles and minsters to go on with theirs too, and not to fail nor be discouraged, till they also have finished their testimony. And thus he accomplishes what he undertook. 1. He brings forth judgment unto truth. By a long course of miracles, and his resurrection at last, he shall fully evince the truth of his doctrine and the divine origin and authority of that holy religion which he came to establish. 2. He sets judgment in the earth. He erects his government in the world, a church for himself among men, reforms the world, and by the power of his gospel and grace fixes such principles in the minds of men as tend to make them wise and just. 3. The isles of the Gentiles wait for his law, wait for his gospel, that is, bid it welcome as if it had been a thing they had long waited for. They shall become his disciples, shall sit at his feet, and be ready to receive the law from his mouth. What wilt thou have us to do?
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–7 Behold my servant, whom I uphold,.... The Targum is,
Behold my servant, whom I uphold,.... The Targum is,
"behold my servant the Messiah;''
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and Kimchi on the place says, this is the King Messiah; and so Abarbinel (f) interprets it of him, and other Jewish writers, and which is right; for the prophet speaks not of himself, as Aben Ezra thinks; nor of Cyrus, as Saadiah Gaon; nor of the people of Israel, as Jarchi; but of Christ, as it is applied, Mat 12:17 who is spoken of under the character of a "servant", as he is; not as a divine Person, for as such he is the Son of God; but as man, and in his office as Mediator; a servant of the Lord, not of angels, or men, but of his divine Father; who chose him, called and sent him, and assigned him his work; which was principally the redemption of his people, and which he diligently, faithfully, and fully performed; in which he was "upheld" as man and Mediator by his Father, not only in his being as man, but was strengthened and helped in his mediatorial service so that he did not sink under the mighty weight of the sins of his people, or of the wrath of God: or, "whom I lean upon" (g); as a master on his servant, so Kimchi; he relied on him to do the work he undertook; he trusted him with his own glory, and the salvation of his people. This prophecy is ushered in with a "behold"; exciting attention to what is said concerning Christ, as of the greatest importance; directing the eye of faith to him for righteousness and salvation; and as expressive of admiration at him, that he who was the Son of God should become a servant, and undertake the salvation of men:
mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth: this character of "elect" may respect the choice of the human nature to the grace of union with the Son of God; which was chosen out from among the people, and separated from them for that purpose; and was preordained to be the Lamb slain for the redemption of man, and appointed to glory; and likewise the choice of Christ to office, to be the Mediator between God and man; to be the Saviour and Redeemer of the Lord's people; to be the Head of the church, and to be the foundation and the corner stone of that spiritual building; and to be the Judge of quick and dead: and with him, as such, was the Lord "well pleased, or delighted"; with his person; as the Son of God; and with all his chosen, as considered in him; with what he did as his servant; with the righteousness he wrought out; with the sacrifice he offered up; and with his sufferings and death, through which peace and reconciliation were made with God for sinners:
I have put my Spirit upon him; my Holy Spirit, as the Targum; not on him as a divine Person, as such he needed him not; but as man, with which he was filled without measure at his incarnation, and which rested upon him, and qualified him for his work and office, as Prophet, Priest, and King:
he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles; the Gospel, the produce of divine wisdom; the Gospel of God, whose judgment is according to truth; the rule of human judgment in things spiritual and saving, and by which Christ judges and rules in the hearts of his people; this he brought forth out of his Father's bosom, out of his own heart, and published it in person to the Jews, and by his apostles to the converted by it, became subject to his rule and government. Gentiles, who being converted by it, became subject to his rule and government.
(f) Mashmiah Jeshuah, fol. 9. col. 1. 2. Chizzuk Emunah, p. 299. (g) "qui innitar", Munster, "innitar ei, vel illi", Pagninus, Calvin; "in eo", Montanus.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1–6 The person and office of Christ appointed by the…
The person and office of Christ appointed by the Father, ver. 1-9. A new song to God for his gospel, among the Gentiles, ver. 10-16. The idolatry of the Heathen, and obstinacy of the Jews, ver. 17-25.
Behold - The prophet having given one eminent instance of God's certain fore-knowledge, in the deliverance of the Jews by Cyrus, now adds another more eminent example of it, by foretelling the coming of the Messiah. This place therefore is expressly interpreted of Christ, Matt. xii, 18, &c. And to him, and to him only, all the particulars following, truly and evidently belong. Whom - Whom I will enable to do and suffer all those things which belong to his office. Elect - Chosen by me to this great work. Delighteth - Both for himself and for all his people, being fully satisfied with that sacrifice, which he shall offer up to me. Bring forth - Shall publish or shew, as this word is translated, Matt. xii, 18. Judgment - The law, and will, and counsel of God, concerning man's salvation. Gentiles - Not only to the Jews, but to the Heathen nations.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 6, 7 The prophet sets forth the meekness of Messiah's character,…
CHAPTER XLII
The prophet sets forth the meekness of Messiah's character, and
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the extent and blessings of his kingdom, particularly among the
Gentiles, 1-9.
In consequence of this he calls on the whole creation to join
him in one song of praise to God, 10-12.
After which he seems again to glance at the deliverance from
the captivity; although the words may full as well apply to the
deliverance vouchsafed to the Church; to the overthrow of her
must powerful enemies; and to the prevalency of true religion
over idolatry and error, 13-17.
The prophet then reproves the Jews for their blindness and
infidelity in rejecting the Messiah, and gives intimations of
these judgments which their guilt would draw on them, 18-25.
The prophet, having opened his subject with the preparation for the return from captivity at Babylon, and intimated that a much greater deliverance was covered under the veil of that event, proceeded to vindicate the power of God, as Creator and disposer of all things; and his infinite knowledge, from his prediction of future events, and in particular of that deliverance. He went still farther, and pointed out the instrument by which he should effect the redemption of his people the Jews from slavery; namely, a great conqueror, whom he would call forth from the north and the east to execute his orders. In this chapter he proceeds to the greater deliverance; and at once brings forth into full view, without throwing any veil of allegory over the subject, the Messiah. "Behold my servant, Messiah," says the Chaldee. St. Matthew has applied it directly to Christ; nor can it with any justice or propriety be applied to any other person or character whatever. - L
NOTES ON CHAP. XLII
Verse 1. Behold my servant, whom I uphold] אתמך בו ethmach bo, on whom I lean. Alluding to the custom of kings leaning on the arm of their most beloved and faithful servant. All, both Jews and Christians, agree, that the seven first verses of this chapter belong to Christ. Now, as they are evidently a continuation of the prophecy in the preceding chapter, that prophecy cannot belong to Cyrus, but to Christ.
He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles - "He shall publish judgment to the nations"] Four MSS. two ancient, add the conjunction ומשפט vemishpat. See Mt 12:18.
The word משפט mishpat, judgment, like צדקה tsedakah, righteousness, is taken in a great latitude of signification. It means rule, form, order, model, plan; rule of right, or of religion; an ordinance, institution; judicial process, cause, trial, sentence, condemnation, acquittal, deliverance, mercy, &c. It certainly means in this place the law to be published by Messiah, the institution of the Gospel.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5 Isa 42:1. Behold my servant, &c. — “The prophet,…
Isa 42:1. Behold my servant, &c. — “The prophet, having opened his subject with the preparation for the return from the captivity at Babylon, and intimated that a much greater deliverance was covered under the veil of that event, proceeded to vindicate the power of God, as Creator and Disposer of all things, and his infinite knowledge from his prediction of future events, and in particular of that deliverance; he then went still further, and pointed out the instrument by which he should effect the redemption of his people from slavery, namely, a great conqueror, whom he would call forth from the north and the east, to execute his orders. He now proceeds to the great deliverance, and at once brings forth into full view the Messiah, without throwing any veil of allegory over the subject.” For, though the person here spoken of has by some been supposed to be Cyrus, and by others Isaiah himself, and by others again the people of the Jews; yet we are directed by an infallible interpreter to understand the prophet as speaking of Christ. For to him St. Matthew has directly applied his words; nor, as Bishop Lowth has observed, can they, “with any justice or propriety, be applied to any other person or character whatever.” This is so evident, that not only the generality of Christians, but the Chaldee paraphrast, and divers of the most learned Jews, understand the passage of the Messiah, and of him alone; and pass a very severe sentence upon their brethren that expound it of any other person, and affirm that they are smitten with blindness in this matter. Indeed, to him, and to him only, all the particulars here following do truly and evidently belong, as we shall see. My servant — Though he was the only Son of the Father, in a sense in which no creature, man or angel, was, is, or can be his son; see Heb 1:2-5; yet, as Mediator, and with respect to his human nature, he sustained the character, and appeared in the form of a servant, learned obedience to his Father’s will, practised it, and was continually employed in advancing the interests of his kingdom. Whom I uphold — Whom I assist, and enable to do and suffer all those things which belong to his office; mine elect — Chosen by me to this great work of mediation and redemption; in whom my soul delighteth — Or, as רצתהis often rendered, is well pleased, both for himself and for all his people, being fully satisfied with that sacrifice which he shall offer up to me: see Mat 3:17; Mat 17:5; 2Pe 1:17; Joh 3:35. I have put my Spirit upon him —
Not by, but without, measure, Joh 3:34; by which he is furnished with that abundance and eminence of graces and gifts which are necessary for the discharge of his high and mighty undertaking. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles — He shall publish or show (as the word יציאoften signifies, and is translated Mat 12:18) the law, counsel, or will of God concerning man’s salvation; and that not only to the Jews, to whom the knowledge of God’s law had been hitherto in a great measure confined, but to the heathen nations also.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1–7 Behold - This word is designed to call attention…
Behold - This word is designed to call attention to the person that is immediately referred to. It is an intimation that the subject is of importance, and should command their regard.
My servant - This phrase denotes properly anyone who acknowledges or worships God; anyone who is regarded as serving or obeying him. It is a term which may be applied to anyone who is esteemed to be a pious man, or who is obedient to the commands of God, and is often applied to the people of God Gen 50:17; 1Ch 6:49; 2Ch 24:9; Dan 6:20; Dan 9:2; Tit 1:1; Jam 1:1; 1Pe 2:16; Rev 7:3; Rev 15:3. The word ‘servant’ may be applied either to Isaiah, Cyrus, or the Messiah; and the question to whom it refers here is to be decided, not by the mere use of the term, but by the connection, and by the characteristics which are ascribed to him who is here designated as the ‘servant’ of Yahweh. There have been no less than five different views in regard to the personage here referred to; and as in the interpretation of the whole prophecy in this chapter, everything depends on this question, it is of importance briefly to examine the opinions which have been entertained.
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I. One has been that it refers to the Jewish people. The translators of the Septuagint evidently so regarded it. They render it, Ἰακώβ ὁ παῖς μοῦ, κ.τ.λ. Iakōb ho pais mou, etc. - ‘Jacob is my servant, I will uphold him; Israel is my chosen one, my soul hath embraced him.’ Jarchi also so interprets the passage, but so modifies it as to understand by it ‘the righteous in Israel;’ and among the moderns, Rosenmuller, Paulus, and some others adopt this interpretation. The principal reason alleged for this interpretation is, that the phrase ‘servant of Yahweh,’ is used elsewhere in a collective sense, and applied to the Jewish people. Rosenmuller appeals particularly to Isa 41:8-9; to Isa 42:19, and to Isa 44:21; Isa 45:4; Isa 48:20; and argues that it is to be presumed that the prophet used the phrase in a uniform manner, and must therefore be supposed here also to refer to the Jewish people. But the objections are insuperable.
1. In Isa 42:6, the servant of Yahweh here referred to, is plainly distinguished from the people, where God says, ‘I will give thee for a covenant of (with) the people.’
2. The description which the prophet gives here of the character of the ‘servant’ of Yahweh, as meek, mild, gentle, quiet, and humble Isa 42:2-3, is remarkably unlike the character which the prophet elsewhere gives of the people, and is as remarkably like the character which is everywhere given of the Messiah.
3. It was not true of the Jewish people that they were appointed, as is here said of the ‘servant’ of God Isa 42:7, to ‘open the blind eyes, and to bring the prisoners out of prison.’ This is evidently applicable only to a teacher, a deliverer, or a guide; and in no sense can it be applied to the collected Jewish people.
II. A second opinion has been, that by the ‘servant of Yahweh’ Cyrus was intended. Many of the Jewish interpreters have adopted this view, and not a few of the German critics. The principal argument for this opinion is, that what precedes, and what follows, relates particularly to Cyrus; and an appeal is made particularly to Isa 45:1, where he is called the Anointed, and to Isa 44:28, where he is called the Shepherd. But to this view also, the objections are obvious.
1. The name ‘servant of Yahweh,’ is, it is believed, nowhere given to Cyrus.
2. The description here by no means agrees with Cyrus. That he was distinguished for justice and equity is admitted (see the note at Isa 41:2), but the expressions used here, that God would ‘put his Spirit upon him, that he should not cry, nor lift up his voice, so that it should be heard in the streets,’ is one that is by no means applicable to a man whose life was spent mainly in the tumults of war, and in the pomp and carnage of battle and conquest. How can this description be applied to a man who trod down nations, and subdued kings, and who shed rivers of blood?
III. Others suppose that the prophet refers to himself. Among the Jews, Aben Ezra, and among others, Grottoes and Doderlin held this opinion. The only reason for this is, that in Isa 20:3, the name ‘servant’ of Yahweh is given to Isaiah. But the objections to this are plain, and insuperable.
1. Nothing can be urged, as we have seen, from the mere use of the word ‘servant.’
2. It is inconceivable that a humble prophet like Isaiah should have applied to himself a description expressive of so much importance as is here attributed to the servant of God. How could the establishment of a new covenant with the people of God, and the conversion of the pagan nations Isa 42:6-7, be ascribed to Isaiah? And in what sense is it true that he was appointed to open the eyes of the blind, and to lead the prisoners from the prison?
IV. A fourth opinion, which it may be proper just to notice, is that which is advocated by Gesenius, that the phrase here refers to the prophets taken collectively. But this opinion is one that scarce deserves a serious refutation. For,
1. The name ‘servant of Yahweh,’ is never given to any collection of the prophets.
2. Any such collection of the prophets is a mere creature of the fancy. When did they exist? Who composed the collection? And how could the name servant designate them?
3. Of what collection of people could it be imagined that the description here given could be applied, that such a collection should not strive, nor cry; that it should be a covenant of the people, and that it should be the means of the conversion of the Gentile world?
V. The fifth opinion, therefore is, that it refers to the Messiah; and the direct arguments in favor of this, independent of the fact that it is applicable to no other one, are so strong as to put it beyond debate. A few of them may be referred to.
1. This is the interpretation of the Chaldee Paraphrase, which has retained the exposition of the ancient and early Jews. ‘Behold my servant, the Messiah (משׁיתא עבדי ‛abeddı̂y meshı̂ythâ') I will cause him to come near; my chosen.’
2. There are such applications of the passage in the New Testament to the Lord Jesus, as to leave no room to doubt that, in view of the sacred writers, the passage had this reference. Thus, in Luk 2:32, he is spoken of as ‘a light to lighten the Gentiles’ (compare Isa 42:6). In Act 26:18, Paul speaks of him as given to the Gentiles,’ to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light’ (compare Isa 42:7). In Mat 3:17, God says of the Redeemer, ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased,’ - language remarkably similar to the passage before us Isa 42:1, where he says, ‘mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth.’ And the whole inquiry is put to rest by the fact that Matthew Mat 12:17-21 expressly and directly applies the passage to the Lord Jesus, and says that it was fulfilled in him.
3. It may be added, that the entire description is one that is exactly and entirely applicable to the Lord Jesus. It is as applicable as if it had been made after he had appeared among people, and as if it were the language of biography, and not of prophecy. It is an exceedingly beautiful and tender description of the Son of God; nor can there be any objection to its application to him, except what arises from a general purpose not to apply any part of the Old Testament to him, if it can be avoided. I shall regard the passage, therefore, as applicable to him, and him alone; and suppose that the design of the Spirit here in introducing this reference to the Messiah is, to comfort the hearts of the exile Jews with the assurance that they must be restored to their own land, because it was from them that the Messiah was to proceed, and from them that the true religion was to be spread around the world.
Whom I uphold - whom I sustain, or protect; that is, who is the object of my affection and care. In Mat 3:17, the expression is, ‘in whom I am well pleased.’ And so in Mat 12:18, it is rendered, ‘my servant, whom I have chosen.’
Mine elect - My chosen one; or the one whom I have selected to accomplish my great purposes. It implies that God had designated or appointed him for the purpose. In Mat 12:18, it is rendered ‘my beloved.’ It implies that he was the object of the divine favor, and that God had chosen or appointed him to perform the work of a Messiah.
In whom my soul delighteth - This language is applied the Lord Jesus in Mat 3:17; Mat 12:18. God regarded him as qualified for his work: he approved of what he did; he was well pleased with all his words, and thoughts, and plans. The word ‘soul’ here, is equivalent to I myself - in whom I delight.
I have put my Spirit upon him - (Compare Joh 3:34): ‘For God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him.’ The Lord Jesus was divine, yet as Mediator he is everywhere represented as ‘the anointed’ of God, or as endowed with the influences of the Holy Spirit (compare the note at Isa 11:2). See also Isa 61:1, where the Messiah says of himself, ‘The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because be hath anointed me’ (compare Luk 4:18). Before he entered upon his public ministry, the Spirit of God descended on him at his baptism Mat 3:17, and in all his work he showed that he was endowed abundantly with that Spirit.
He shall bring forth judgment - The word ‘judgment’ (משׁפט mishpâṭ) is used in a great variety of significations. It properly means judgment, that is, the act of judging Lev 19:15; the place of judgment Ecc 3:16; a cause, or suit before a judge Num 28:5; a sentence of a judge 1Ki 3:28; and thence guilt or crime, for which one is judged Jer 51:9. It also means right, rectitude, justice; a law, or statute; a claim, privilege, or due; also manner, custom, or fashion; or an ordinance, or institution. Here it is used, probably, in the sense of the order or institution that would be introduced under the Messiah; and it means that he would set up or establish the true religion among the Gentiles.
To the Gentiles - This is one of the many declarations which occur in Isaiah, that the Messiah would extend the true religion to pagan nations, and that they should be brought to participate in its privileges.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 6, 7 My servant. Christ, who, according to his humanity, is…
My servant. Christ, who, according to his humanity, is the servant of God, (Challoner) and Redeemer of others; none else being able to satisfy for themselves. (Worthington) (Philippians ii. 7.) (Calmet) --- This passage clearly refers to the Messias, (Chaldean; Kimchi) who was prefigured by Cyrus, ver. 6. (Calmet) (Hugo.) --- It is quoted by St. Matthew (xii. 18.) who has some variations both from the Hebrew and the Septuagint, (Calmet) particularly the first part of ver. 4., which the Septuagint renders, "He shall shine, and shall not be broken."
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 The third chief figure: The personal servant of God…
III.—THE THIRD DISCOURSE
The third chief figure: The personal servant of God in the contrastive, principal features of his manifestation
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Isaiah 42
1. THE MEEK SERVANT OF GOD
Isa_42:1-4
1 Behold my servant, whom I uphold;
Mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth;
I have put my spirit upon him:
He shall 1bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
2 He shall not cry, nor lift up,
Nor cause his voice to be heard in the street.
3 A bruised reed shall he not break,
And the 2smoking flax shall he not 3quench:
He shall bring forth judgment 4unto truth.
4 He shall not fail nor be 5discouraged,
Till he have set ajudgment in the earth:
And the isles shall wait for his law.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
See List for the recurrence of the words: Isa_42:1. הֵן רָצָה–בָּחִיר–תָּמַךְ– Isa_42:3. כֵחָה–פִּשׁתָּה Isa_42:4. יָחַל–תּוֹרָה
Isa_42:1. With רצתה נפשׁי one looks for בּוֹ (comp. Mic_6:7, etc). Evidently the preceding בּוֹ continues in force.
Isa_42:4. אל יכהה corresponds to the second clause of Isa_42:3; לא ירוץ to the first clause. From this it appears that יָרוּץ is not from רוּץ, but from רָצַיץ. The pronunciation of the imperf. Kal with u occurs also in other ע֨ע֨verbs (יָרוּן Pro_29:6. יָשׁוּד Psa_91:6), and it is remarkable that the imperfect forms of רצץ occur only with the pronunciation u, Psa_18:30; 2Sa_22:30; Ecc_12:6.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. As in chap. 41 the form of Cyrus, who is servant of Jehovah without being called so, and the form of Israel, who is servant of Jehovah and is so called, have their roots, so the form of Him who is servant of Jehovah in the highest sense, the form of the Messiah has its root in chap. 24. Thus the Prophet allows the types of his prophetic forms to appear in succession, and in a way that sketches them for us at first only in general outline. Here now he lets a servant of Jehovah appear, whom, after the first strokes that draw his form, we might regard as identical with the servant of Jehovah mentioned Isa_41:8. For all that is said in our Isa_42:1, applies well enough to the people of Israel. But can Isa_42:2-3 be said of them? Here is mentioned One, who could, if He would, but He will not. He could cry, and break the bruised reed, and quench the glimmering wick, for He had the right and the might to do it. That is the Lord Himself, that comes to visit His people in meekness and lowliness. And yet He does appear as a Judge, loud and terrible, as appears from Isa_42:13. For this chapter is full of contrasts. Isa_42:1-4 contrast with Isa_42:10-17; Isa_42:5-9 with Isa_42:18-21. Contrasts appear, too, within the individual strophes; e. g., Isa_42:4 a. contrasts with 4 b.
2. Behold my servant—for his law.
Isa_42:1-4. תָּמַךְ in itself can mean “to seize, hold fast.” Here, however, it is not an act of violence that is spoken of, but an act of love. The Servant of Jehovah supports Himself on Jehovah, and Jehovah supports, holds and bears His Servant (comp. Isa_42:6; Joh_8:29). The words “in whom I am well pleased,” Mat_3:17; Mat_17:5; 2Pe_1:17, heard at the baptism and the transfiguration of Christ, seem to connect with our רצתה וגו׳ and also with חָפֵץ ver 21. The idea of anointing seems to underly the expression I have put My Spirit upon Him. (The expression occurs only here in Isaiah; for Isa_37:7 belongs in another category; still comp. Isa_11:2; Isa_61:1). The use of the holy anointing oil (also of incense) is often signified by נתן על in Lev_2:1; Lev_2:15; Lev_14:17-18; Lev_14:28-29. This construction is confirmed by Isa_61:1. By the anointing with the Holy Spirit, the Servant of God is qualified to bring right to the nations. משׁפט here can mean neither judicial transaction, nor judicial sentence; it can only mean standard of right. But what sort appears partly from the nature of the thing itself, partly from the parallel passages. The heathen, too, had standards of right in general. But they lacked the true source of right, the knowledge of Him who alone is truth; they lacked the νόμος τη̄ς ἀληθείας . Not merely the juridical norm of right in the absolute sense, i. e., religion (HengstenbergChristol. on our text, Delitzsch, Reinke) is to be understood. This absolute standard of right, hitherto the prerogative of Jehovah and His people, the Servant of Jehovah will carry forth to all nations (comp. Isa_2:3; Mic_4:2; Isa_51:4; Psa_147:19-20). Thus הוֹצִיא signifies the publishing of what has hitherto been hid, revelation (Hab_1:4).
In Isa_42:2-3 it is added in praise of the Servant of the Lord that He will not cry in the streets, nor break the bruised reed. If He is to be praised for this, then He must have been able to do what He abstained from doing. Evidently a contrast presents itself here. It is not that the Servant of the Lord cannot do what He would even like to do. But the contrary: He could; but He will not. He abstains from the use of His power; He divests Himself. By this even it is intimated that His power must be great. Otherwise there would not be so much made of His refraining from using it. Is it credible that such humble abstinence from the use of power that they enjoyed could ever be mentioned to the praise of Isaiah, or of the prophets generally, or of the people of Israel generally, or of the spiritual Israel, or of Cyrus, or of Uzziah, or Hezekiah or Josiah [the various persons supposed by different commentators to be meant by the Servant of Jehovah.—Tr.]? When did Israel ever have great power in reference to the heathen, and in humble love abstain from its use? Or when had ever a prophet or king of Israel the high position of a teacher of mankind, and filled it with humble self-denial? And of Cyrus it cannot be said that he was called to give to the heathen the νομος τη̄ς ἀληθείας. There is only One, that stood as Teacher of all nations, and who, spite of His great dignity, could say of Himself: “Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light” (Mat_11:28-30). It is as if the Lord had our passage in mind when He spoke these words. For not only do His words: “I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth” (ibid, Isa 42:29) recall Isa_42:5 of our chapter, that describes God as the One “that created the heavens, and stretched them out.” But, what is still more important, we find there the same contrast as the basis of Christ’s words, that rules over also our passage. The almighty Lord of heaven and earth does not ask after the wise and prudent, He has revealed Himself to those under age. And Christ Himself! How significant that He introduces the words to the weary and heavy laden quoted above, with the words: “All things are delivered unto Me of My Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal Him” (ibid. Isa 42:27). Does He not say here in a most emphatic way, that He is a meek, lowly and patient teacher although the greatest power and the highest knowledge are delivered to Him? Besides the evident connection of our passage with Mat_11:25-30, that we have thus remarked, the evangelist Matthew himself declares expressly in what immediately follows (Mat_12:15-21) that he saw in the conduct of the Lord at that time the fulfilment of the words of our Prophet. That He healed the sick, and yet forbad to have it published, that He would only serve (comp. Mat_20:28), and sought not His honor and His advantage (Joh_8:50; Joh_5:30), that seems to Matthew to correspond to the picture of the Servant of the Lord that Isaiah drew in our chapter.
The expression נָשָׂא meaning נשׁא קיל occurs Num_14:1; Job_21:12, and in Isa. in part first (Isa_3:7) and in part second (Isaiah 42:2, 41). The omission being idiomatic, it need not be supplied from the following קוֹלוֹ. The statement that the Servant of Jehovah shall not cry nor lift up His voice is understood in various ways. It is said, on the contrary, Isa_42:13-14, that He will cry. This belongs to the contrasts with which the chapter abounds. The meaning of Isa_42:2-3 is, therefore, not that the Servant of the Lord will in general not cry, and will break nothing whatever. Rather, as His anointing with the Spirit implies, He will only not roar and rage as do the powers of this world, nor do violence to the weak and wretched. On the contrary He will show Himself gentle and kind to the poor and weak, which is precisely the Old Testament meaning of צַדִּיק. What is already bruised (“nicked,” קָנֶה רָצוּץ comp. Isa_36:6; Isa_58:6; Deu_28:33) He will not finish by breaking, and the feebly glimmering wick He will not extinguish. פִשְׁתָּה is the wick made from linen (פִּשְׁתֶּה which however does not occur, comp. Gesen.Thes. p. 1136). The double statement of Isa_42:3 contains a λιτότης. For it is inconceivable that He, whose being is light and life, intends only the non-extinguishment of the wick or the non-fracture of the reed. Rather He intends both as the beginning of new life.
The clause לאמת יוציא מ׳ stands alone as a positive statement in antithesis to the foregoing negatives. The LXX. translates: είς ἀλ́θειαν ἐξοίσει κρίσιν. Mat_12:20 reads:ἕως ἄν ἐκβάλη̣ εἰς νῖκος τήν κρίσιν . The latter translation seems to come from a confusion with Hab_1:4. For there it reads:ולֹא יֵצֵא לָנֶצַח משׁפָט. But in Aramaic נְצַח means vicit;נֶצְחָנָא ,נִצְחָנָא is victoria;נַצִיחָאvictor.לֶֽאֱמֶת which occurs no where else in the Old Testament, can only mean secundam veritatem (Vulg.inלְמִשְכָּט ,לְצֶרֶק32:1. One might suppose that the expression meant the same as משׁפט יוציא לגוים Isa_42:1. But it is to be noticed that Isa_42:1 it is the nations to whom the Servant of Jehovah brings forth right, whereas Isa_42:3 it is to those compared to the bruised reed and glimmering wick. Moreover in Isa_42:1 the addition לאמת is wanting. Both considerations justify our assuming a modification of the sense in Isa_42:3. To the heathen, who do not know Him, God will reveal the standard of right, by the use of which they will find the right. But for the poor and wretched He will procure a right decree corresponding to the truth, He will help them to their rights; something that elsewhere also is made to be an essential part of the glory of the Messianic kingdom (Isa_1:21; Isa_1:26 sq.; Isa_9:6). But הוֹצִיא expresses here the proceeding, issuing of the decree of a judge, in which sense יָצָא occurs twice in Hab_1:4. Per ducere, to carry into effect, to conduct to the end, cannot be the meaning of הוציא.
By Isa_42:4, the Prophet would obviate a misunderstanding, by preparing a transition that makes prominent a contrastive side of the Servant of Jehovah, which appears even in the second, but still more decidedly in the third strophe. For instance, it might perhaps be inferred from Isa_42:2-3 that the Servant of Jehovah were only meek and lowly, that thus He were made only of weak stuff, that His being would lack the firmness, the manly force, the ability to be angry and punish. To obviate this false inference the Prophet says, though the Servant of Jehovah will be such as described Isa_42:2-3, still He will Himself be no bruised reed, [ירוץ from רָצַץ see Text. and Gram]. Spite of his gentleness, He shall be firm as a rock (Isa_17:10; Isa_26:4), on which all attacks of His enemies shall dash to pieces, and He shall carry out His counsel victoriously. The conjunction צר signifies here, as often (Gen_28:15; Psa_112:8), continuance until the object is attained; the meaning of this form of expression being always that a ceasing will not take place till the end in view is attained (against Gesen.Thes. p. 992, and Hengstenberg,Authentie d. Daniel, p. 67). What follows does not enter into the consideration. The standard of right that the Servant of Jehovah will establish on the earth is the same mentioned Isa_42:1. It is afterwards called תּוֹרָה “law,” which is only nearer definition added on. That is, it is only made plainer that this standard of right will be a religious one, a counterpart of the law of Sinai. As Delitzsch remarks, the Servant of Jehovah will add to the Sinaitic the Zionitic Torah (comp. Isa_2:3). The position of ייחלו at the end of the clause indicates that we are not to consider it as dependent on עַד. But the Prophet would say: when the standard of right is established by the Servant of Jehovah as Torah, as religious law, then will the isles (meaning here the remotest regions of the heathen world) turn themselves to it in hope and trust (comp. Isa_51:4-5).
Footnotes:
[1]reveal right.
[2]Or, dimly burning.
[3]Heb. quench it,
[4]according to truth.
[5]Heb. broken.
2. THE SERVANT OF GOD AS THE BEARER OF A NEW CONVENANT. THE THIRD APPLICATION OF PROPHECY AS PROOF OF DIVINITY
Isa_42:5-9
5 Thus saith God the Lord,
He that created the heavens, and stretched them out;
He that spread forth the earth, and that which cometh out of it;
He that giveth breath unto the people upon it,
And spirit to them that walk therein:
6 I the Lord have called thee in righteousness,
And will hold thine hand,
And will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people,
For a light of the Gentiles;
7 To open the blind eyes,
To bring out the prisoners from the prison,
And them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.
8 6I am the Lord: that is my name:
And my glory will I not give to another,
Neither my praise to graven images.
9 Behold, the former things are come to pass,
And new things do I declare:
Before they spring forth I tell you of them.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
See List for the recurrence of the words: Isa_42:5. בורא—כה אמר. Isa_42:6. נצר—אחזק. Isa_42:7. כֶּלֶא.
Isa_42:5. On נטה שׁמים comp. Isa_40:22. The form נוטיהםwith י is to be explained, not indeed according to Isa_54:5, but after the analogy of those forms of לח׳ in which the original י reappears. On רָקַע comp. on Isa_40:19; Isa_44:24. As the word properly means to hammer out broad (comp. צאצאיה,( רָקִיעַ(τὰ ἔκγονα, כֹּל אֲשֶר תּוֹצֵא הָאָרֶץ Gen_1:12 sqq., a word that occurs only in Job and Isa.; comp. Isa_22:24) taken strictly does not suit it. But in רקצ there lies ideally the notion of spreading out and צאצאיה depends on that.
Isa_42:6. אַחְזֵק, the abbreviated jussive form, here exceptionally in the first person [See Green’s Gr. § 97.2 a]. In regard to its being joined with בּ see Isa_4:1; Isa_45:1; Isa_51:18; Isa_56:2; Isa_56:4; Isa_56:6; Isa_64:6; comp. Isa_41:13).——That צָם and נגֹיִם have not the article, accords with the prophetic style, and is not to be pressed.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. This strophe consists of a preface, principal part, and conclusion. In respect to Isa_42:1-4 there is a climax. The introduction Isa_42:5 is a considerable leap. There the Prophet designates the Lord as the one that has created heaven and the earth, and all that is on it. This affords the basis for what follows. The same God that could do this, and He only, is able also to deliver them. He, too, can say of the redeemer His Servant: I have called Thee, will uphold, protect and make Thee the bearer of a new covenant, and a light to all nations (Isa_42:6). This new covenant and enlightening the nations shall consist in opening blind eyes, and delivering prisoners from prison (Isa_42:7), which is to be understood in both a spiritual and a physical sense. The strophe concluds (Isa_42:8-9) by the emphatic statement that He, Jehovah announces this beforehand for the sake of His own honor, and especially to show (Isa_42:8) the difference between Himself and idols. As He has fulfilled earlier prophecies, so now He gives new ones in order, by their eventual fulfilment, to prove His divinity.
2. Thus saith God——therein.
Isa_42:5. It seems to me that הָאֵל put first is, like Gen_46:3, meant to designate emphatically the true God, who alone has power, in contrast with the powerless false gods (Isa_42:8). האל placed before יהוה as here, does not occur elsewhere. Comp. Isa_5:16. בורא see List: except in Isaiah only twice: Amo_4:13; Ecc_12:1. בורא שׁמים, Isa_45:18 (Isa_65:17). צַם, which has הלכים בה for parallel, signifies accordingly the people of the earth generally. The order of thought here makes it evident that the chief features of the Mosaic account of the creation float before the Prophet’s eye: creation of the heavens; spreading out the earth, the imparting of נְשָׁמָה (comp. Gen_2:7) and רוּחַ (Gen_7:22) to men.
3. I the Lord——prison house.
Isa_42:6-7. Having reminded his hearers who God is as in Isa_42:5, the Prophet lets the Lord announce Himself as the one who will give the world a redeemer in His Servant. He that can create, etc., can also do this. One is reminded of those passages where Jesus Christ proves His power to forgive sins by pointing to His miracles: Mat_9:2 sqq.; Mar_2:3 sqq.; Luk_5:18 sqq.). That the one called is the Servant of God, is evident from the context. קראתיך recalls Isa_41:2; Isa_41:4; Isa_41:9. But the Lord has called His Servant בצדק. If the Old Testament צדקה “righteousness” has for its antithesis חָמָם or עשֶׁקּ, i.e., violence, unrighteousness, then a righteous man, צַדִּיק, is one who in every respect wills only what is right and proper. He will neither do violence to the poor and weak, nor regard the person of the mighty and violent man; He will neither condemn the penitent and contrite, nor let the impenitent go unpunished. Thus His treatment of the penitent sinner is as just as it is of the impenitent. He could destroy the former if He would; for He has the power. Who would call Him to account? But is then grace, that dispenses pardon on the ground of a subjective or objective performance, not also just? That is, does not God in a higher sense exercise righteousness, when He forgives the contrite who implores grace on the ground of the atoning-sacrifice that even God Himself has made for him? Thus it is not at all partial favor, measuring with unequal measure, when God calls His Servant into the world as redeemer. Rather, in Him grace displays itself as combined in one with righteousness. Unrighteous grace there is not in God any way. Thus Isaiah can say of Cyrus that God has raised him up in righteousness (Isa_45:13). By “I have called thee the appearance of the Servant is signified as something that has already taken place. The verbs that follow signify as future what the Lord purposes to do with His Servant. He will take Him by the hand and (which expresses the object of so doing) protect Him, and make Him for a covenant of the people, and for a light of the Gentiles.
When Hermann Schultz (Alttestamentl. Theol. II. p. 75) says, that there is here not the remotest mention of a future personality, I should like to know how he may reconcile that with Isa_42:9. One sees from the Futures אתנך ,אצרך ,אחזק and still more plainly from Isa_42:9, that the Prophet points away to a remote future that has not even begun to bud. And the “covenant of the people,” too, must be a new one, and not one in existence already. For were it an old, already existing one, how did the Lord come to say that He would make His Servant for this covenant? In fact it must be a very new covenant, vastly superior to the old one, since, according to Isa_42:7, it can “open blind eyes, and bring out the prisoners from prison,” which the old covenant could not do. Neither the total of Israel, nor the ideal Israel, nor the order of prophets can set in operation what is promised in Isa_42:7; or if this were something that they could do, then it does not belong here. we justly expect something great here, a work of salvation, an act of redemption, in fact something greater than is promised Isa_42:2-3, for the strophe Isa_42:5-9 forms the ladder to what follows, which presents to view the highest good. Either Isaiah does not speak of the Messiah at all, (which indeed Knobel maintains with entire consistency), or he speaks of Him already here. The opinion that Isaiah here does not yet understand the Messiah under “the Servant of Jehovah,” that the Servant of Jehovah appears as an individual only later, say from Isa_52:14 on, comes from the failure to observe the character of 40–42 which prepare the foundation for what follows. In Jos_3:14 even the ark of the covenant is called הארון הברית. When even such an inanimate vessel is called the covenant, why may that not be said of the Lord Himself, who, in fact, is the sole living and personal bond that unites divinity and humanity. As Christ calls Himself the way (Joh_14:6), or the resurrection (Joh_11:25), so, too, He may be called the covenant. Thus, e.g., מַם“tributum” (Jos_16:10, etc.), signifies Him that tributum affert, שָׁלוֹם (Psa_120:7) Him that pacem agit. Thus ברית צם is He that mediates the covenant to the people. But this is no other than the Messiah. I do not comprehend how V. Fr. Oehler (D. Knecht Jehova’s, I. p. 50) can say: “Israel in the Messianic time needs no more an Abraham, a Moses as mediator of a covenant of the people with Jehovah, but the people as regenerated, as conscious of its destiny, as perfect servant of Jehovah is itself the covenant.” Israel has, indeed, no need of an Abraham or Moses; but Christ it does need, and without Him, too, it could never be “the perfect servant of Jehovah.”
By צָם is meant Israel, as appears both from the added ברית and from the antithetical גוים (comp. Isa_49:6). Salvation comes from the Jews (Joh_4:22). The sunrise from on high (Luk_1:78) appears in Israel and proceeds thence to the heathen. For the recurrence of the phraseology here see Isa_49:6; Isa_49:8, comp. Isa_51:4. The covenant, that the Servant of Jehovah is to mediate is called Isa_54:10 a covenant of peace, and Isa_55:3; Isa_61:8, an everlasting covenant (comp. Isa_59:21; Isa_61:4; Isa_61:6).
In Isa_42:7, the Prophet specifies the contents of the general notions “covenant of the people,” “light of the Gentiles.” If פקח ע׳ ע׳ (comp. Isa_35:5; Isa_29:18) connects primarily with אור גוים, and appears attracted by this thought, so הוציא ממסגר אסיר relates primarily to עָם, thus to Israel. Why may one not think first of Israel in reference to the deliverance from imprisonment, seeing the entire second part of Isaiah is primarily a book of consolation for Israel in captivity? But to prevent our thinking that the opening of eyes refers only to the heathen, and the leading out of prison only to Israel, the Prophet adds a third clause, that combines both factors, and thus intimates that also those sitting in darkness shall be freed, and those languishing in prison be enlightened. From this appears how unjust to the text a rough, outward construction like Knobel’s is. For did the heathen, then, share Israel’s captivity in Babylon? Certainly not. But there is a blindness and a captivity under which both Israel and the heathen labored (comp. Act_26:17-18). At the same time it must not be denied, that also acts of physical deliverance are to be regarded as degrees of the fulfilment of our prophecy, e.g., from the chains of prison and darkness, like the deliverance from the Babylonish Exile, and those acts of healing that the personal Servant of Jehovah did during His life on earth (comp. Isa_9:1; Mat_4:14-16, with ibid. Isa_42:23). Light and freedom, therefore light and right (for freedom is his right whom the prison holds not or holds no longer) will the Servant of Jehovah bring to the world. Should not one think here of the Urim and Thummim of the High-Priest (Exo_28:30), and consequently construe this offering of light and right as the priestly activity of the Servant of Jehovah? The expression dwellers in darkness occurs only here and Psa_107:10. Comp. Isa_9:1.
4. I am the Lord——of them.—
Isa_42:8-9.The verses 6, 7 form the pith of the strophe; which is prefaced (Isa_42:5) by words that let us infer its significance, and is concluded by just such words (Isa_42:8-9). The words אנֹי יהוה, that directly follow the pith of the strophe, seem to correspond to the words of similar meaning with which (Isa_42:6) it immediately begins. They are therefore in apposition with אני יהוה at the beginning of Isa_42:6, and to be translated “I Jehovah” (not “I am Jehovah”). Verily it must be something great which the Lord twice announces with the words, “I, Jehovah, do it.” It must be something that only Jehovah can do; thus something far beyond the power of a man or of any other creature. Jehovah, however, can do it because He is called יהוה, i, e., according to Exo_3:14, the eternally existent, the absolutely existent (in הוא שׁמי, appears even a reminiscence of זה שׁמי, Exo_3:15), who just thereby is distinguished from all other beings, that either have no real existence at all, as idols, or that have not the source of their existence in themselves. Did the Lord not do what He has promised, Isa_42:6-7, His name would lie. He would not then be what He calls Himself; He were a liar and deceiver, like those that unjustly assume the name “god.” Thus He pledges the honor of His name for the fulfilment of what is promised, Isa_42:6-7. But the Lord must do this not only to be consistent with Himself; He does it also in order that His honor may not unlawfully be taken by another. Did He promise and not fulfil, He would not be distinguished from idols. Indeed, in a certain sense, He would be less than idols. For not to be able to prophesy at all (Isa_41:21) were better than to prophesy and not fulfil. In a quite similar sense Isa_48:11. But, moreover the Lord may not risk the coming to pass of the great things spoken of, Isa_42:6-7, without His having previously foretold them, lest Israel say as in Isa_48:5, “mine idol hath done them,” etc. Thus, as in Isa_41:4; Isa_41:22 sqq., by prophesying them, He vindicates the future things as His plan and His work, and proves His divinity. But as He does not now first begin to prophesy, but had done it already in the remote past, so He can now point, not only to the future fulfilment of what is now prophesied, but also to the actual fulfilment of what was formerly prophesied. Thus present fulfilment is security for that which is to be. Accordingly, by הראשׁנות, Isa_42:9, I cannot, with Delitzsch and others, understand the immediate future, but only that foretold in the past. If the ראשׁנות were “the appearance of Cyrus and the movements of the nations connected therewith,” then instead of בָּאוּ it must read בָּאוֹת (comp. Isa_41:22). How can fulfilments still future, any way, be the pledge of others also future? I understand, therefore, by the former things the totality of prophecies made from the days of the Patriarchs to the catastrophe of Assyria, and in part fulfilled, and by new things (comp. Isa_48:6) all that the Prophet has to say concerning the future salvation that begins with Cyrus. These are the things which the Prophet, with the actual or the ideal present in view, designates as not recognizable even in their buds (comp. Isa_43:19).
Footnotes:
[6]I the Lord.
THE SERVANT OF GOD AS A STRONG GOD
Isa_42:10-17
10 Sing unto the Lord a new song,
And his praise from the end of the earth,
Ye that go down 7 to the sea, and 8 all that is therein;
The isles, and the inhabitants thereof
11 Let the wilderness and the cities thereof lift up their voice,
The villages that Kedar doth inhabit:
Let the inhabitants of the rock sing,
Let them shout from the top of the mountains.
12 Let them give glory unto the Lord,
And declare his praise in the islands.
13 The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man,
He shall stir up 9jealousy like a man of war:
He shall cry, yea, roar;
He shall 10prevail against his enemies.
14 I have long time holden my peace;
I have been still and refrained myself:
Now will I cry like a travailing woman;
I will 11destroy and 12devour at once.
15 I will make waste mountains and hills,
And dry up all their herbs;
And I will make the rivers islands,
And I will dry up the 13pools.
16 And I will bring 14the blind by a way that they knew not;
I will lead them in paths that they have not known:
I will make darkness light before them,
And 15crooked things 16straight.
These things will I do unto them., and not forsake them.
17 They shall be turned back, they shall be greatly ashamed,
That trust in graven images,
That say to molten images,
Ye are our gods.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
See List for the recurrence of the words: Isa_42:10. מלאו –מקצה הארץ. Isa_42:11. צָוַח. Isa_42:13. צָרַח, Hiph.—גָבַר Hithp. Isa_42:14. —חָרַשׁ—חָשָׁה—מעולם שָׁאַף—אפעה—אָפַפ. Isa_42:15. Almost all the words. Ver 16. מישׁור—מעקשׁים.
Isa_42:10. מקצה הארע depends on שִׁירוּ. But that Hebrew usage is to be noted which puts the terminus a quo where we put the terminus in quo. Comp. Isa_17:13; Gen_1:7. Thus our way of expressing it would be “at the end of the earth.” But when even the furthest off praise the Lord, certainly those lying between are not excluded.——The words יורדי הים ומלאו strongly remind one of Psa_96:11; Psa_98:7, where it reads יִרְעַם הַיָם וּמְלֹאוֹ, which is the more remarkable seeing these Psalms belong to those that begin with שׁירו לי׳ שׁיר חדשׁ Lowth conjectures for this reason that we ought instead of יורדי to read here יִרְעַם (יָרֹן ,יָרִיעַ or the like). But ירעם would not suit the following איים וישׁביהם.
Isa_42:12. The expression שִים כְּבוֹד, beside the present, occurs only Jos_7:19; comp. Psa_66:2.
Isa_42:14. הָשָׁה (compּ הָסָה) is more “to be quiet”, while חָרַשׁ agreeably to the fundamental meaning incidere, insculpere, means primarily “to be deaf and dumb” (comp. κωφός from κόπτω , obtusus, the dull, dumb), hence “to be silent.” The imperfects אחרישּׁ and אתאפק signify, (by reason of החשׁיתי that represents the silence generally as an accomplished fact), the single acts of keeping still that constantly followed each other in the past.——אֶפְּעֶה, ἄπ . λεγ. The root פָּעָה occurs only in the serpent-name אֶפְעֶה (Isa_30:6; Isa_59:5; Job_20:16), in the substantive אֶפַע (Isa_41:24 which see) and in the name of the midwife פּוּעָה (Exo_1:15). Both that serpent name and the kindred roots פָּאָה,פוּחַ involve the meaning “to breathe, blow.” In Chald., however, פָּעָה means directly “to cry,” and is especially used of the bleating of sheep. Thence come the substantives פְּעִיָה “vociferatio,” and פָּעַיְתָא mulier clamosa. We will likely come nearest the truth if we take פָּעָה to mean the loud groaning, joined with lamentation, of the travailing woman, which, too, offers an admirable explanation of the name פּוּעָה for a midwife. There is, moreover, an assonance in אפעה and אתאפק, that continues in אשׁם and אשׁאף To derive אשּׁם from שָׁמֵם vastatem esse, because in Eze_36:3 שַׁמּוֹת וְשָׁאֹף are found conjoined, is forbidden both by grammar and the context. It is rather derived from נָשַׁם, an unused root, indeed, but one that occurs in the substantive נְשָׁמַה.
Isa_42:17. With יבשׁו, instead of the inf. absol., we have a noun of the same stem as in Isa_22:17-18; Isa_14:19; Isa_14:22; Isa_29:14; Isa_33:4; Isa_46:10.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. Chapter 42 is evidently constructed as an ascending and descending climax. The present strophe forms the point of it; the two preceding ones lead up to it; the two that follow lead down from it. Why should Isa_42:10-17 not refer to the Servant of Jehovah, when both before and after (comp. Isa_42:19) He is the chief subject? True, He is not mentioned in the third strophe. But is not He that leads the blind the same as He that opens the eyes of the blind and liberates the prisoners (Isa_42:7)? And is there not a manifest contrast presented between Him that does not cry (Isa_42:2) and Him that cries and roars (Isa_42:13)? And does not the negative, Isa_42:4, form the transition to the positive statement that the Servant of Jehovah will be also the opposite of one that does not cry, and that does not let His voice be heard in the streets? It must indeed be an exceeding glorious fact, for whose praise the whole earth (Isa_42:12) is summoned. Yea, that is the wonder, that the one described in Isa_42:2-3 as quiet and meek, is at the same time Jehovah Himself, who goes forth as an angry warrior against His enemies (Isa_42:13). He has long kept silence: did He not even suffer the whole heathen world to go its own way (Act_14:16). At last, however, He rouses Himself. Like a travailing woman, amid mighty sorrows He brings about a new order of things (Isa_42:14). He makes heathendom wither; but the heathen that have preserved a susceptibility for the truth He leads, like blind men restored to sight, in new ways of salvation hitherto unknown (Isa_42:15-16). He will certainly accomplish this to the confusion of those that continue to trust in false gods (Isa_42:17).
2. Sing unto–—islands.
Isa_42:10-12. A new song is becoming for the new matter; like new skin bottles for new wine (Mat_9:17). The expression a new song occurs, Psa_33:3; Psa_40:4; Psa_96:1; Psa_98:1; Psa_144:9; Psa_149:1 : “sing unto the Lord a new song” occurs, Psa_33:3; Psa_96:1; Psa_98:1. It is to be noted, too, that the more ancient of these Pss. (Psalms 33, 96, 98) have all of them, I may say, an ecumenical character, in that all treat of the mutual relation of Jehovah and of all creation, i.e., of the power of Jehovah over all that is created, and of the duty of the latter to worship and praise the Lord.Psa_40:4; Psa_144:9 express only the author’s purpose to sing a new song to the Lord. But Psalms 149, certainly a late song and an imitation, has a very particularistic character. One may say, therefore, that here, like in chapter 12, the author strikes up the psalm tone. He summons those to praise who are on the sea, and those that are in the sea, as immediately after he directs the same summons to the isles and their inhabitants, to the wilderness and its towns. The יורדי הים are not those that go down to the sea, but those that sail down the sea, as appears plainly from Psa_107:23, the only other place where the expression occurs. For the sea, optically regarded, may be conceived as an elevation (comp. Luk_5:4); thus, as really seen, the sea presents itself as flowing. Flowing water, however, cannot mount up. It seems to me far fetched, when Delitzsch supposes that Ezion-Geber is the Prophet’s point of view in calling out. I rather think that by those sailing down the sea and isles, which he conceives as between his point of view and “the ends of the earth,” the Prophet would signify the west. Behind him lie the desert and the villages of the Arabs (בְּנֵי קֶדֶם) on the east; on the left he has the rock city (סלע), and on the right mountains, i.e., to the south the mountain of Edom, to the north Lebanon. Regarding יִשְׂאוּ see on Isa_42:2. It is well known that in the desert, too, there were and are cities (fortified places). Comp., e.g..Jos_15:61-62; Jos_20:8. The תצרים(comp. Lev_25:31) are opposed on the one hand to cities, on the other to the mere tent encampments; like Hadaríje (stationary Arabs) are distinguished from Wabarîje (tent Arabs) (Delitzsch). On Kedar comp. at Isa_21:16. There were hardly dwellers in the rooks numerous enough, in an appellative sense, to make it worth while naming them here, where only grand genera are mentioned. But the Prophet might very well, in order to signify the South, think of the great rock city of Edom (Petra, comp. on Isa_16:1). But I do not think he intends by “mountains” only the mountains near Petra; for then the North would be entirely omitted. Hence I think we must understand the great mountains to the north of Palestine. As object of the crying out, Isa_42:12 again expressly mentions the honor and praise of Jehovah. The islands are named as representing the remotest regions.
3. The Lord shall go——forsake them.
Isa_42:13-16. As in the preceding strophe we distinguished a kernel, and a preface and conclusion, forming, so to speak, a shell for it, so we must do here. From the extent of the preface and its elevated tone, we observe that the kernel must be something highly significant. Isa_42:13-16 cease to speak of the Servant of Jehovah. But He reappears, Isa_42:22. Instead appears Jehovah Himself, Isa_42:13. And things are affirmed of Jehovah that partly agree, partly form a strange contrast with what before and after is imputed to the Servant of Jehovah. When it is said, Isa_42:7, that the Servant of Jehovah will open the eyes of the blind and free the prisoner, is that essentially different from what we read, Isa_42:16, of leading the blind, etc.? Do these blind remain blind? What, then, has the Lord to do with blind persons! Or are the ways that He leads them not ways of freedom and salvation? But if, Isa_42:2-3, the Servant of Jehovah appears as one that does not cry, but is meek and gentle, how comes it that, Isa_42:13-14, Jehovah is portrayed as an impetuous warrior, that cries and groans? And this appears in the climax-strophe of our chapter to which the preceding strophes lead up, and from which those following lead down I cannot believe that the third of the five strophes of our chapter can treat of a foreign subject. It must be the same, though the form makes it difficult to detect the unity. And in fact it was difficult for the Prophet himself, a very riddle, to comprehend the unity of Jehovah and His Servant, just as it must assuredly have been also an inexplicable mystery that the Son of David should at the same time be Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace (Isa_9:5). I do not say, therefore, that Isaiah here produces a doctrine in an unhistorical way, that must remain hidden from himself. But I do say that the Spirit of God intimates here a relation of Jehovah to His Servant, which, of course, only presents itself to us in entire clearness in the New Testament history; but which, now we stand in this clear light, we can and ought thereby to detect in its Old Testament envelope. Oehler begins the article Messias in Herz.,R-Enc., with these words: “According to the view of Old Testament prophecy, the completion of salvation is brought about by the personal coming of Jehovah in His glory. He Himself appears amid the rejoicing of the whole creation for the restoration of His kingdom on earth. Psa_96:10 sqq.; psa 98:7 sqq.,” etc. It is remarkable that Oehler, in support of his thought, cites precisely those Pss. which, as above shown, have such resemblance to our passage. It is admitted by expositors that these Pss. have generally a near relation to Isaiah 40-66 (comp. Moll on Psalms 96.sqq.). May we not have in Psalms 96, 98 the oldest commentary on our passage, a testimony that already in the time after the Exile our passage was referred to the Messiah, therefore that the unity of the Messiah and Jehovah was recognized?
The Prophet, then, here describes the Servant of Jehovah from another side. He, the quiet, and meek One, is at the same time El-Gibbor, and hence it may be said of Him: Jehovah goes forth like a mighty man.—But as being El-Gibbor he is no more called Servant of Jehovah; for the El Gibbor has laid aside the form of a servant. Further on this see below under Doctrinal and Ethical, p. 461, § 9. An אישׁ מלחמות is a man that carries on many wars (comp. 2Sa_8:10; 1Ch_18:10). The expression He shall stir up jealousy (sc. in Himself) recalls passages like Psa_78:38; Dan_11:25; Hag_1:14; Isa_59:17. The intensive אף, comp. Isa_43:7. The enemies against whom Jehovah goes forth are manifestly the same that as conquered, yet at the same time blessed, are to offer praise and thanks to the Lord (Isa_42:10-12). The entire heathen world is meant. This is confirmed by Isa_42:17 that speaks of the confusion of those that persist in serving idols in spite of their knowledge of God.
It is quite preposterous, with Hahn, to assume a dividing line between Isa_42:13-14. Isa_42:14 sqq. first gives us light concerning what the Lord intends according to Isa_42:13. They contain the words that announce the object of the expedition of Him that goes forth. From everlasting the Lord had kept silence—Did the text treat only of the deliverance of Israel from exile, מעולם might then be referred to the beginning of it, and then the Exile would be represented as an immeasurable period during which the Lord had kept silence (comp. on Isa_62:11). But the reference is not merely to Israel’s deliverance, but to a deliverance in which all humanity, the heathen included, and even all nature, shall participate, as appears most plainly from the rejoicing of the same Isa_42:10-12. For the same reason the “for ever” cannot begin with the elevation of Israel into a nation, i.e., the departure out of Egypt. If the Lord has in mind the heathen world, then it must be in reference to them that He has so long kept silence. How long was this? Without doubt since in Abraham He separated a tiny little part of mankind to be a special sphere for a preparatory revelation, while the great mass that was left He “suffered to walk in their own ways,” Act_14:16. He had not, indeed, omitted now and then to remind the heathen of Himself, and the double exile of His servant, the people Israel, especially served this purpose. But, in general, the heathen world is that part of mankind that was actually to experience what must become of human nature when God surrenders it, uninfluenced by revelation, wholly to the free unfolding of its natural powers. In reference to these, the Lord may well say: I kept silence from the remotest time. In contrast with this silence of milleniums will the Lord,i.e., the Servant of Jehovah identical with Jehovah, enter finally upon His conquest of the heathen world. By this He effects something quite new. He calls into being a new covenant with mankind. Hence He represents this new, hitherto unheard of deed as a birth that is accomplished only by means of great effort and acute pains. And may not, in fact, the spread of Christianity among the heathen, with all the pains, dangers and conflicts that attended it, be compared with the painful breaking forth of a fruit from the womb of a mother? This is one of the passages where to Jehovah is imputed action proper to women, and particularly a mother (comp. Isa_46:3 sq.; Isa_49:15).
If the heathen are intended here, then by I will make waste mountains and hills, and dry up the rivers and pools, Isa_42:15, are meant heathen heights and heathen waters. Mountain heights are often enough representatives of the civilization of which they are the locality, and great waters representative of the populations that dwell about them. Therefore we must construe Isa_42:15-16 figuratively, just as we did Isa_42:13-14, and understand by mountains and rivers the heathen world. If by mountains and waters be understood the land of exile in a physical sense, would not that conflict with what was said Isa_41:18 sq.? Would not the people of God suffer by this drying up? But what is meant by the Servant of Jehovah drying up the heathen world? I think that by that the Lord means a spiritual drying up. At the time the Servant of Jehovah goes forth into the heathen world, the latter will have survived itself. It will have become inwardly powerless and sapless. It will exist like a withered tree, like the bed of a stream having water only in its deepest places, whereas the shallower parts appear like islands—like a dried up lake. Only call to mind utterances like Pilate’s “what is truth” (Joh_18:38) for proof of this cheerless, dried up state of heathendom. I will make the rivers islands reminds of Psa_107:33.
Isa_42:16. I cannot understand Israel to be intended by the blind here; for they are not such in either a physical or a spiritual sense. Nor would blindness alone be mentioned to describe a general condition of misery (comp. Isa_41:17; Isa_35:5; Isa_29:18). I think, therefore, that those heathen are meant, whom the Lord leads out of the shrivelled up heathendom into the light which His Servant brings into the world.These are opposed to the ones (Isa_42:17) that persist in idolatry. It is, therefore, spiritual and not physical blindness that is meant (comp. Isa_43:8). The same Servant of Jehovah whose office and calling are to open eyes in general, will do this for the heathen too, leading them ways they knew not: for the knowledge of the true God and of His salvation had been shut up from them. But those that are so led cease to be blind. Hence the Prophet continues: I will make darkness light before them,i.e., the previous darkness shall give place to light, consequently they will have gained powers of sight. To this corresponds what follows: and (I will make) crooked things (ways) (comp. Isa_59:8) to a flat field. When this is done, they will no more go astray in crooked roads, but will walk straight and right ways. What I may call the imposing introduction Isa_42:10-12 having prepared us for something great, the last clause of Isa_42:16 in turn testifies to the greatness and marvel of the things that have been held in prospect from Isa_42:13 on. Lest it be thought more has been promised than can be performed, the Lord gives an express assurance of the contrary. Notice the definite article. Not things in general: no, it is the things. It is His whole, great work in nuce, His entire plan of salvation that is drawn in its fundamental features from Isa_42:13 on. Both the Perfects and the positive affirmation followed by the negative (ולא עזבתים) are meant to confirm the certainty of the eventual fulfilment.
Isa_42:17. But this salvation will not be the portion of all blind heathen. Therefore it reads, too, Isa_42:16, עִוְרִים, not חָעִוְרִים. Many will remain blind. Of these it is said: They shall be turned back, etc.
Footnotes:
[7]on.
[8]Heb. the fulness thereof.
[9]his zeal.
[10]Or, behave himself mightily.
[11]blind ones.
[12]Heb. swallow, or, sup up.
[13]lakes.
[14]blind ones.
[15]crooked ways to a flat field.
[16]Heb. into straightness.
4. THE SERVANT OF THE LORD HIMSELF DEAF AND BLIND
Isa_42:18-21
18 Hear, ye deaf;
And look, ye blind, that ye may see.
19 Who is blind, but my servant?
Or deaf, as my messenger that I 17sent?
Who is blind as he that Isaiah 18 perfect,
And blind as the Lord’s servant?
20 19Seeing many things, but thou observest not;
20Opening the ears, but he heareth not.
21 The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness’ sake;
He will magnify the law, and make21 it honorable.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. Is then the Servant of Jehovah ever reproached? And if Israel is deaf and blind toward the word of the Lord, can it as deaf and blind be called the servant of the Lord? Indeed, according to his very being, the latter cannot shut himself up against the spirit and word of Jehovah. It was said, Isa_42:3, that the Servant of Jehovah will reveal the right and law of God by a discipline of lowliness and gentleness; according to Isa_42:7 He will open blind eyes and deliver from the fetters of sin and error. And shall, Isa_42:18 sqq., by the same expression “Servant of Jehovah,” be designated also Israel, that is even deaf and blind with respect to God’s revelation? Moreover how utterly disconnected an earnest complaint against the nation must appear here, after the glorious promise of Isa_42:13-17! Delitzsch supposes that the blind to whom, Isa_42:16, freedom is promised, provoked not only the compassion but also the displeasure of the Lord, because it was their own fault that they did not see. To them is the call to rid themselves of the ban that rests on them. But the blind of Isa_42:16 do not stay blind. According to 16b the darkness becomes light before them. How does that accord with Isa_42:18-20?
In my opinion the two strophes Isa_42:18-25 present the reverse side or descending climax of the chapter, of which the other, or light side of the Servant of Jehovah, was given in Isa_42:1-17. It is a new contrast that we observe here. He that opens the eyes of others is Himself blind. The crying mighty-man, Isa_42:13, corresponds to the quiet Servant of Jehovah, Isa_42:2; so here the Servant that is Himself blind, Isa_42:19, corresponds to Him that opens eyes for others, Isa_42:7. The strophes correspond crosswise; the first to the third, the second to the fourth, and each time it is contrasts that correspond. How entirely one misconceives the unity of this chapter who fails to recognize in the Servant of Jehovah Isa_42:18 the same that was already observed in Isa_42:1-9! The deaf and blind of the People of Israel, or rather the People Israel as consisting of deaf and blind, i.e., as one generally sick and wretched, is summoned (Isa_42:18) to give heed for its salvation to a double wonder that happens with the Servant of Jehovah. He is Himself so blind and deaf that no one equals Him in blindness and deafness (Isa_42:19)! He that had healed many blind eyes, Himself observes nothing (Isa_42:20)! This is the first wonder. But in this one, apparently Himself so sick, the Lord has pleasure for His righteousness’ sake. By virtue of the same, He will give the world a new, glorious law (Isa_42:21); and this is the second wonder.
2. Hear ye deaf—honorable.
Isa_42:18-21. The deaf and blind here are, any way, such as hear and see if they will. Otherwise how can they be summoned to see and hear. And when (Isa_42:20) they are summoned to notice that He Himself does not hear, and yet opens ears, etc., and yet is an object of divine approval, and gives the world a new and more glorious law, then only those can be meant who should be witnesses of these marvellous contrasts in the life of the personal Servant of Jehovah. To these is intimated that in these contrasts is contained the mystery of their deliverance. But they are deaf and blind who will not see (Isa_6:9-10; Mat_13:13 sqq.). It is the hardened nation Israel which therefore fares as we read afterwards Isa_42:22.—לִרְאוֹת, Isa_42:18, is to be referred to both the foregoing verbs (zeugmatically) in the general sense of observing. As I find chapter 42. draws the fundamental traits of the personal Servant of Jehovah in general, so here, as appears to me, those traits are especially sketched that are further developed in chapter 53. We remarked at Isa_42:16 a difference between blindness mentioned alone, and mentioned with other deficiencies. In the latter case the deficiencies named may be regarded as representing distress and wretchedness generally. Such is the case here. It is not meant that the Servant of Jehovah will be only blind and deaf, just as at Isa_42:7 it was not meant that He would only heal the blind and free the prisoner. It is natural that those deficiencies should be named as attaching to the Servant of Jehovah, from which He is said to free others. Accordingly, to correspond with Isa_42:7, He should be described as blind and languishing in prison. But the latter trait the Prophet does not observe in the image of the future presented to him. Indeed, he describes the Servant of Jehovah, as blind and deaf: thus as a man, as one on whom all heavy sorrows come down like a tempest, as a picture of grief, and beside as one who runs blindly into his destruction (comp. Mat_16:22) and in the greatest danger remains dumb as a deaf man. He sees these defects attaching to the Servant of Jehovah in a degree unequalled by any other man. In a word: the Prophet beholds the Servant of Jehovah, not only as the one despised and forsaken of men, as the man of sorrows and acquainted with sickness (Isa_53:3), but at the same time as the physician that can heal others and not Himself (Luk_4:23; Luk_23:39; Mat_27:40; Mat_27:42). And the reason for this strange appearance? Isaiah indicates it Isa_53:4 sqq. Seb. Schmidt signifies it with the words: “coecus est atque surdus imputative.” Only here is the Servant of Jehovah called messenger, “angel of the Lord.” It calls to mind on the one hand “I will send my angel” Gen_24:7; Gen_24:40, and on the other Mal_3:1. מְשֻׁלָּם, which occurs only here as participle (as nom. propr. it occurs often: 2Ki_22:3; 2Ki_21:19, etc.), must be construed according to the analogy of הָשְׁלַם (Job_5:23), as in pacem, amicitiam receptus.
The words of Isa_42:20 are difficult. Those that understand the People of Israel to be meant by the Servant of Jehovah must take פָּקֹחַ אָזְנַיִם in the sense of “to have open ears.” Thus Umbreit translates: “with open ears He hears not;” Delitzsch: “opening the ears still He does not hear;” V. Fr. Œhler: “open ears has He, and He hears not.” But, in the first place, פָּקַח, which only here is used of ears, being everywhere else used of eyes, never means “to have eyes.” But it must mean “to have” if taken in antithesis to ולא ישׁמע: for he that hears not, though he has ears, does not use his ears. But one who does not use the ears he has can never be called a פָֹּקֵחַ אזנים. פָּקַח elsewhere always means to open the eyes of others or one’s own eyes for the purpose of actual and intensive use. Thus Gen_3:5 : “And your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall know good and evil;” comp. Gen_3:7; 2Ki_6:17; 2Ki_6:20“Lord open His eyes that he may see.” Comp. 2Ki_4:35; 2Ki_19:16 (Isa_37:17); Isa_35:5; Jer_32:19; Zec_12:4; Dan_9:18; Psa_146:8; “Lord open (make see) the blind;” Pro_20:13; Job_14:3; Job_27:19. Finally, the adjective פִּקֵּחַ is one that opens his eyes well, a seeing person: Exo_4:11; Exo_23:8. From this it appears that פָּקֹחַ אזנים and ולא ישׁמע would involve a contradiction if by “ears” be understood his own ears who opens them. For to open his own ears and yet not hear is impossible. In the second place, it may not at all be accidental that פָּקַחonly in our passage is used of opening ears. Already in Isa_42:7 we had it in reference to opening eyes; and it is affirmed of the Servant of Jehovah. May not the Prophet, by using פָּקֹחַ and not פָּתֹחַ in Isa_42:20, have intended, perhaps, to give a hint that the subject of פקח אזנים is identical with that of פקח עיעים? Moreover the feminine רַבּוֹת Isa_42:20 points back to עִוְרוֹת Isa_42:7, and strengthens the conjecture that the Prophet would warn against referring Isa_42:20 to any other person than the subject of Isa_42:7. If we have correctly understood the second clause of Isa_42:20, we have gained the foundation for the understanding of the first. K’thibh is to be read רָאִיתָ, the K’ri רָאוֹת. The latter is inf. absol. Kal (like שָׁתוֹת22:13; עָרוֹתHab_3:13). Both of these forms only make sense when one takes פקח א׳=“to have ears.” For then the form ראית must also some way signify “to have eyes” or “to see,” and both can be said of the servant of Jehovah only in the national sense. But if פקח א׳ means “to open ears,” if it stands parallel with Isa_42:7, and if the personal Servant of Jehovah is the subject of both declarations, then also ראית cannot describe the seeing as the action of the Servant of Jehovah. It must refer to the seeing of others which the Servant of Jehovah brings about. But then one must doubt the correctness of both the text and the margin. Either ראות is to be pointed רֹאוֹת (comp. Isa_30:20; Jer_20:4; Jer_42:2, etc.), or a ה has been dropped from before it. The latter could easily happen because of the foregoing verse closing with ה. The reading then would be הַרְאוֹת (infin. Hiph. “to make see,” Deu_3:24; Deu_1:33; Exo_9:16, etc.). [The Author’s labored exposition seems to originate and find its sole justification in the contradiction developed above: “to open one’s ears and not to hear is impossible;” and then, if this be the sense, that one must understand the Servant of Jehovah in a national and not a personal sense, and thus surrender the identity of subject in the chapter. But the logical contradiction cannot be greater than that presented in Isa_6:9, and in (the exaggeration even of) the same language as quoted by our Lord in Mat_13:13. While adhering to the Author’s general view of the whole chapter, and of this “strophe” in particular, we may adhere also to the rendering of Isa_42:20 in the Eng. Version, with which Umbreit and Delitzsch (see above) agree. Why may not the contrasts of this chapter, that the Author points out (see e.g., under Isa_42:15-16), be intensified into paradoxes and contradictions? If the Spirit of God in the Prophet has uttered the riddle of the identity of the Servant of Jehovah, and Jehovah Himself, the solution of which can only be seen in the clear light of the New Testament (see under Isa_42:12), why not also the riddle of Isa_42:20? Why (like the New Testament realizations to which the Author refers under Isa_42:19; Isa_42:22) is not the verification of the paradoxes of Isa_42:20 to be found in, say, Act_1:7, and Mar_13:32. “Of that day and that hour knoweth no man—neither the Son, but the Father,” and in the mystery of Christ going intelligently to meet death (Mar_8:31) and yet on the eye of its accomplishment praying to escape it like one that knows not (Luk_22:42; Heb_5:7)?—Tr.].
Like one blind the Servant of Jehovah runs to His destruction, who yet causes so many others to see. Although warned (Mat_16:22), still He gives no heed to what may benefit or hurt His own person. שָׁמַר, has here, as often, the meaning “observavit, attendit” (comp. Hos_4:10; 1Sa_26:15; 2Sa_18:12, etc., according to the fundamental meaning of the word, “rectis et intentis occulis intuitus est,” “to gaze, stare at,” comp. שָׂמַר ,סָמַר, riguit, horruit.שָׁמִיר “thorn,” see Gesen.Thes. p. 1442). The change of person is not unfrequent in Isa_1:29; Isa_14:30; Isa_33:2; Isa_33:6; Isa_41:1.
Isa_42:22. Thus the Servant of Jehovah seems to pay the penalty of His folly by a fate that makes Him appear as one despised of men and esteemed as of no value. But different is His relation to Jehovah, who has pleasure in Him for His righteousness’ sake. The pronominal object in the third person is omitted, as often happens. The prophetic discourse is brief and obscure. But it finds its echo, and at the same time its significance is cleared up in those passages of the New Testament, wherein the Father expressly points to the Son as the object of His approval (comp. Isa_42:1 and Mat_3:17; Mat_17:5; Mar_1:11; Luk_3:23; 2Pe_1:17). And why should not Jehovah take pleasure in Him whom no one could charge with sin, yet who, notwithstanding, surrendered His holy soul to death, in order to fulfil the Father’s decree of salvation ? When it is further said: He will magnify the law and make it honourable, it is self-evident that not that Torah is meant whose end the Servant of Jehovah will be, but that which shall proceed from Him (Isa_42:4; Isa_51:4; Isa_2:3). We will therefore take the Servant of Jehovah as the subject of “magnify” and “make honorable,” though the sense were not essentially different if Jehovah were regarded as subject. Great and glorious will the new, Zionitic Torah be; as much greater and more glorious than the old Sinaitic, as its Mediator, means and object will be infinitely greater (Galatians 3).
For the recurrence of words used in this strophe see List.
Footnotes:
[17]send.
[18]endowed with salvation (Heilbegabte).
[19]Many eyes see.
[20]Ears he opens.
[21]Or, him.
5. THE SERVANT OF JEHOVAH A STONE OF STUMBLING TO UNBELIEVING ISRAEL
Isa_42:22-25
22 But this is a people robbed and spoiled;
22They 23are all of them snared in holes,
And they are hid in prison houses:
They are for a prey, and none delivereth;
For a 24spoil, and none saith, Restore.
23 Who among you will give ear to this?
Who will hearken and hear 25for 26the time to come?
24 Who gave Jacob for a spoil,
And Israel to the robbers?
Did not the Lord, he against whom we have sinned?
27For they would not walk in his ways,
Neither 28were they obedient unto his law.
25 Therefore he hath poured upon him
The fury of his anger, and the strength of battle:
And it hath set him on fire round about, yet he knew not;
And it burned him, yet he laid it not to heart.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
See List for the recurrence of the language generally; but particularly:
Isa_42:22. הָיָה לָבַז—חָבָא—שָׁסוּי—בּזוּז (Num_14:3; Num_14:31, frequent in Jer_2:14; Jer_15:13; Jer_17:3, etc.).—מְשִׁסָּה (comp. 2Ki_21:14).—הָשַׁב, Pausal form occurs only here. Isa_42:24. מְשׁוּסָּה (K’ri מְשִׁסָּה)—זוּ.
Isa_42:25.לָהַט—עְזוּז Piel—בָּעַד.
Isa_42:22. That הוּא refers to the people appears from עם immediately following; it is singular by attraction.—That בחורים cannot mean young persons appears from the context. חוּרִים corresponding to בתי כלאים. must rather mean the “holes” (comp. חֻר Isa_11:8.—הָפֵחַ is any way inf. absol. that, in the animated discourse, stands for the verb fin. That כֻּלָּם must be acc. obj. (Delitzsch) is not correct. For the inf. absol. not unfrequently has a subject word along with it (comp. Pro_12:7; Job_11:5; Job_40:2; Eze_1:14). As there occurs no verb הֵפַח, we must take הָפִיחַ as Hiph. of פּוּחַ, meaning “to blow, to pant” (comp. Hab_2:3; Pro_29:8, etc.). [Fuerst, Lex. פָחַח Hiph. הֵפֵֽחַ inf. constr. הָפֵֽחַ “to fetter.”—Tr.].—בית כלא see Isa_42:7.
Isa_42:24. זוּ for אֲשׁר (see Ewald, § 331, b). The Masorets hesitate to construe the word as relative; probably because of its seldom occurrence in Isaiah. Hence they put the Athnach under יהוה, by which זוּ is separated from what precedes, and receives a demonstrative force.—לֹא אָבוּ הָלוֹךְ is indeed not the usual construction (yet comp. Isa_30:9); still not too unusual (comp. Isa_7:15; Jer_9:4; Mic_6:8, etc.). The object is emphatic prominence for the notion “going” which as infin. absol. appears more nearly a substantive.
Isa_42:25. The singular suffix in עָלָיו relates to a notion singular, ideally present, i.e., the total of Israel, not previously named.—As the fundamental meaning of חֵמָה is “aestus, heat, glow,” it may easily be taken for prepositive apposition. The assonance with מלחמה seems to have had some influence. To take it as apposition with אַפּוֹ receives confirmation from the image being prolonged in the second clause of the verse, where not only the feminine forms תלהטהו and תבער refer back to חֵמָה, but also this glow is conceived of as an actual kindling fire (not as a mere image of intense anger). Accordingly I cannot take מלחמה as the subject of ועזוז מלחמה .תלהטהו I regard as an intervening thought that, points the, meaning of the figurative expression חמה אפו But חֵמָה still remains the chief notion, and as such the subject of the two positive clauses of the second half of the verse.—בָּעַר, “igne consumsit, combussit,” is, as a rule, construed with בְּ (Job_1:16; Num_11:3; Psa_106:18 where, too, both the verbs בער and להט are used, etc.; comp. Isa_30:33; Isa_43:2).
Footnotes:
[22]Or, In snaring all the young men of them.
[23]They all pant in the holes.
[24]Heb. a treading.
[25]Heb. for the after time.
[26]far away.
[27]And.
[28]did hearken.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. In this fifth and last strophe the Prophet descends from the heights of most glorious hope of salvation attained in the third, down to the depths of a most mournful perspective of judgment, which, however, he applies as an awakening cry to his unbelieving countrymen. The future reveals none of the effects that ought to have followed a believing regard for what was announced Isa_42:18 sqq. On the contrary, the Prophet sees a robbed people languishing in hard captivity (Isa_42:22). From this he knows that Israel has not accepted the Servant of Jehovah. He uses the mournful prospect to attempt to move Israel, by a wholesome alarm, to ward off that mournful future by a sincere repentance. With “among you” (Isa_42:23) he addresses the Israel of the ideal present, i.e., of the Exile. Who among you, he asks, gave heed to this impending visitation of the remote future? But there is little prospect of a cheering reply. For Jehovah has already given over Judah and Israel as a prey to their enemies for their sins (Isa_42:24). Yet even this they have not taken to heart (Isa_42:25).
1. But this—Restore.
Isa_42:22. But this people is the antithesis of ver; 18. There the deaf and blind were summoned to give heed to what was to be said of the Servant of Jehovah. But—and now we learn why Israel was called deaf and blind (Isa_42:18), Israel heeds not, and so the Prophet sees a robbed, etc., people. Thus Isa_42:22 shows the condition that will ensue as punishment for Israel’s not knowing the Servant of Jehovah and the day of its visitation (Luk_19:41-44).
3. Who among you—not to heart.
Isa_42:23-25. But the Prophet knows that the impending judgment may be averted by timely repentance. It is true there is little hope of such repentance; but he attempts it. He asks: who among you—time to come? With בָּכֶם the Prophet, in contrast with those standing far off, to which, e.g., Isa_5:18 relates, must have in mind Israel of the Exile.. He puts it to these that they should hear, heed and hearken far off. What they ought to hear is primarily his word. But they ought to heed it, by lending an ear to the remote times past (לאחור see on Isa_41:23) that as it were, speak to them by the mouth of the Prophet. Because the old time is conceived of as lying before the Prophet (comp. יְמֵי קֶדֶם23:7; Isa_37:26; Isa_51:9, etc.), so the future is what lies backward. Unhappily, there is little prospect of such heeding the future, because Israel does not even heed the chastisement of the immediate present. Isa_42:24-25, therefore, give the reply to the question Isa_42:23, which itself begins with a question: who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel,etc. The name Jacob here evidently signifies the tribe of Judah (comp. Isa_9:7 and List). This appears from the two members of the answer. For the first member: he against whom we have sinned, plainly relates to that part of all Israel to which the Prophet himself belongs—hence the first person—while the second member: and they would not walk in his ways, by the third person, signifies the part to which the Prophet did not belong. In Isa_42:24-25 is proof that the Prophet has in mind Israel of the Exile as his ideal audience. For, first, chapters 40–66 are in general addressed to Israel dwelling in Exile, and second, it is seen from Isa_42:24 a and 25 that Judah and Israel are equally represented as visited by God’s destructive judgments. Isa_42:25. Therefore he hath poured upon him,etc., describes the consequences of disobedience. (See Text. and Gram.) Elsewhere, too, occurs the image of pouring out wrath as a fiery heat (Eze_14:19; Eze_20:33-34; Eze_22:22; Lam_2:4, etc.). Israel is represented as a dwelling or city, since it is said it shall be set on fire. But it has not hitherto learned (יָדַע Perf.) the meaning of these divine judgments, and even now does not lay them to heart (יָשִׂים Imperf.). Hence we were obliged to say, that the Prophet could only expect an unfavorable reply to his question, Isa_42:23.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. There is neither in heaven nor on earth any thing as rich in wondrous contrasts as the manifestation of the Son of God in the flesh. For there all the divine attributes are united to their corresponding antipodes of creature lowliness in the form of the Servant of Jehovah. The antitheses of power and weakness, wisdom and folly, glory and lowliness, love and anger, surround Him as a radiant crown. This Servant of Jehovah, in whom unite all contrasts, meets us in this chapter. The chosen of the Lord, in whom He is well pleased, on whom the Spirit of the Lord rests so that He may reveal to the heathen the divine law, is still at the same time a Servant, and that, too, a Servant in the completest and most proper sense of the word. He does not rule, He does not suffer Himself to he ministered unto, but He ministers, and with the utmost devotion He serves all. Mild and kind, meek and lowly He appears, though He has the might and power to do the loftiest deeds. He appears weak and yet almighty, He appears poor and yet rich above all. He has not where to lay His head, yet all eyes wait upon Him. He is full of love, yet woe unto those on whom His anger falls (Isa_42:13). He is wise above all, and yet, from the standpoint of worldly wisdom, how foolish He appears where care for His own human person is concerned.
2. On Isa_42:2, “Clamavit non clamore contentionis, sed caritatis et devotionis. Clamavit dictis et factis, voce et vita, clamavit praedicando, clamavit orando, clamavit Lazarum resuscitando, tandem clamavit moriendo et adhuc quotidie in coelis existens clamat ad nos.” Augustin.
3. On Isa_42:2-3. As the Servant of God, so ought the servants of God to do. It is a chief part of pastoral wisdom not to make a fleshly noise, not to break the bruised reed, and quench the glimmering wick by merciless judging, but rather to heal what has been wounded, and kindle up the faint spark. He that does so, will cooperate in producing the blessing that the Servant of the Lord (Isa_42:6-7) was to bring into the world. “Christianus in conscientia debet esse medicus, foris autem in externis moribus asinus, qui ferat onera fratrum.” “Necesse est in ecclesia sancta esse infirmos et tales, quorum factis offendamur, sicut in corpore humano non ossa tantum, sed etiam mollis et infirma caro est. Quare ecclesia Christi constat ex portantibus et portatis. Et vita nostra est compositum quoddam ex fortitudine et infirmitate.” Luther.
4. On Isa_42:4. Gentleness and meekness are not weakness; they are not inconsistent with energy and firmness, indeed with the greatest earnestness and righteous anger. Just for this reason the Servant of the Lord is fitted to be the Saviour of the world. He can be a comfort to the weak, a terror to the wicked, and all things to all. And such is the character of the new covenant established by Him. Comp. Luk_1:52-53; Luk_2:34.—Therefore the islands hope in His law. The Christian church with its missions responds not only to the command of its Lord, but also to a longing of the heathen world, even though it be something more or less unconscious.
5. On Isa_42:6. “Without Christ God can make no covenant with us. Therefore when God made a covenant with our first parents, the seed of the woman was the security of it. When God made a covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob the same seed was the ground of it. In fine: Christ is the chief reason and corner-stone both of the Old and of the New Testament covenant. It is important that, when we find ourselves covenant breakers with God, we take refuge again in this covenant.” Cramer.
6. On Isa_42:7. “As long as we are out of Christ we are blind and darkness (Eph_5:8; Luk_1:79; Mat_6:23). For to be carnally minded is enmity against God (Rom_8:7). And the natural man understands not the things of the Spirit of God (1Co_2:14). And we cannot, as of ourselves, form one good thought of ourselves (2Co_3:5).” Cramer.
7. On Isa_42:8. On the words, “I Jehovah, that is My name,” Rabbi Salomon remarks as follows: “Illud nomen expositum est in significatione dominii, estque virtus ejus apud me ad ostendendum, me esse dominum.” (לְהַרְאוֹת שֶׁאָדוֹן אָנִי הוּא מְפֹרָשׁ בִּלְשׁוֹן אַדְנוּת וְכחוֹ עָלַי.) Thus he finds in these words a reference to the שֵׁם חַמְפֹרָשׁ and gives its meaning by אֲדֹנָי, which is always read by the Jews. On the various other meanings given of the Shem-ham’phorash see Buxtorf, Lex chald., p. 2432 sqq., and Oehler in Herz., R.-Enc., vi., p. 455. “יהוה is the essential name of the eternal and self-existent God, hence can be given to no one that is not God” (Cramer). Hence many understand the expression Shem-ham, phorash in the sense that יהוה is the nomen Dei separatum, i.e., the incommunicable name of God, that gives instruction only concerning the being of God, and. hence cannot be ascribed to others (see Oehler, l. c.). But since the Messiah is Himself God, and there is no God but Jehovah; He, too, may be named with the name Jehovah, Deu_33:29; Psa_118:27; Jer_23:6. See Starke in loc.
8. On Isa_42:9. “We adduce other proof of Christian doctrine than do the philosophers who take their grounds from reason. We take our grounds out of God’s very mouth, who cannot lie, from His science and omnipotence. Therefore this word is so precious (1Ti_1:15; 1Ti_4:9).”—Cramer. [“The sense is, that God predicted future events before there was any thing by which it might be inferred that such occurrences would take place. It was not done by mere sagacity, as men like Burke and Canning may sometimes predict future events with great probability by marking certain political indications or developments. God did this when there were no such indications, and when it must have been done by mere omniscience. In this respect all His predictions differ from the conjectures of man, and from all the reasonings which are founded on mere sagacity.”—Barnes.]
9. On Isa_42:10-17. In this section the Servant of Jehovah is no more named. Only Jehovah Himself is spoken of. But the actions, for whose sake heaven and earth shall proclaim the praise of the Lord, belong no more to what the Servant of Jehovah may do in His servant form, i.e., in His humiliation, but to what He does as one raised up to glory. In the condition of exaltation, however, He has laid aside the form of a servant: thus He is no more called Servant of Jehovah. When they crucified and buried Him, the humble Servant of Jehovah, suffering without a murmur, seemed to be quite done for. But on the day of Pentecost He broke loose again only the more mightily. Then the Jews who had not learned to know Him thus, and the heathen that had not learned to know Him at all, were panic stricken. Then He began His victorious career of conquering (inwardly) the Jews and the heathen. Since that time both are inwardly dried up. As long as the gospel was not there, they had a relative right to live and to a corresponding life power. But after the revelation of absolute truth in Christ they have lost these. Their continued existence is only a vegetation, and if in these days they exhibit a certain revirescence, still it is only like the flaring up of the vital spark in a dying person, which would never happen either did Christianity only let its light shine purer and stronger. But continually the Lord leads the blind of all nations in the path of light. But those that, spite of all, cling to idols, must ever come to more shame.
10. On Isa_42:18-21. “Physician heal thyself,” is called to the great Physician, who healed all sicknesses of men, yea, made the very dead alive (Luk_4:23). For this reason He was mocked on the cross, because He, who helped others, could not help Himself (Mat_27:42). The Prophet observes this trait in the life of the Servant of the Lord. He sees in it a symptom of the deepest suffering. But, not withstanding, He recognizes that at the same time God’s approval rests on this man of contradictions, and that He is to become the origin of a new, glorious law. Does not the Prophet see here the unrighteous Righteous one, the wicked Saint, the perishing Saviour, the blind eye comfort, the dead Prince of life? Yea, he sees the Incomprehensible, who on the cross redeemed the world from hell, who, condemned as the most guilty laden, still was that righteousness for the world that alone avails with God.
11. On Isa_42:22-25. As experienced salvation is the pledge of future salvation, yea, of final ἀπολύτρωσις, so, too, chastisements already endured are the pledges of future ones, and, under circumstances, of such as are still greater, yea, of utter destruction. Israel ought to have learned by its first exile, and by all that preceded and followed it, that God can bring a yet sorer visitation on His people, yea, destroy their outward existence. Had it regarded this and rightly received the Servant of the Lord accordingly, it might have escaped the second, final, and worst exile. But they were never willing to believe that the Lord could so jumble up, overthrow, and destroy His people, His city, and His house, that a restoration of its outward existence is impossible.
HOMILETICAL HINTS
1. On Isa_42:1-4. “The testimony of our heavenly Father Himself to His Son. He tells us: 1) Who He is and why He comes. 2) How He appears and discharges His office. 3) What He brings to pass, and by what means.” Advent sermon, E. Taube, in “Gottes Brünnlein hat Wassers die Fülle. Hamburg, 1872.
On Isa_52:2-3. “Christ is the gracious hen that woos us under her wings (Mat_23:37); the good Shepherd that binds up the neglected (Eze_34:16); that can have compassion (Heb_4:15); and who does not cast out him who comes to Him (Joh_6:37), as He has proved by examples, as Mary Magdalene (Luk_7:37); the woman taken in adultery (Joh_8:11); the father of the lunatic (Mar_9:24); Peter (Luk_22:61); the thief on the cross (Luk_23:43); Thomas (Joh_20:27), etc.”—Cramer.
2. On Isa_42:1-4, “What a glorious Saviour God has given the world in His Son. For He comes to us: 1) As the anointed of the Lord; 2) as the meek and humble Friend of sinners; 3) as the strong and faithful perfecter of His work.” Sermon in Advent, W. Leipoldt (Festpredigten), Leipzig, 1845.
3. On Isa_42:5-9. The New Covenant. 1) The Founder of the covenant (God the Lord who has made the earth Isa_42:5, will also redeem it; hence He has foretold the new covenant Isa_42:9, and brought it into being Isa_42:6). 2) The Mediator of the covenant (Christ, the Son of God and Son of man, is the natural, personal link between God and men; He it is who represents men before God as a Lamb, bearing their sin, and God toward men as the One that brings them God’s grace and the new, divine vital force). 3) The Object of the covenant (a. to bring light and freedom to men Isa_42:7 b. to preserve the honor of the Lord as the only God as opposed to all idols. Isa_42:8).
4. [On Isa_42:10-12. The new song of the New Testament. The newness: whereas holy songs were before very much confined to the Temple, now they are to be sung all the world over. They were sung by one people and one tongue; they shall be sung by many of many tongues. They were sung by a pastoral people living in valleys among the hills; they are to be sung in all climes, by men of all callings and of every degree of culture. The substance of the song must be new to suit so many. The form in which that substance is reduced to song under these varied influences must be endlessly new. After M. Henry.]
5.On Isa_42:10-17. A missionary sermon. The revelation of salvation among the heathen. 1) Its intentional delay till the point when the time was fulfilled (Isa_42:14 a). 2) Its appearance at the right time: a. as powerful and accompanied with mighty effect (Isa_42:13); b. as a painful birth (Isa_42:14 b. a: resistance on the part of the old, and consequent laborious breaking forth of the new). 3) Its operation: a. on the old heathen existence itself: it dries up (Isa_42:14, b; β; Isa_42:15); b. on unbelieving men: they are brought to shame (Isa_42:17); c. on believing men: they are led to light and freedom (Isa_42:16); d. for God: the redeemed world sings Him a new song (it praises Him no more merely as Creator, but also as Redeemer, and New Creator, Isa_42:10-12).
6. On Isa_42:13. “That ever kindly smiling God, that covers all suppurating sores, and that every where and every way shows favor and spares men, whom one so often hears preached from the pulpit, is not the God of the Bible. It is another of which the Old Testament writes: ‘Thou art not a God that hast pleasure in the wicked; the wicked shall not abide in Thy presence:’ and, ‘The Lord thy God is a consuming fire and a jealous God:’ and, ‘The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, He shall stir up jealousy like a man of war.’ ” Tholuck.
7. On Isa_42:18 sqq. When Peter said to the Lord: “Lord, pity Thyself; this shall not be unto Thee” (Mat_16:22), the Lord was deaf and gave Peter an answer that quenched in him and others all disposition to warn Him again. And when He entered into Jerusalem and cleansed the Temple, and unsparingly scourged the high priests and scribes, was He not blind then? Did He not see what hate He was thereby conjuring up against Himself and what His fate would be? Thus the Lord was deaf and blind, but He was so to His own greatest honor. It is very different, however, with the blindness and deafness of those that would not see in Him the Lord of glory, and would not hear His word. The Lord indeed became a sacrifice to their hatred. But He is, notwithstanding, the One of whom Psalms 110. says: “Sit thou on My right hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool.” And from Him proceeds the covenant that is as much better than the old one as the blood of Christ speaks better than Abel’s. They, however, have become a robbed and plundered people. They are scattered among all people, their Temple, their priesthood is destroyed, their entire old covenant is shivered like an earthen vessel. And the same fate will happen to all who do not take warning from God’s judgment on stiffnecked and obdurate Israel. As the first exile ought to have been a warning to the readers for whom this chapter of Isaiah was destined, to prevent them from falling into a second and worse, so for us Christians, the first act of the world’s judgment, the judgment on the house of God, should be a warning not to misuse and neglect the time till the second chief act of judgment, the time of the church among the heathen.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–7 Matthew (Mat 12:19) marks the kind of "cry" as…
Matthew (Mat 12:19) marks the kind of "cry" as that of altercation by quoting it, "He shall not strive" (Isa 53:7).
street--the Septuagint translates "outside." An image from an altercation in a house, loud enough to be heard in the street outside: appropriate of Him who "withdrew Himself" from the public fame created by His miracles to privacy (Mat 12:15; Isa 34:5, there, shows another and sterner aspect of His character, which is also implied in the term "judgment").
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1–7 1. Behold my servant — Who is meant? Not…
1. Behold my servant — Who is meant? Not Israel, as in Isa_41:8, nor the prophet himself, because what is affirmed of this “servant” transcends what any Old Testament prophet was ever called to, and what any mere man was ever capable of doing. The Targum adds Messiah to the words “my servant,” as explanatory of them. And Abarbanel, the Jewish enemy of Christians, says those who interpret otherwise are “smitten with blindness.” To the conception of a transcendent Personality the word must refer, from attributes following, which are applicable only to such a conception; in other words, to the incarnate Redeemer, looming up to the prophet’s eye from the far future. It may be asked what affinity has this word here with the same word in Isa_41:8, and in Isa_42:19-20, where it seems God’s true Israel is called his “servant.” The answer is, our prophet was of the broadest cast of mind; of loftiest spiritual conceptions withal; and was ever certain of victory crowning truth and righteousness as against idolatry and sin; and the conqueror was ever to be the Messiah, first of the Davidic type of kingly glory and righteousness, (Isa_17:12;) then Jehovah and co-workers, namely, the embodied idea of the true Israel as in these chapters, (41-47;) then the holy seed descended from Abraham, the indestructible germ, in which the continuity of Israel was preserved, culminating in the Christ, as St. Paul interprets in Gal_3:16. The one true Israel becomes thus individualized in the person of the future great deliverer, the coming Christ. Delitzsch illustrates by a pyramid, of which the base is Israel as a whole; the central section Israel according to the flesh, but purified, and so the remnant Israel; the apex is the personal Messiah springing out of Israel. God has also his “servants” outside of Israel; of whom, in these chapters, is Cyrus, representing employed agencies from the Gentile world over whom he rules, as do typical Messianic agencies from Israel in whom he rules.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–7 1. The election, equipment, and mission of the Servant.
1. The election, equipment, and mission of the Servant.
Behold my servant] LXX. reads Ἰακὼβ ὁ παῖς μου (“Jacob my servant”) and in the next line, Ἰσραὴλ ὁ ἐκλεκτός μου (“Israel my chosen”).
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whom I uphold] Cf. ch. Isa_41:10.
mine elect] R.V. my chosen. Used of Israel ch. Isa_43:20, Isa_45:4; cf. the verb in Isa_41:8 etc.; and Deu_7:7 &c.
I have put my spirit upon him] The Servant’s function being prophetic, he is, like the prophets, endowed with the spirit of Jehovah. Cf. ch. Isa_11:2 ff., where the Messiah is endowed with the Spirit for His royal functions.
he shall bring forth (or send forth) judgment to the nations] This is the ultimate purpose of the Servant’s being raised up,—the diffusion of the true religion throughout the world. The word “judgement” (mishpâṭ) occurs three times in these few verses, and evidently in a special sense. The plural is often used of the ordinances (lit. “judicial decisions”) of Jehovah; these are sometimes viewed as a unity and described by the sing. (see ch. Isa_51:4; Jer_5:4; Jer_8:7). This is the sense here; it means the religion of Jehovah regarded as a system of practical ordinances. All recent commentators instance the close parallel of the Arabic dîn, which denotes both a system of usages and a religion. This the Servant shall “send forth” to the nations by his prophetic word. The best commentary on the passage is ch. Isa_2:1-4.
1–4. Israel as the Lord’s Servant. The features of the portrait are these: (1) It starts from the thought of ch. Isa_41:8 ff., the election by which Israel is constituted the Servant of Jehovah; but this is immediately followed by (2) the equipment of the Servant with the Divine Spirit, and (3) the mission for which he is raised up, viz., to be the organ of the true religion to the world (Isa_42:1). (4) The manner and spirit of the Servant’s working are then described; his unobtrusiveness and tenderness (3 f.). (5) His unflinching constancy in the prosecution of his work, and his final and complete success. The whole description is singularly elevated, and impressive; Jehovah speaks of His Servant as He sees him, and as he shall yet be revealed to the world.
If the Servant of the Lord here described is Israel, he is obviously not Israel in its actual condition of bondage and inefficiency. He is Israel according to its idea,—the Divine ideal after and towards which Jehovah is fashioning the people. This ideal is personified, and it is the vividness of the personification that leads many readers to think that an individual must be meant. But such impressions are not greatly to be trusted. It is a very hazardous thing to set limits to the possibilities of O.T. personification. The real question is whether the characteristics ascribed to the Servant are capable of being realised by the nation of Israel, or whether they are such as to demand a separate and personal embodiment. Even if it should be found that some details do not readily fall in with the national interpretation it would not at once follow that that interpretation was false; for no one argues that our Lord’s parables must be literally true stories, because they contain features to which no spiritual meaning can be attached. But that consideration need not trouble us in this passage, for it will be seen that all that is here said of the Servant is applicable to Israel in the ideal light in which it is here presented. Certainly no historic individual of that age can possibly be the subject of the picture.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–7 (1) Behold my servant . . .—Here the words…
XLII.
(1) Behold my servant . . .—Here the words point not, as before, to the visible, or even the ideal Israel, but to One who is the centre of both, with attributes which are reproduced in His people in the measure of their fulfilment of the ideal. “Elect” is another of the words with which Isaiah has fashioned the theology of Christendom. It meets us there four times (45:4, 65:9, 22), and is echoed and interpreted in the voice from heaven of Mat_3:17. That voice fixed on the human consciousness of the Son of Man that He was “the servant of the Lord,” and throughout His life we trace an ever expanding and conscious reproduction of the chief features of Isaiah’s picture. Disciples like St. Matthew learnt to recognise that likeness even in what might seem to us subordinate details (Mat_12:17-21).
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I have put my spirit . . .—An echo from Isa_11:2, heard once more in Isa_61:1. The promise we note as fulfilled in closest connection with the utterance of the previous words in Mat_3:16; Luk_3:22; Joh_1:32-33.
He shall bring forth judgment to . . .—The ministry of “the servant,” as extending to the Gentiles, is prominent in 2 Isaiah (Isa_49:6-7; Isa_52:15). It expands the thought of Isa_2:1-4. There the Temple is the centre from which the knowledge and the “judgment” (used here in the sense of law, or ordinance) flow; here it is from the personal teaching of “the servant.”
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1–7 Vers. 1-8. ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE SERVANT OF THE LORD,…
Vers. 1-8. ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE SERVANT OF THE LORD, AND THE WORK WHICH HE WILL PERFORM. There are comparatively few who deny that, in this place at any rate, the "Servant of the Lord" is the Messiah. (So the Targum on the passage; so Abar-barnel; so, among moderns, Oehler, Delitzsch, and Mr. Cheyne.) The portraiture has "so strong an individuality and such marked personal features, that it cannot possibly be a mere personified collective;" and it goes so "infinitely beyond anything of which a man was ever capable that it can only be the future Christ" (Delitzsch). It may be added that St. Matthew (Mat_12:17-21) distinctly applies the passage to our Lord.
Behold. "Behold," as Mr. Cheyne says, "invites the attention of the world both of the Jews and of the nations to a new revelation." It looks back to the similar expression of vers. 24 and 29 of the preceding chapter, which draw down the curtain upon the idol-gods, while this "behold" reveals One who is to occupy their place, and to be a worthy object of the worship of mankind, My Servant; i.e. my true and perfect servant, utterly obedient; (Joh_4:34 Heb_3:2) not, like Israel, my rebellious and faithless servant; not, even, like my prophets, yielding an imperfect obedience, Whom I uphold. "As the Father hath life in himself, so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself". (Joh_5:26) As the fount or origin of Divinity (phgh Yeothtov ), the Father supports and sustains even the Son and the Spirit. Mine Elect. (comp. 1Pe_2:6) Christ was "chosen" from all eternity in God"s counsels to the great work of man"s redemption, and to be the Mediator between God and man. I have put my Spirit upon him. (see Isa_11:2 Isa_61:1; and for the fulfilment, comp. Luk_2:40 Luk_3:22 Luk_4:18-21 Luk_3:34) He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles; i.e. "he shall publish," or "cause to be published, to the Gentiles, the true Law of God religion on its practical side." The publication of Christianity throughout all the world has abundantly fulfilled this promise or prophecy. The call of the Gentiles had been already declared by Isaiah in his earlier preaching. (Isa_2:2 Isa_11:10 Isa_19:22-25 Isa_25:6 Isa_27:13, etc.)
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Vers. 1-7. The servants of God, and the one true Servant.
It must be admitted By all that the expression "Servant of God" or "Servant of Jehovah," is used in Scripture in various senses. All who work out God"s purposes, however unconsciously or even unwillingly, are called by the sacred writers "God"s servants," in respect of the service, albeit unconscious or unwilling, which they render him. Thus Jeremiah calls Nebuchadnezzar "God"s servant", (Jer_25:9 Jer_27:6, etc.) and Ezekiel speaks of the wages" due to him because he and his army "served a good service" on God"s behalf against Tyre. (Eze_29:18) In quite a different sense, the Israelites generally are called God"s servants, not as actually rendering him any service at all, but as bound by covenant to be his servants, engaged in his service by contract, however they might break the contract, reject his service, rebel against him, and choose for themselves "other lords". (Isa_26:13) In a third sense, different from both of these, the faithful Israelites, those who earnestly endeavoured to serve God, are called his servants, partly as bound by covenant, like the unfaithful servants, but mainly as consciously and intentionally working for God, and doing him "true and laudable service." Such service, however, must always have been, at the best, imperfect, falling very far short of that entire fidelity and complete obedience which God requires and which man ought to render. Hence, when a servant is spoken of with whom no fault is found a servant who never "fails" (ver. 4), whom God holds always by the hand (ver. 6), who is to give a law to the nations (ver. 4), and to "bring forth judgment unto truth" (ver. 3), in whom, moreover, "God"s soul delighteth" (ver. 1), we may be sure that it is not faithful Israel that is intended. Of faithful Israel even of the faithfullest in Israel, whether prophet, priest, or king none of these things could be predicated. Isaiah would not speak of any prophet, least of all, of himself, in the terms wherewith he describes "the Servant of Jehovah" in this passage. No; One is proclaimed to us greater than the sons of men the perfect model of a "servant of God," obedient in all things, unceasingly active in God"s service, never fainting, never wearying. "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," said Jesus; (Joh_5:17) "My meat is to do the will of my Father which sent me, and to finish his work"; (Joh_4:34) "Wist ye not that I must be about my Father"s business?". (Luk_2:49)
HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON Vers. 1-7. The Servant of Jehovah.
"Behold!" Let all the world hearken and attend to the new revelation. It is admitted that the conception is substantially that of Christ in the Gospels. According to one critic, indeed, the prophetic passage springs from the time of Herod II Let us think, then, of Jesus and his mission.
I THE ELECT OF GOD. Six times does the word occur in this portion of Isaiah; it is found also in Psa_89:3 Psa_105:6, 43 106:5, 23. He has been endowed with God"s Spirit, anointed for a special mission, for a high and arduous task; and this is to publish the Law, the practical religion of Jehovah, to the nations of the earth. "All religions claim to be laws; biblical religion dwells with increasing earnestness on the moral as opposed to the ritual law.
II HIS METHODS. They are gentle, quiet, spiritual. He speaks, not in the loud voice of passionate debate and contention, but with the still small voice of reasonable persuasion. He does not come to crush life, but to develop it; not to despise the weak, but to encourage and raise them. The crushed reed is the very type of helplessness; the dimly burning wick of ignorance of the best. It has been designated as the religion of condescension. When it came into the world, it found the multitude crushed beneath the yoke of political oppression, exhausted by the demands of heathen ritualism, yet longing for health and salvation; it stooped to them and blessed them. He himself is as a brightly burning Lamp, and a Reed, "a humble Plant;" unlike others, "covered with leaves, or hardened in their stalk." In a spirit of strict truthfulness, for this end born and brought into the world, he shall proceed to establish justice and true religion on the earth. He shall be the nations" Desire; and they shall wait in longing upon him. (cf. Mat_12:17-21) Such is Christianity, as it exists in the mind of its Author, and as it appears in the world, pursuing its beneficent way, in spite of all revolutions, and of all religious changes and controversies. J.
HOMILIES BY W. CLARKSON Vers. 1-4. The characteristics of the true Leader.
Taking these words as applicable to the Anointed of the Lord, and then, secondarily, to every one who is equipped and sent of him to lead and save men, we have the following features indicated.
I THE SPIRIT OF OBEDIENCE. "My Servant "(ver. 1). Jesus Christ was the Servant of Jehovah; he was "about his Father"s business" from the beginning. He came "to work the work of him that sent him." It was his "meet to do the Father"s will, and to finish his work." It was his joy to know, at the end of his career, that he had "finished the work which the Father had given him to do." The spirit of obedience, of active conformity to the known will of "him that sent him," possessed and characterized our Lord in a very marked degree.
II THE EXCELLENCY WHICH ATTRACTS. "Whom I uphold; my Chosen, in whom my soul delighteth;" in other words, that One "in whom I am well pleased." There was in our Lord everything which satisfies and attracts. Excellency is often found in conjunction with characteristics which are so uninviting and even repelling that there is a measure of admiration felt, but no delight, no good pleasure; the soul is not drawn in affection and attachment. Jesus Christ was One in whose spirit, attitude, behaviour, was everything that called forth the pleasure of the Father, and that now evokes the love and the delight of his disciples.
III RECIPIENCY OF THE HIGHEST GIFT. "I have put my Spirit upon him." God "gave not the Spirit by measure" unto him, (Joh_3:34) because he had an immeasurable capacity of receiving it. God"s highest gifts to us depend, not on his willingness or ability to bestow, but on our readiness and capacity to receive. God dwelt, by his Spirit, perfectly in his Son, our Saviour, and according to our faith and purity he will dwell in us.
IV QUIETNESS OF METHOD. "He shall not cry," etc. (vide next homily).
V PATIENT HOPEFULNESS. "A bruised reed," etc. (vide next homily).
VI PERSISTENT ENERGY. "He shall bring forth judgment unto truth;" "He shall not fail," etc.
1. The disregarded and despised Son of man did not fail to speak, to suffer, to work, until his task on earth was complete.
2. The neglected and unknown Son of God, dwelling in the heavens, will not be discouraged until the race has been regenerated and renewed. Through the instrumentality of his Church he will work on this sin-distracted world until its ignorance be displaced by knowledge, its iniquity yield to holiness of heart and life, its indifference give place to earnest interest and all-constraining love. C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. The Lord"s Servant.
Various suggestions have been made by way of explanation of this term. Some regard the Lord"s servant as the Hebrew nation, distinguished from the heathen; or as a new Israel opposed to the old; or as the righteous part of the Hebrew nation; or as the Israel which suffered for its religious testimony to the heathen; or as an i, teal Israel; or as the order of the Hebrew prophets. Bishop Wordsworth says, "The "Servant of Jehovah," as represented by Isaiah, is a Person; he is a Prophet, Priest, and King. He is more than a prophet, as teaching the world; he is more than a priest, as offering himself for all; he is King of kings, and Lord of lords; he is God." Dean Stanley finely says, "In the foreground of the future stands, not the ruler, or conqueror, but the Servant of God, gentle, purified, suffering whether it be Cyrus whom he had anointed; or Jacob whom he had chosen; his people with whom after all their affliction he was well pleased; or Jeremiah and the prophetic order, the victim of their country"s sins, led as a lamb to the slaughter; or One, more sorrowful, more triumphant, more human, more Divine, than any of these, the last and true fulfilment of the most spiritual hopes and the highest aspirations of the chosen people." Delitzsch says, "The conception of the Servant of Jehovah is, as it were, a pyramid, of which the base is the people Israel as a whole, the central part Israel "according to the Spirit," and the summit the Person of the Mediator of salvation who arises out el Israel." Cheyne says, "In the sublimest descriptions of the Servant I am unable to resist the impression that an historical Person is intended, and venture to think that our general view of "the Servant" ought to be ruled by those passages in which the enthusiasm of the author is at its height. "Servant of Jehovah" in these passages seems about equivalent to "Son of Jehovah" in Psa_2:7 (" son" and "servant" being, in fact, nearly equivalent in the Old Testament), viz. the personal instrument of Israel"s regeneration, or the Messiah." The whole passage, vers. 1-4, is applied to Christ in Mat_12:17-21, as illustrating Christ"s mild, silent, and uncontentious manner of working. We shall come again upon the representation of Christ as "Servant," when we reach the great chapter of this prophecy, the fifty-third. The passage now before us directs attention to three points in relation to this "Servant of the Lord," the Christ.
I HIS ENDOWMENT. "I have put my Spirit upon him." The expression calls to mind the endowments of the Spirit, as a Spirit of rule and judgment, which followed the anointing of Saul and David. In precise adaptation to work required, God gives spiritual endowment. The scene of the baptism of Christ has been misunderstood, as the time when the special endowment of the Spirit came upon him for his life-ministry. It is a truer and deeper view of that scene of the descending dove and heavenly witness that sees in it only an outward manifestation and expression of a fact which already existed the Spirit already dwelt in Christ beyond measure. The outward expression in symbol was graciously accommodated to the comforting of his humanity, and the conviction of those who believe in his Divine mission. It may be shown that every endowment of the Divine Spirit is
(1) a seal, testifying that he on whom it rests is under commission of God; and
(2) a fitness, ensuring the highest adaptation to that precise work which is given the agent to do. It involves efficiency and authority.
II HIS COMMISSION. To "bring forth judgment to the Gentiles." "Judgment" here is not used in its magisterial sense. It is the equivalent of "righteousness," or, more precisely, of the truth that makes for righteousness." That truth is conceived as having been for a time the special possession of Israel; but by Messiah it is to be opened to the whole world. Every man that doeth righteousness is accepted of him." The point that Isaiah sets in such clear light is, that the commission of the great "Servant of Jehovah" is a distinctly moral one. It is only in a secondary or derived sense anything but moral. It concerns righteousness. It glorifies righteousness. It breaks soul-bondages. It dispels prejudices and errors. It proposes to bring men together in a brotherhood of common goodness, of which the bloom will be mutual love and helpfulness. The world"s separations and woes can never be mastered until men arc made right, and that is Christ"s work.
III HIS CHARACTERISTICS. Unpretentious, uncontentious, trusting wholly to moral influences for securing moral ends. "He shall not strive nor cry." As Matthew Arnold well expresses it, "He shall not clamour, shall not speak with the high vehement voice of the men who contend. God"s Servant shall bring to men"s hearts the word of God"s righteousness and salvation by a gentle, inward, and spiritual method." Illustrating the parable of the leaven, Dr. Marcus Dods says, "According to the Head of the Church, his religion and Spirit are to be propagated by an influence which operates like an infectious disease, invisible, without apparatus and pompous equipment, succeeding all the better where it. is least observed. Our Lord bases his expectation of the extension of his Spirit throughout the world, not upon any grand and powerful institutions, not on national establishments of religion or on any such means, but on the secret, unnoticed influence of man upon man." The characteristic silences of the great "Servant" may wisely become the characteristics of his servants. Moral forces make no noise. R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1–7 Behold My Servant
Isa_42:1-17
Behold My Servant
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Who is the servant of Jehovah?
The following are, in brief, the leading opinions which have been held:
(1) Hitzigs, that the Jewish people in exile is referred to, as distinguished from the heathen;
(2) that of Paulus and Maurer, that the servant is the pious portion of the people;
(3) that of Gesenins, that the prophetic order is intended;
(4) that of Hofmann, combining (2) and (3), that it means Israel, the prophetic people, suffering on behalf of the heathen world;
(5) that of Oehler and Delitzsch, that the conception of the servant of
Jehovah is, as it were, a pyramid, of which the base is the people of Israel as a whole, the central part Israel according to the Spirit, and the summit, the person of the Mediator of salvation, who arises out of Israel. (Prof. T. K. Cheyne, D. D.)
The Mediator is the centre
1. In the circle of the kingdom of promise--the second David.
2. In the circle of the people of salvation--the true Israel.
3. In the circle of humanity--the second Adam. (F. Delitzsch, D. D.)
The servant of Jehovah
In the sublimest description of the servant I am unable to resist the impression that we have a presentiment of an individual, and venture to think that our general view of the servant ought to be ruled by those passages in which the enthusiasm of the author is at its height. Servant of Jehovah in these passages seems equivalent to son of Jehovah in Psa_2:7 (son and servant being, in fact, nearly equivalent in the Old Testament), namely, the personal instrument of Israels regeneration, or, as we may say in the broader sense of the word, the Messiah. (Prof. T. K. Cheyne, D. D.)
Jehovah and Jehovahs servant
This servant is brought before us with all the urgency with which Jehovah has presented Himself, and next to Jehovah He turns out to be the most important figure of the prophecy. Does the prophet insist that God is the only source and sufficiency of His peoples salvation? It is with equal emphasis that He introduces the servant as Gods indispensable agent in the work. Cyrus is also acknowledged as an elect instrument. But neither in closeness to God, nor in effect upon the world, is Cyrus to be compared for an instant to the servant. Cyrus is subservient and incidental But the servant is a character, to delineate whose immortal beauty and example the prophet devotes as much space as he does to Jehovah Himself. As he turns again and again to speak of Gods omnipotence and faithfulness and agonising love for His own, so with equal frequency and fondness does he linger on every feature of the servants conduct and aspect: His gentleness, His patience, His courage, His purity, His meekness: His daily wakefulness to Gods voice, the swiftness and brilliance of His speech for others, His silence under His own torments; His resorts--among the bruised, the prisoners, the forwandered of Israel, the weary, and them that sit in darkness, the far-off heathen; His warfare with the world, His face set like a flint; His unworldly beauty, which men call ugliness; His unnoticed presence in His own generation, yet the effect of His face upon kings; His habit of woe, a man of sorrows and acquainted with sickness; His sore stripes and bruises, His judicial murder, His felons grave; His exaltation and eternal glory--till we may reverently say that these pictures, by their vividness and charm, have drawn our eyes away from our prophets visions of God, and have caused the chapters in which they occur to be oftener read among us, and learned by heart, than the chapters in which God Himself is lifted up and adored. Jehovah and Jehovahs servant--these are the two heroes of the drama. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)
The servant, first Israel as a whole, then Israel in part
Nothing could be more clear than this, that in the earlier years of the exile, the servant of Jehovah was Israel as a whole, Israel as a body politic Very soon the prophet has to make a distinction, and to sketch the servant as something less than the actual nation In modern history we have two familiar illustrations of this process of winnowing and idealising a people, in the light of their destiny. In a well-known passage in the Areopagitica Milton exclaims: Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself and shaking her invincible locks; methinks I see her as an eagle renewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full midday beam while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about, amazed at what she means. In this passage the nation is no longer what Milton meant by the term in the earlier part of his treatise, where England stands simply for the outline of the whole English people; but the nation is the true genius of England realised in her enlightened and aspiring sons, and breaking away from the hindering and debasing members of the body politic. Or, recall Mazzinis bitter experience. To no man was his Italy more really one than to this ardent son of hers, who loved every born Italian because he was an Italian, and counted none of the fragments of his unhappy country too petty or too corrupt to be included in the hope of her restoration. To Mazzinis earliest imagination, it was the whole Italian seed who were ready for redemption, and would rise to achieve it at his summons. But when his summons came, how few responded, and after the first struggles how fewer still remained, Mazzini himself has told us with breaking heart. The real Italy was but a handful of born Italians; at times it seemed to shrink to the prophet alone. From such a core the conscience indeed spread again, till the entire people was delivered from tyranny and from schism, and now every peasant and burgher from the Alps to Sicily understands what Italy means, and is proud to be an Italian. But for a time Mazzini and his few comrades stood alone. It is a similar winnowing process through which we see our prophets thought pass with regard to Israel. Him, too, experience teaches, that the many are called, but the few chosen. Perhaps the first traces of distinction between the real servant and the whole nation are to be found in the programme of his mission (Isa_42:1-7). (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)
The ideal servant Jehovah
That mysterious form of the ideal servant of Jehovah, which seems, as we read, to shift and change its aspect, was to Israel what the colossal man of the idealist is to humanity at large (E. H.Plumptre, D. D.)
The servant of the Lord
The figure, as it first appears in this half of what are called Isaiahs prophecies, evidently represents Israel as God intended it to be, chosen for His service and for the diffusion of His Name; the conviction gradually steals over the prophet that the nation cannot discharge these functions, but that the Israel within Israel, the devout core of the people, is the Servant of the Lord; and finally, the knowledge seems to have been breathed into him that not even that holy seed which is the substance thereof is adequate to do all that the Servant of the Lord is to do; and thus finally the figure changes into a Person, who can be and do all that Israel ought to have been and done, but was not, and did not. In other words, whether the prophet discerned it or no, the role of the Servant of the Lord is only fulfilled by Jesus Christ. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Cyrus and the Servant of Jehovah
His relation to Cyrus, before whose departure from connection with Israels fate the Servant does not appear as a person, is most interesting. Perhaps we may best convey it in a homely figure On the ship of Israels fortunes--as on every ship and on every voyage--the prophet sees two personages. One is the pilot through the shallows, Cyrus, who is dropped as soon as the shallows are past; and the other is the captain of the ship, who remains always identified with it--the servant. The captain does not come to the front till the pilot is gone; but, both alongside the pilot, and after the pilot has been dropped, there is every room for his office. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)
The ideal servants work
The chief aspects of the ideal servants work may be classed as follows:
1. He is to be the embodiment of a new covenant between Jehovah and His people, to restore the actual nation exiled at the time in Babylon, and to reestablish them in their own land (Isa_42:6; Isa_49:5-6; Isa_49:8).
2. But He has a mission not to Israel merely, but to the world: He is to teach the world true religion, and to be a light of the Gentiles (Isa_42:1; Isa_24:3; Isa_24:6; Isa_49:6).
3. He is to be a prophet, patient and faithful in the discharge of His work, in spite of the contumely and opposition which He may encounter Isa_50:4-9).
4. Being innocent Himself, He is to suffer and die for the sins of others Isa_53:4-9). (Prof. S. R. Driver, D. D.)
The Trinity in unity
This is the language of the Eternal Father; but it contains a description of our blessed Lord and Saviour in His character, as the Redeemer of the world. Then the Spirit of God is represented as resting upon Christ, to qualify Him for that work of redemption; and thus in this one verse we have brought before us suggestions concerning the Fathers sovereign will, the Sons willing obedience, and the Spirits fulness of grace manifested in the Person of the Son, and the setting Him apart for His real work.
I. THE SCRIPTURAL REVELATION CONCERNING THE TRINITY IN UNITY.
1. No one can doubt that Holy Scripture teaches the unity of God.
2. Yet Scripture speaks of this one God, this one Jehovah, Israels Lord, as revealing Himself in three distinct characters and relations, and only three.
3. Then Scripture attributes works and qualities to each of these three Persons which could not be attributed to them justly if each of them were not truly God.
4. Then Holy Scripture teaches, notwithstanding, that these Three Divine Persons, each spoken of as God, are yet one God, and this without any difference or inequality.
II. THE PRACTICAL VIEW OF THE TRINITY WHICH THIS PASSAGE CONTAINS. We gather from it that it is the will of the Eternal Jehovah that the glory of the Trinity should be specially manifested in connection with the Person and work of Christ. Observe the description of the Second Person in the blessed Trinity.
1. He is Gods Servant. How can the Second Person in the Trinity be spoken of as the Servant of the Eternal Father? The very expression denotes the manhood of Christ. He cannot be a Servant except by creation, and His body was created in order that He might sustain the position of Servant to the Eternal God. A body, we are told in the Epistle to the Hebrews, quoting from the Psalms, hast Thou prepared Me . . . Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God. Here is the Son speaking to the Father. Then the expression Gods Servant denotes the humiliation of our blessed Lord Php_2:7). As Gods servant we have to consider Him in connection with His office, as well as with His humiliation and with His manhood. The office which He had to sustain was to bring sinful men back again to God.
2. Then He is Gods beloved--Mine elect, in whom My soul delighteth.
3. The Man Christ Jesus has the Spirit of God--I will put My Spirit upon Him, that is, I will put it on Him as a garment. At the conception, and at His baptism and ordination to His work, this was specially manifested. Then Jesus had the Spirit for the special work which He had to perform as Mediator. There were three objects to be accomplished, if man was to have a suitable remedy. Man was ignorant of Gods will through sin: he needed, therefore, a prophet to teach him, not only what to do, but the actual doing of it, and Jesus was anointed to be that Prophet. Then man was rebellious, and he needed, therefore, a king who should rule over his inward passions, and subdue them, as well as over his outward enemies, and quell them: and therefore Jesus was anointed, that He might sustain the office of King. And man was in a sinful condition, under the curse of the broken law, and therefore he needed a priest to sacrifice for him, and to make intercession for him, and Jesus was that Priest, anointed with the Spirit of God, in order that He might make that satisfaction, and offer that sacrifice, and present that intercession through which sinners may be brought nigh unto God. Thus qualified, the Saviour will bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. (W. Cadman, M. A.)
The servitude of Jesus
I. IN CHRIST, SERVICE AND FREEDOM WERE PERFECTLY COMBINED. He gave the service of being, the service of work, the service of suffering, the service of worship, the service of rest each to the very highest point of which that service is capable. But when He came, knowing as He did all to which He was coming, He came with these words upon His lips, I delight to do it.
II. CHRIST HAD MANY MASTERS, AND HE SERVED THEM ALL WITH PERFECT SERVICE.
1. There was His own high purpose, which had armed Him for His mission, and never by a hairs-breadth did He ever swerve from that.
2. There was the law. The law had no right over Christ, and yet how He served the law, in every requirement, moral, political, ceremonial, to the smallest tittle.
3. There was death, that fearful master with his giant hand. Step by step, inch by inch, slowly, measuredly, He put Himself under its spell, He obeyed its mandate, and He owned its power.
4. To His Heavenly Father what a true Servant He was, not only in fulfilling all the Fathers will, but as He did it, in always tracing to Him all the power, and giving back to Him all the glory.
III. THERE IS A DEPTH OF BEAUTY AND POWER, OF LIBERTY AND HUMILIATION, OF ABANDONMENT AND LOVE, IN THAT WORD SERVANT, which none ever know who have not considered it as one of the titles of Jesus. But there is another name of Jesus, very dear to His people, The Master. To understand the Master you must yourself have felt the Servant. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
The dignity of service
He is not a man of clear and weighty judgment who sees nothing of honour even in the word servant. Ill times have befallen us if we attach to that word nothing but the idea of humiliation, lowness, valuelessness. That word must be restored to its right place in human intercourse. If any man proudly rise and say he is not servant, there is a retort, not of human invention, which might overwhelm any who are not swallowed up of self-conceit and self-idolatry. We do not know what it is to rule until we know what it is to serve. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Gods programme for the world
This programme is entrusted to the servant of the Lord, who is the Christ of the New Testament.
I. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JEHOVAH AND HIS SERVANT. In all His life of ministry this Servant was assured of three things--
1. That He was chosen of God for the service to which He came.
2. That He dwelt deep in the love of God His Father.
3. That His life lay entirely within the will of God. He was chosen, beloved, approved. All this is possible to those who say, I am the Lords.
II. THE SERVANTS DIVINE EQUIPMENT. I have put My Spirit upon Him.
III. THE MISSION OF THE SERVANT: ITS TEMPER AND METHOD. Christ came to reveal God, to restore all things to the pattern of the Divine mind, to make Gods judgment the standard of all life and conduct, so that the world should be governed by the principles of Gods righteousness. This is to be accomplished without noise or ostentation. This description of Christs character is remarkable for its omissions: it is a striking list of omissions. The Spirit works by a process of exclusion in revelation and sanctification, and in the restoration of righteousness in the world. (S. Chadwick.)
The ideal Israelite
Long before Christ appeared in the flesh, He had already appeared in the Spirit. The chapter carries us back to a time when the conception of a Saviour definitely began. Up to then there had been vague presentiments; after then there was a character prepared for the Jesus who was to come. So it is with all heroes, they are needed before they are born; they could not work their work unless they were needed and discerned; they have prophets to beget them as well as parents.
I. AN ACTUAL NAME APPLIED. The title of Gods servant is one that runs through all Oriental language. The Israelite people at large had failed,--the Jewish people, as reformed by Josiah, had failed,--it remained for God to justify His purpose by manifesting a new model, who should represent Him rightly to the Gentiles.
II. AN IDEAL DESCRIPTION GIVEN.
1. This genuine man of God must be a man of gentleness, and yet He should inherit the earth.
2. A method equally new would prevail in religion; there the true Missionary would proceed with tolerance; He would not thrust His revelation upon aliens, He would open their eyes to behold their own revelation; they also had lamps, dimly-burning, but still alight. Gods servant must not extinguish them, He must revive them.
3. But to be gentle in forwarding the right, tolerant in inculcating the true, tender in making allowance for the weak--all this belongs to consummate sympathy, and sympathy demands compensating qualities, for it has besetting defects. Converse with sensitive consciences is often enfeebling. Virtue goes out of us in the endeavour to impart strength, and the infection of fear overtakes the very physician. But our prophet has a strong intellect in view, a Helper who shall not be bruised by anything He has to bear.
4. There is about the perfect character the distinction of patience. He burns brightly in mind. He bears up bravely in heart, until He have set judgment in the earth. This true service has been fulfilled by the Carpenter of Nazareth--His qualities are on record; His spirit lasts. (B. H. Alford.)
Messiah and His work
I. THE CHARACTER AND SPIRIT OF THE MESSIAH.
II. THE WORK WITH WHICH, AS THE FATHERS SERVANT, HE HAD BEEN ENTRUSTED.
III. THE WAY IN WHICH HE WAS TO EXECUTE IT. He shall not fail, etc. (Original Secession Magazine.)
The service of God and man
I. THE CONSCIENCE OF THE SERVICE. Before being a service of man, it is a service for God. My servant.
II. THE SUBSTANCE OF SERVICE. Judgment for the nations shall He bring forth. According to truth shall He bring forth judgment. He shall not flag nor break, till He set in the earth judgment.
III. THE TEMPER OF SERVICE (Isa_42:2-3).
IV. THE POWER BEHIND SERVICE (Isa_42:5-6). (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)
Behold, My Servant!
They are rare qualities which Jehovah calls us to behold in the elect Servant: a Divine modesty; a Divine humility; a Divine perseverance.
I. THE MODESTY OF THE BEST WORK. God is always at work in our world, leading the progress of suns, refreshing grass with dew, directing the flight of the morning beams. But all His work is done so quietly, so unobtrusively, with such reticence as to His personal agency, that many affirm there is no God at all. Thus was it with the work of Christ. He put His hand on the mouths of those who proclaimed His deity, or blazoned abroad His fame. This quality is Gods hall-mark upon the best work. His highest artists do not inscribe their names upon their pictures, nor introduce their portraits amongst their groups.
II. THE HUMILITY OF THE BEST WORK. He has put down the mighty from their seat, and exalted the humble and meek. And so was it with our Lord. He passed by Herods palace, and chose Bethlehem and its manger bed. He refused empires of the world, and took the way of the cross. He selected His apostles and disciples from the ranks of the poor. He revealed His choicest secrets to babes. He left the society of the Pharisee and Scribe, and expended Himself on bruised reeds and smoking flax, on dying thieves and fallen women, and the peasantry of Galilee.
III. DIVINE PERSEVERANCE. Though our Lord is principally concerned with the bruised and the dimly-burning wick, He is neither one nor the other (see R.V., marg.). He is neither discouraged nor does He fail. This, again, is the quality of the best work. That which emanates from the flesh is full of passion, fury, and impulse. It essays to deliver Israel by a spasm of force that lays an Egyptian dead in the sand; but it soon exhausts itself, and sinks back nerveless and spent. It is impossible too strongly to emphasise the necessity of relying in Christian work on the co-witness of the Spirit of God. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
Purpose and method of the Redeemer
I. THE REDEEMERS PURPOSE. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles; He shall bring forth judgment unto truth, and He is to set judgment in the earth. The word judgment, as here used, has no better equivalent than righteousness, in the sense of that which is essentially right in heart and life, both toward God and man. This righteousness--rightness--in all the powers and operations of the soul, and in all its relations to God and the universe, is the master-need of mankind. The Redeemer has undertaken to meet this great need of the world. He came not to establish certain forms of theological thought and expression; not to set up certain ecclesiastical organisations and rituals--all these are of little worth, except in so far as they can be made the means to a vastly grander end. Jesus Christ came to establish essential righteousness in individual human souls, and so in the community and in the world. It is His grand purpose to enlighten the ignorance, to quicken the conscience, to energise the will, to purify the affections, and to exalt the aims of men, bringing them thus into harmony with God. He came to make every wrong right--to break the oppressors yoke, to banish cupidity and caste, ignorance and selfishness, and every form of sin. In the prosecution of this sublime purpose the Redeemer calls all His disciples into co-operation with Himself. In this they are to find the development of their own spiritual character, and by this the world is to be won for Christ.
II. THE REDEEMERS METHOD. This is set before us by the prophet in a fourfold view--
1. As authorised. Behold My Servant, whom I uphold; Mine elect, in whom My soul delighteth; I have put My Spirit upon Him. Here the Redeemer is represented as acting under the appointment and authorisation of the Eternal Father. Nor is it difficult to perceive why this is necessary. God, as the Sovereign, against whom man has offended, was alone competent to determine whether any mediation could be admitted between Himself and His rebellious creatures, and, if any, what the nature of that mediation should be. It is essential to any mans faith in redemption that he should recognise it as of God from the beginning. The interposition of Christ is first of all, and more than all, the manifestation of the Fathers impartial and everlasting love for lost men. The Redeemer is God, the equal of the Father in glory, majesty, power, divinity, and eternity; but He is God manifest in the flesh. As it was necessary that the Redeemer should be authorised, so it was necessary that the authority under which He acted should be explicitly attested. It was thus attested. Mine elect in whom My soul delighteth; I have put My Spirit upon Him (Luk_4:14). This aspect of His mission was clearly understood by His apostles (Act_4:27; Act_10:38). At intervals during His ministry there came to Him Divine attestation; at its close He was declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection of the dead: and having ascended to the Father He was constituted Head over all things to the Church, principlities and powers being made subject to Him, for it pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell.
2. As unostentatious (Isa_42:2). Messiahs mission was to be distinguished by no secular pomp, by no military glory. The Redeemers appearance was to be lowly, His operations silent and unobtrusive. The Saviour of men is great in gentleness. On this point prophecy is mysteriously impressive. History answers to prophecy. In the life of Jesus Christ there is a marvellous mingling of grandeur and humility. The same principle pervades the whole of His administration. There is marvellous grandeur, but there is deep lowliness. The Gospel has mysteriously subdued the hearts of men, forming into its own spirit tempers and habits the most alien from its nature.
3. As compassionate. A bruised reed, etc. Advancing to the realisation of His sublime purpose the Redeemer will not overlook the smallest acquisition; and His attention will be especially directed to those who are specially needy, weak, and helpless.
4. As persevering. He shall not fail, etc. He was not discouraged. He ploughed His way through all opposition from Bethlehem to Golgotha. The risen and exalted Redeemer is moving steadily on to His final and complete triumph. (R. R. Meredith, D. D.)
The Servant of Jehovah
I. THE CHARACTER HE SUSTAINS. Behold, My Servant, etc. In this capacity God sustained and protected Him. He is also set forth as the object of His special choice and affection. Mine elect, etc. He delighted in Him on account--
1. Of the close relationship that existed between them. Not merely was He Jehovahs Servant, but His only-begotten Son.
2. The resemblance He bore to Him.
3. His having engaged to execute the Divine purposes.
II. THE WORK HE HAD TO ACCOMPLISH.
1. For this work He was endowed with every requisite qualification. I have put My Spirit upon Him.
2. The work assigned to Him was very extensive in its range. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
3. The character of His work is here intimated. He was to bring forth judgment; for the religion He would establish was to be pre-eminently distinguished truth and righteousness.
III. THE MANNER IN WHICH IT WAS TO BE EFFECTED.
1. The absence of all ostentation and clamour. It is invariably found that it is not the most noisy that do the most work.
2. He was to evince great tenderness and compassion. A bruised reed, etc. These words were verified in His conduct towards two classes--
(1) The humble penitent.
(2) His bitterest foes. This passage is thus applied by Matthew (chap. 12.).
3. Perseverance in the face of all difficulties and discouragements. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, etc. (Anon.)
The coming Saviour
About these chapters, as a unit, a halo of Messianic brightness gathers, like the aureole with which painters surround the brow of Christ. In these verses (1-11) the prophet taught that--
I. THE COMING SAVIOUR WAS TO SET UP A KINGDOM WHICH SHOULD BE UNIVERSAL (Isa_42:1; Isa_42:4; Isa_42:6). Those whom Isaiah addressed supposed that true religion was to reach the world, if at all, through the channels of Judaism; they thought the only way to heaven was through the ,portals of the Jewish Church. The prophet declares that the benefits of Christ s kingdom are to extend to Jew and Gentile alike. No distinctions of race or clime are to arrest its growth. No wonder that under the thrill of such a vision he shouts, Sing unto the Lord a new song, and His praise from the end of the earth! It is sometimes said that the religious spirit of the Old Testament is narrow; that it makes God bestow His favours on the few, and not on the many. Can, however, a larger measure of grace be conceived than is here expressed?
II. CHRISTS KINGDOM WAS TO BE EXTENDED BY PEACEFUL MEASURES (verses 2, 3). The prophet addressed those who thought religious conquest was to be achieved by force. Hitherto conflicts had marked the intercourse of Gods chosen people with the Gentiles. The Jews looked for their coming king to be warlike. How strangely, then, does Isaiah describe their conquering prince,--He shall not cry, i.e shout as He advances, nor lift up, i.e make demonstration of His power, nor shall He cause His voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall He not break, and the smoking flax shall He not quench: He shall bring forth judgment unto truth, i.e truth shall be His victorious weapon. The element in Christianity to which our text refers makes that which is feeble among men powerful for Christ. It also makes it possible for all Christs servants to be efficient labourers. They become such by imbibing the spirit of the Master. Not all can publicly proclaim the Gospel, but every one can seek for the same mind which was in Christ.
III. CHRISTS KINGDOM WAS TO REVEAL GODS SYMPATHY WITH MAN, ESPECIALLY IN HIS SUFFERING. (verse 7). The primary reference in these figures is undoubtedly to spiritual results. Eyes morally blind are to be opened, and captive souls emancipated from the prison-house of sin. It is, however, no less true that bodily and mental freedom are included in the blessings of Messiahs reign. The Church is now the representative of the Divine sympathy for suffering; and she should not forget that, as of old, believers will be multiplied when it is seen that through her Christ now cares for bodies as well as souls.
IV. CHRISTS KINGDOM WAS TO FILL THE EARTH WITH JOY (verses 10, 11). As lessons from our subject we learn--
1. Christians should labour in hope. Isaiah suggests one of the strongest proofs of our Lords divinity by affirming, He shall not fail nor be discouraged until He have set judgment in the land. When we learn of the Master we catch a hopeful spirit.
2. The results of serving Christ are permanent. (Sermons by the Monday Club.)
Silent spread of Christianity
This prophecy accords with fact. Gibbon, in his History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, has the following words describing the silent but rapid spread of Christianity: While the Roman Empire was invaded by open violence or undermined by slow decay, a pure and humble religion gently insinuated itself into the minds of men, grew up in silence and obscurity, derived new vigour from opposition, and finally erected the triumphant banner of the Cross on the ruins of the Capitol. (Sermons by the Monday Club.)
The coming Saviour
I. OUR LORDS CHARACTER AS PORTRAYED IN PROPHECY.
1. That our Lord should come as a servant (Isa_42:1).
(1) This was His own testimony when He came (Mat_20:28; Joh_6:38).
(2) This is the testimony of the apostles (Php_2:6-8).
2. That our Lord was Divinely chosen for His work. Mine elect (1Pe_2:6-7).
3. That our Lord should be endowed with the Holy Spirit. I have put My Spirit upon Him (Mat_3:16-17; Luk_4:14; Luk_4:18-19; Heb_9:14; Heb_1:9).
4. That our Lord would institute a religion for the Gentiles (Isa_42:1). Such is the force of the word judgment.
5. That His Spirit would be most tender and gentle (Isa_42:2-3).
(1) This, surely, is a correct description of the historic Christ. His own testimony (Mat_11:29). The testimony of His apostles Heb_7:26; Heb_12:2-3; 1Pe_2:21-24).
(2) In this He gave His disciples an example.
6. That His courage would be equal to His gentleness (verse 4).
(1) It is not the noisy and boastful that are the most courageous and reliable.
(2) The deeper our conviction of the truthfulness of our cause the more patient and gentle may we be in its advocacy.
(3) The commission of Christ to His disciples proves His entire confidence in the success of His cause.
II. OUR LORDS COMMISSION FORETOLD IN PROPHECY.
1. In its authority (verses 5, 9). The authority is the highest in respect to power and principle.
2. In its purpose (verse 7).
(1) Our Lord appropriates the terms of this commission to Himself Luk_4:17-19).
(2) This is the commission He fulfilled in His life.
III. BOTH THE CHARACTER AND COMMISSION OF CHRIST ARE JUST INCENTIVES TO THANKSGIVING TO GOD (verse 10).
1. All should praise God.
2. To praise God for Christ intelligently we must personally experience His saving power.
Lessons--
1. The study of prophecy is the imperative duty of every child of God.
2. The most inspiring portions of prophecy are those which centre in the person and work of our Lord Jesus.
3. No prophecy can be fully understood that is not interpreted in the light of Christs work. For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.
4. Christianity is a religion for the whole race (verse 4).
5. The gentleness with which its advocates should be characterised and the beneficent designs of its mission must commend it, when rightly represented, to all nations, climes, and tongues.
6. Under no circumstances will our Lord justify His disciples in an advocacy of His Gospel in a spirit antagonistic to His own.
7. Let all disciples of Christ copy His life, spirit and love, and work for the gracious ends for which He lived and died! (Homiletic Review.)
The servant of Jehovah
This chapter exhibits to our view the servant of Jehovah, i.e the Messiah and His people, as a complex person, and as the messenger or representative of God among the nations.
1. His mode of operation is described as being not violent but peaceful (Isa_42:1-5).
2. The effects of His influence are represented as not natural but spiritual (Isa_42:6-9).
3. The power of God is pledged for His success, notwithstanding all appearances of inaction or indifference on His part (Isa_42:10-17). (J. A. Alexander.)
Mine elect in whom My soul delighteth
Christ delighted in by the Father
Christ Jesus was the elect of God, inasmuch as from all eternity infinite wisdom had chosen Him to execute the sovereign purposes of infinite mercy. We may pronounce that the Father delighted in His elect, because--
I. THE MEDIATION OF CHRIST MAGNIFIED EVERY DIVINE ATTRIBUTE.
II. IT ALSO MET EVERY HUMAN NECESSITY. (H. Melvill, B. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v1
CHAPTER XVIII
THE SERVICE OF GOD AND MAN
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Isa_42:1-7
WE now understand whom to regard as the Servant of the Lord. The Service of God was a commission to witness and prophesy for God upon earth, made out at first in the name of the entire nation Israel. When their unfitness as a whole became apparent, it was delegated to a portion of them. But as there were added to its duties of prophecy, those of martyrdom and atonement for the sins of the people, our prophet, it would seem, saw it focussed in the person of an individual.
In history Jesus Christ has fulfilled this commission both in its national and in its personal aspects. He realised the ideal of the prophet-people. He sacrificed Himself and made atonement for the sins of men. But having illustrated the service of God in the world, Christ did not exhaust it. He returned it to His people, a more clamant conscience than ever, and He also gave them grace to fulfil its demands. Through Christ the original destination of these prophecies becomes, as Paul saw, their ultimate destination as well. That Israel refused this Service or failed in it only leaves it more clearly to us as duty; that Jesus fulfilled it not only confirms that duty, but adds hope and courage to discharge it.
Although the terms of this Service were published nearly two thousand five hundred years ago, in a petty dialect that is now dead, to a helpless tribe of captives in a world whose civilisation has long sunk to ruin, yet these terms are so free of all that is provincial or antique, they are so adapted to the lasting needs of humanity, they are so universal in their scope, they are so instinct with that love which never faileth, though prophecies fail and tongues cease, that they come home to heart and conscience today with as much tenderness and authority as ever. The first programme of these terms is given in Isa_42:1-7. The authorised English version is one of unapproachable beauty, but its emphasis and rhythm are not the emphasis and rhythm of the original, and it has missed one at least of the striking points of the Hebrew. The following version, which makes no attempt at elegance, is almost literal, follows the same order as the original that it may reproduce the same emphasis, and, as far as English can, repeats the original rhythm. The point, which it rescues from the neglect of the Authorised Version, is this, that the verbs used of the Servant in Isa_42:4, "He shall not fade nor break," are the same as are used of the wick and the reed in Isa_42:3.
Lo, My Servant I hold by him; My Chosen!
Well-pleased is My soul!
I have set My Spirit upon him;
Law to the Nations he brings forth.
He cries not, nor lifts up,
Nor lets his voice be heard in the street.
Reed that is broken he breaks not off,
Wick that is fading he does not quench;
Faithfully brings he forth Law.
He shall not fade neither break,
Till he have set in the Earth Law;
And for his teaching the Isles are waiting.
Thus saith the God, Jehovah,
Creator of the heavens that stretched them forth,
Spreader of Earth and her produce,
Giver of breath to the people upon her,
And of spirit to them that walk therein:
I, Jehovah, have called thee in righteousness,
To grasp thee fast by thy hand, and to keep thee,
And to set thee for a covenant of the People,
For a light of the Nations:
To open blind eyes,
To bring forth from durance the captive,
From prison the dwellers in darkness.
I. THE CONSCIENCE OF SERVICE
As several of these lines indicate, this is a Service to Man, but what we must first fasten upon is that before being a Service to Man it is a Service for God. "Behold, My Servant," says Gods commission very emphatically. And throughout the prophecy the Servant is presented as chosen of God, inspired of God, equipped of God, Gods creature, Gods instrument; useful only because he is used, influential because he is influenced, victorious because he is obedient; learning the methods of his work by daily wakefulness to Gods voice, a good speaker only because he is first a good listener; with no strength or courage but what God lends, and achieving all for Gods glory. Notice how strongly it is said that God "holds by him. grasps him by the hand." We shall see that his Service is as sympathetic and comprehensive a purpose for humanity as was ever dreamed in any thought or dared in any life. Whether we consider its tenderness for individuals, or the universalism of its hope for the world, or its gentle appreciation of all human effort and aspiration, or its conscience of mankinds chief evil, or the utterness of its self-sacrifice in order to redeem men, -we shall own it to be a programme of human duty, and a prophecy of human destiny, to which the growing experience of our race has been able to add nothing that is essential. But the Service becomes all that to man, because it first takes all that from God. Not only is the Servants sense of duty to all humanity just the conscience of Gods universal sovereignty, -for it is a remarkable and never-to-be-forgotten fact, that Israel recognised their Gods right to the whole world, before they felt their own duty to mankind, -but the Servants character and methods are the reflection of the Divine. Feature by feature the Servant corresponds to His Lord. His patience is but sympathy with Jehovahs righteousness, -"I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness." His gentleness with the unprofitable and the unlovely "He breaks not off the broken reed nor quenches the flickering wick"-is but the temper of "the everlasting God, who giveth power to the faint, and to them that have no might He increaseth strength." His labour and passion and agony, even they have been anticipated in the Divine nature, for "the Lord stirreth up zeal like a man of war; He saith, I will cry out like a travailing woman." In no detail is the Servant above his Master. His character is not original, but is the impress of his Gods: "I have put My spirit upon him."
There are many in our day, who deny this indebtedness of the human character to the Divine, and in the Service of Man would have us turn our backs upon God. Positivists, while admitting that the earliest enthusiasm of the individual for his race did originate in the love of a Divine Being, assert nevertheless that we have grown away from this illusory motive; and that in the example of humanity itself we may find all the requisite impulse to serve it. The philosophy of history, which the extreme Socialists have put forward, is even more explicit. According to them, mankind was disturbed in a primitive, tribal socialism-or service of each other-by the rise of spiritual religion, which drew the individual away from his kind and absorbed him in selfish relations to God. Such a stage, represented by the Hebrew and Christian faiths, and by the individualist political economy which has run concurrent with the later developments of Christianity, was (so these Socialists admit) perhaps necessary for temporary discipline and culture, like the land of Egypt to starved Jacobs children; but like Egypt, when it turned out to be the house of bondage, the individualist economy and religion are now to be abandoned for the original land of promise, -Socialism once more, but universal instead of tribal as of old. Out of this analogy, which is such Socialists own, Sinai and the Ten Commandments are, of course, omitted. We are to march back to freedom without a God, and settle down to love and serve each other by administration.
But can we turn our backs on God without hurting man? The natural history of philanthropy would seem to say that we cannot. This prophecy is one of its witnesses. Earliest ideal as it is, of a universal service of mankind, it starts in its obligation from the universal Sovereignty of God; it starts in every one of its affections from some affection of the Divine character. And we have not grown away from the need of its everlasting sources. Cut off God from the Service of man, and the long habit and inherent beauty of that Service may perpetuate its customs for a few generations; but the inevitable call must come to subject conduct to the altered intellectual conditions, and in the absence of God every mans ideal shall surely turn from, How can I serve my neighbour? to How can I make my neighbour serve me? As our prophet reminds us in his vivid contrast between Israel, the Servant of the Lord, and Babylon, "who saith in her heart: I am, and there is none beside me," there are ultimately but two alternative lords of the human will, God and Self. If we revolt from the Authority and Example of the One, we shall surely become subject, in the long run, to the ignorance, the short-sightedness, the pedantry, the cruelty of the other. These words are used advisedly.
With no sense of the sacredness of every human life as created in the image of God, and with no example of an Infinite Mercy before them, men would leave to perish all that was weak, or, from the limited point of view of a single community or generation, unprofitable. Some Positivists, and those Socialists who do not include God in the society they seek to establish, admit that they expect something like that to follow from their denial of God. In certain Positivist proposals for the reform of charity, we are told that the ideal scheme of social relief would be the one which limited itself to persons judged to be of use to the community as a whole; that is, that in their succour of the weak, their bounty to the poor, and their care of the young, society should be guided, not by the eternal laws of justice and of mercy, but by the opinions of the representatives of the public for the time being and by their standard of utility to the commonwealth. Your atheist-Socialist is still more frank. In the state, which he sees rising after he has got rid of Christianity, he would suppress, he tells us, all who preached such a thing as the fear of the future life, and he would not repeat the present exceptional legislation for the protection of women and children, for whom, he whines, far too much has been recently done in comparison with what has been enacted for the protection of men. These are, of course, but vain things which the heathen imagine (and some of us have an ideal of socialism very different from the godlessness which has usurped the noble name), but they serve to illustrate what clever men, who have thrown off all belief in God, will bring themselves to hope for: a society utterly Babylonian, without pity or patience, -if it were possible for these eternal graces to die out of any human community, -subject to the opinion of pedants, whose tender mercies would be far more fatal to the weak and poor than the present indifference of the rich; seriously fettering liberty of conscience and destitute of chivalry. It may be that our Positivist critics are right, and that the interests of humanity have suffered in Christian times from the prevalence of too selfish and introspective a religion; but whether our religion has looked too intensely inward or not, we cannot, it is certain, do without a religion that looks steadily up, owning the discipline of Divine Law and the example of an Infinite Mercy and Longsuffering.
But, though we had never heard of Positivism or of the Socialism that denies God, our age, with its popular and public habits, would still require this example of Service, which our prophecy enforces: it is an age so charged with the instincts of work, with the ambition to be useful, with the fashion of altruism; but so empty of the sense of God, of reverence, discipline, and prayer. We do not need to learn philanthropy, -the thing is in the air; but we do need to be taught that philanthropy demands a theology both for its purity and its effectiveness. When philanthropy has become, what it is so much today, the contest of rival politicians, the ambition of every demagogue who can get his head above the crowd, the fitful self-indulgence of weak hearts, the opportunity of vain theorists, and for all a temptation to work with lawless means for selfish ends, -it is time to remember that the Service of Man is first of all a great Service for God. This faith alone can keep us from the wilfulness, the crochets, and the insubordination, which spoil so many well-intentioned to their kind, and so woefully break up the ranks of progress. Humility is the first need of the philanthropist of today: humility, discipline, and the sense of proportion; and these are qualities which only faith in God and the conscience of law are known to bestow upon the human heart. It is the fear of God that will best preserve us from making our philanthropy the mere flattery of the popular appetite. To keep us utterly patient with men we need to think of Gods patience with ourselves; while to us all there come calls to sacrifice, which our fellow men may so little deserve from us, and against which our self-culture can plead so many reasons, that unless Gods will and example were before us, the calls would never be obeyed. In short, to be most useful in this life it is necessary to feel that we are used. Look at Christ. To Him philanthropy was no mere habit and spontaneous affection; even for that great heart the love of man had to be enforced by the compulsion of the will of God. The busy days of healing and teaching had between them long nights of lonely prayer: and the Son of God did not pass to His supreme self-sacrifice for men till after the struggle with, and the submission to, His Fathers will in Gethsemane.
II. THE SUBSTANCE OF SERVICE
The substance of the Servants work is stated in one word, uttered thrice in emphatic positions. "Judgment for the nations shall he bring forth. According to truth shall he bring forth judgment. He shall not flag nor break, till he set in the earth judgment."
The English word "judgment" is a natural but misleading translation of the original, and we must dismiss at once the idea of judicial sentence, which it suggests. The Hebrew is "mishpat," which means, among other things, either a single statute, or the complete body of law which God gave Israel by Moses, at once their creed and their code; or, perhaps, also the abstract quality of justice or right. We rendered it as the latter in Isaiah 1-39. But, as will be seen from the note below, when used in Isaiah 40-66 without the article, as here, it is the "mishpat" of Jehovah, -not so much the actual body of statutes given to Israel, as the principles of right or justice which they enforce. In one passage it is given in parallel to the civic virtues "righteousness," "truth," "uprightness," but-as its etymology compared with theirs shows us-it is these viewed not in their character as virtues, but in their obligation as ordained by God. Hence, "duty" to Jehovah as inseparable from His religion (Ewald), "religion" as the law of life (Delitzsch), "the law" (Cheyne, who admirably compares the Arabic ed-Din) are all good renderings. Professor Davidson gives the fullest exposition. "It can scarcely," he says, "be rendered religion in the modern sense; it is the equity and civil right which is the result of the true religion of Jehovah: and though comprehended under religion in the Old Testament sense, is rather, according to our conceptions, religion applied in civil life. Of old the religious unit was the state, and the life of the state was the expression of its religion. Morality was law or custom, and both reposed upon God. A condition of thought such as now prevails, where morality is based on independent grounds, whether natural law or the principles inherent in the mind apart from religion, did not then exist. What the prophet means by bringing forth right is explained in another passage, where it is said that Jehovahs arms shall judge the peoples, and that the isles shall wait for His arm. {Isa_51:5} Judgment is that pervading of life by the principles of equity and humanity which is the immediate effect of the true religion of Jehovah." In short, "mishpat" is not only the civic righteousness and justice, to which it is made parallel in our prophecy, but it is these with God behind them. On the one hand it is conterminous with national virtue, on the other it is the ordinance and will of God.
This, then, is the burden of the Servants work, to pervade and instruct every nations life on earth with the righteousness and piety that are ordained of God. "He shall not flag nor break, till he have set in the earth Law,"-till in every nation justice, humanity, and worship are established as the law of God. We have seen that the Servant is in this passage still some aspect or shape of the people, -the people who are not a people, but scattered among the brickfields of Babylonia, a horde of captives. When we keep that in mind, two or three things come home to us about this task of theirs. First, it is no mere effort at proselytism. It is not an ambition to Judaise the world. The national consciousness and provincial habits, which cling about so many of the prophecies of Israels relation to the world, have dropped from this one, and the nations mission is identified with the establishment of law, the diffusion of light, the relief of suffering. "I will give thee for a light to the nations: to open blind eyes, to bring out from durance the bound, from the prison the dwellers in darkness." Again, it is no mere office of preaching to which the Servants commission is limited, no mere inculcation of articles of belief. But we have here the same rich, broad idea of religion, identifying it with the whole national life, which we found so often illustrated by Isaiah, and which is one of the beneficial results to religion of Gods choice for Himself of a nation as a whole. What such a Service has to give the world, is not merely testimony to the truth, nor fresh views of it, nor artistic methods of teaching it; but social life under its obligation, the public conscience of it, the long tradition and habit of it, the breed-what the prophets call the "seed"-of it. To establish true religion as the constitution, national duty, and regular practice of every people under the sun, in all the details of order, cleanliness, justice, purity, and mercy, in which it had been applied to themselves, -such was the Service and the Destiny of Israel. And the marvel of so universal and political an ideal was that it came not to a people in the front ranks of civilisation or of empire, but to a people that at the time had not even a political shape for themselves, -a mere herd of captives, despised and rejected of men. When we realise this, we understand that they never would have dared to think of it, or to speak of it to one another, unless they had believed it to be the purpose and will of Almighty God for them; unless they had recognised it, not only as a service desirable and true in itself, and needed also by humanity, but withal as His "mishpat," His "judgment"or "law," who by His bare word can bring all things to pass. But before we see how strongly He impressed them with this, that His creative force was in their mission, let us turn to the methods by which He commanded them to achieve it, -methods corresponding to its purely spiritual and universal character.
III. THE TEMPER OF SERVICE
1. He shall not cry, nor lift up,
Nor make his voice to be heard in the street.
There is nothing more characteristic of our prophecy than its belief in the power of speech, its exultation in the music and spell of the human voice. It opens with a chorus of high calls: none are so lovely to it as heralds, or so musical as watchmen when they lift up the voice; it sets the preaching of glad tidings before the people as their national ideal; eloquence it describes as a sharp sword leaping from Gods scabbard. The Servant of the Lord is trained in style of speech; his words are as pointed arrows; he has the mouth of the learned, a voice to command obedience. The prophets own tones are superb: nowhere else does the short sententiousness of Hebrew roll out into such long, sonorous periods. He uses speech in every style: for comfort, for bitter controversy, in clear proclamation, in deep-throated denunciation: "Call with the throat, spare not, lift up the voice like a trumpet." His constant key-notes are, "speak a word, lift up the voice with strength, sing, publish, declare." In fact, there is no use to which the human voice has ever been put in the Service of Man, for comforts sake, or for justice, or for liberty, for the diffusion of knowledge or for the scattering of music, which our prophet does not enlist and urge upon his people.
When, then, he says of the Servant that "he shall not cry, nor lift up, nor make his voice to be heard in the street," he cannot be referring to the means and art of the Service, but rather to the tone and character of the Servant. Each of the triplet of verbs he uses shows us this. The first one, translated "cry," is not the cry or call of the herald voice in chapter 40, the high, clear Kara; it is ssaak, a sharper word with a choke in the centre of it, meaning to scream, especially under excitement. Then "to lift up" is the exact equivalent of our "to be loud." And if we were seeking to translate into Hebrew our phrase "to advertise oneself," we could not find a closer expression for it than to "make his voice be heard in the street." To be "screamy," to be "loud," to "advertise oneself,"-these modern expressions for vices that were ancient as well as modern render the exact force of the verse. Such the Servant of God will not be nor do. He is at once too strong, too meek, and too practical. That God is with him, "holding him fast," keeps him calm and unhysterical; that he is but Gods instrument keeps him humble and quiet; and that his heart is in his work keeps him from advertising himself at its expense. It is perhaps especially for the last of these reasons that Matthew (in his twelfth chapter) quotes this passage of our Lord. Jesus had been disturbed in His labours of healing by the disputations Pharisees. He had answered them, and then withdrawn from their neighbourhood. Many sick were brought after Him to His privacy, and He healed them all. But "He charged them that they should not make Him known; that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Behold, My Servant he shall not strive, nor cry aloud, neither shall any one hear his voice in the streets." Now this cannot be, what some carelessly take it for, an example against controversy or debate of all kinds, for Jesus had Himself just been debating; nor can it be meant as an absolute forbidding of all publishing of good works, for Christ has shown us, on other occasions, that such advertisement is good. The difficulty is explained, by what we have seen to explain other perplexing actions of our Lord, His intensely practical spirit. The work to be done determined everything. When it made argument necessary, as that same day it had done in the synagogue, then our Lord entered on argument: He did not only heal the man with the withered hand, but He made him the text of a sermon. But when talking about His work hindered it, provoked the Pharisees to come near with their questions, and took up His time and strength in disputes with them, then for the works sake He forbade to talk about it. We have no trace of evidence that Christ forbade this advertisement also for His own sake, -as a temptation to Himself and fraught with evil effects upon His feelings. We know that it is for this reason we have to shun it. Even though we are quite guiltless of contributing to such publication ourselves, and it is the work of generous and well-meaning friends, it still becomes a very great danger to us. For it is apt to fever us and exhaust our nervous force, even when it does not turn our heads with its praise, -to distract us and to draw us more and more into the enervating habit of paying attention to popular opinion. Therefore, as a man values his efficiency in the Service of Man, he will not "make himself to be heard in the street." There is an amount of "making to be heard" which is absolutely necessary for the works sake; but there is also an amount which can be indulged in only at the works expense. Present-day philanthropy, even with the best intentions, suffers from this over-publicity, and its besetting sins are "loudness" and hysteria.
What, then, shall tell us how far we can go? What shall teach us how to be eloquent without screaming, clear without being loud, impressive without wasting our strength in seeking to make an impression? These questions bring us back to what we started with, as the indispensable requisite for service-some guiding and religious principles behind even the kindliest and steadiest tempers. For many things in the Service of Man no exact rules will avail; neither logic nor by-laws of administration can teach us to observe the uncertain and constantly varying degree of duty, which they demand. Tact for that is bestowed only by the influence of lofty principles working from above. This is a case in point. What rules of logic or "directions of the superior authority" can, in the Service of Man, distinguish for us between excitement and earnestness, bluster and eloquence, energy and mere self-advertisement; on whose subtle differences the whole success of the service must turn. Only the discipline of faith, only the sense of God, can help us here. The practical temper, by itself will not help us. To be busy but gives us too great self-importance; and hard work often serves only to bring out the combative instincts. To know that we are His Servants shall keep us meek; that we are held fast by His hand shall keep us calm; that His great laws are not abrogated shall keep us sane. When for our lowliest and most commonplace kinds of service we think no religion is required, let us remember the solemn introduction of the evangelist to his story of the foot-washing. "Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He came forth from God and goeth into God, riseth from supper, and layeth aside His garments; and He took a towel, and girded Himself; then He poureth water into the bason, and began to wash His disciples feet."
2. But to meekness and discipline the Servant adds gentleness.
Reed that is broken he breaks not off,
Wick that is fading he does not quench;
Faithfully brings he forth law.
The force of the last of these three lines is, of course, qualificative and conditional. It is set as a guard against the abuse of the first two, and means that though the Servant in dealing with men is to be solicitous about their weakness, yet the interests of religion shall in no way suffer. Mercy shall be practised, but so that truth is not compromised.
The original application of the verse is thus finely stated by Professor Davidson: "This is the singularly humane and compassionate view the Prophet takes of the Gentiles, -they are bruised reeds and expiring flames What the prophet may refer to is the human virtues, expiring among the nations, but not yet dead; the sense of God, debased by idolatries, but not extinct; the consciousness in the individual soul of its own worth and its capacities, and the glimmering ideal of a true life and a worthy activity almost crushed out by the grinding tyranny of rulers and the miseries entailed by their ambitions-this flickering light the Servant shall feed and blow into a flame. It is the future relation of the people Israel to other peoples that he describes. The thought which has now taken possession of statesmen of the higher class, that the point of contact between nation and nation need not be the sword, that the advantage of one people is not the loss of another but the gain of mankind, that the land where freedom has grown to maturity and is worshipped in her virgin serenity and loveliness should nurse the new-born babe in other homes, and that the strange powers of the mind of man and the subtle activities of his hand should not be repressed but fostered in every people, in order that the product may be poured into the general lap of the race-this idea is supposed to be due to Christianity. And, immediately, it is; but it is older than Christianity. It is found in this Prophet. And it is not new in him, for a Prophet, presumably a century and a half his senior, had said: "The remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many peoples as a dew from the Lord, as showers upon the grass"." {Mic_5:7}
But while this national reference may be the one originally meant, the splendid vagueness of the metaphor forbids us to be content with it, or with any solitary application. For the two clauses are as the eyes of the All-Pitiful Father, that rest wherever on this broad earth there is any life, though it be so low as to be conscious only through pain or doubt; they are as the healing palms of Jesus stretched over the multitudes to bless and gather to Himself the weary and the poor in spirit. We contrast our miserable ruin of character, our feeble sparks of desire after holiness, with the life which Christ demands and has promised, and in despair we tell ourselves, this can never become that. But it is precisely this that Christ has come to lift to that. The first chapter of the Sermon on the Mount closes with the awful command, "Be ye perfect, as your Father in Heaven is perfect"; but we work our way back through the chapter, and we come to this, "Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled"; and to this, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Such is Christs treatment of the bruised reed and the smoking flax. Let us not despair. There is only one kind of men for whom it has no gospel, -the dead and they who are steeped in worldliness, who have forgotten what the pain of a sore conscience is, and are strangers to humility and aspiration. But for all who know their life, were it only through their pain or their doubt, were it only in the despair of what they feel to be a last struggle with temptation, were it only in contrition for their sin or in shame for their uselessness, this text has hope. "Reed that is broken he breaketh not off, wick that is fading he doth not quench."
This objective sense of the Servants temper must always be the first for us to understand. For more than he was, we are, mortal, ready ourselves to "break and to fade." But having experienced the grace, let us show the same in our service to others. Let us understand that we are sent forth like the great Servant of God, that man "may have life, and have it more abundantly." We need resolutely and with pious obstinacy to set this temper before us, for it is not natural to our hearts. Even the best of us, in the excitement of our work, forget to think of anything except of making our mark, or of getting the better of what we are at work upon. When work grows hard, the combative instincts waken within us, till we look upon the characters God has given us to mould as enemies to be fought. We are passionate to convince men, to overcome them with an argument, to wring the confession from them that we are right and they wrong. Now Christ our Master must have seen in every man He met a very great deal more to be fought and extirpated than we can possibly see in one another. Yet He largely left that alone, and addressed Himself rather to the sparks of nobility He found, and fostered these to a strong life, which from within overcame the badness of the man, -the badness which opposition from the outside would but have beaten into harder obduracy. We must ever remember that we are not warriors but artists, -artists after the fashion of Jesus Christ, who came not to condemn life because it was imperfect, but to build life up to the image of God. So He sends us to be artists; as it is written, "He gave some apostles, and some prophets, and some pastors and teachers." For what end? For convincing men, for telling them what fools they mostly are, for crushing them in the inquisition of their own conscience, for getting the better of them in argument?-no, not for these combative purposes at all, but for fostering and artistic ones: "for the perfecting of the saints, for the building up of the body of Christ; till we all come unto a full grown man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ."
He who, in his Service of Man, practises such a temper towards the breaking and the fading, shall never himself break or fade, as this prophecy implies when it uses the same verbs in verses three and four. For he who is loyal to life shall find life generous to him; he who is careful of weakness shall never want for strength.
IV. THE POWER BEHIND SERVICE.
There only remains now to emphasise the power that is behind Service. It is, say verses five and six (Isa_42:5-6), the Creative Power of God.
Thus saith The God, Jehovah,
Creator of the heavens, that stretched them forth,
Spreader of the earth and her produce,
Giver of breath to the people upon her,
And of spirit to them that walk thereon,
I, Jehovah, have called thee in righteousness,
That I may grasp thee by thy hand, and keep thee.
Majestic confirmation of the call to Service! based upon the fundamental granite of this whole prophecy, which here crops out into a noble peak, firm station for the Servant, and point for prospect of all the future. It is our easy fault to read these words of the Creator as the utterance of mere ceremonial commonplace, blast of trumpets at the going forth of a hero, scenery for his stage, the pomp of nature summoned to assist at the presentation of Gods elect before the world. Yet not for splendour were they spoken, but for bare faiths sake. Gods Servant has been sent forth, weak and gentle, with quiet methods and to very slow effects. "He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor make his voice to be heard in the streets." What chance has such, our service, in the ways of the world, where to be forceful and selfish, to bluster and battle, is to survive and overcome! So we speak, and the panic ambition rises to fight the world with its own weapons, and to employ the kinds of debate, advertisement, and competition by which the world goes forward. For this, the Creator calls to us, and marshals His powers before our eyes. We thought there were but two things, -our own silence and the worlds noise. There are three, and the worlds noise is only an interruption between the other two. Aeross it deep calleth unto deep; the immeasurable processes of creation cry to the feeble convictions of truth in our hearts, We are one. Creation is the certificate that no moral effort is a forlorn hope. When God, after repeating His results in creation, adds, I have called thee in "righteousness," He means that there is some consistency between His processes in creation, rational and immense as they are, and those poor efforts He calls on our weakness to make, which look so foolish in face of the world. Behind every moral effort there is, He says, Creative force. Right and Might are ultimately one. Paul sums up the force of the passage, when, after speaking of the success of his ministry, he gives as its reason that the God of Creation and of Grace are the same. "Therefore seeing we have received this ministry we faint not. For God, who hath commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ."
The spiritual Service of Man, then, has creative forces behind it; work for God upon the hearts and characters of others has creative force behind it. And nature is the seal and the sacrament of this. Let our souls, therefore, dilate with her prospects. Let our impatience study her reasonableness and her laws. Let our weak wills feel the rush of her tides. For the power that is in her, and the faithful pursuance of purposes to their ends, are the power and the character that work behind each witness of our conscience, each effort of our heart for others. Not less strong than she, not less calm, not less certain of success, shall prove the moral Service of Man.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv1, 5 (Missionary Sermon.)
THE FATHER’S ELECT SERVANT
(Missionary Sermon.)
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Isa_42:1; Isa_42:4. Behold My Servant, &c.
These words belong to one of the most impressive portions of the prophetic Scriptures, and unquestionably relate to the character and work of our Lord Jesus Christ. This might be argued with sufficient certainty from the internal evidence of the passage itself; but it is expressly affirmed, moreover, by an inspired expositor (Mat_12:17-21). Our text is descriptive of the whole work and administration of the Messiah. It calls us to behold, with admiring attention—
I. THE MESSIAH’S OFFICIAL CHARACTER AND QUALIFICATIONS.
1. Our blessed Saviour is the Father’s Servant. It is entirely in reference to His mediatorial work that our Lord is denominated the Father’s Servant (Isa_52:13; Isa_53:11; Isa_49:6). In His divine nature, as the SON, He possesses, from eternity to eternity, an essential equality with the FATHER. But, for the purpose of recovering our fallen race to holiness and happiness, and of re-establishing that divine dominion over man which sin had subverted, He laid His glory by, and sustains the character of a servant to Him who sent Him (Php_2:6-7; Heb_10:7). Nor was it only in His mediatorial humiliation that He acknowledged the Father’s will and conducted Himself as a servant. He does so now in His mediatorial exaltation. That exaltation He enjoys as the recompense of His acts and services of filial submission and zeal (H. E. I. 919); and He administers His kingdom with a view to the glory of the Father, to whom He will ultimately resign it, that God may be all in all (Php_2:9-11; 1Co_15:27-28; H. E. I. 985).
2. Our Redeemer is the Father’s Elect—called of God to the mediatorial office (Heb_5:4-6). In Him alone did God behold the attributes and perfections indispensable for the work of salvation.
(1.) None but a divine person could, as the great prophet of the Lord, manifest the Father’s name to a world which had not known Him (Joh_1:18; H. E. I. 847–848).
(2.) He was ordained to offer a vicarious sacrifice for the sins of the world, and to present effectual intercession for as many as should come unto God by Him. The merit and prevalency of these acts depended materially on the spotless purity and infinite dignity of the sacrifice which was to be offered, and of the Priest who was to intercede (Heb_7:26-28).
(3.) The government was to be on the shoulders of the Messiah. He was to undertake the administration of a spiritual kingdom which requires for the proper transaction of its vast and immensely complicated concerns a wisdom and energy such as no creature can exert. On all these accounts, when the servant was to be chosen to whom the business of salvation was to be intrusted, the elect must needs be the FELLOW OF JEHOVAH.
3. The Divine Person thus and for these purposes chosen by the Father appeared in the form of a servant, by assuming human nature into an ineffable union with the divine nature which belonged to Him from eternity. To qualify that human nature for the momentous duties which the office of Mediator involved, it was made the subject of an unexampled and peculiar anointing from the Holy One: “I have put my spirit upon Him” (cf. Isa_11:1-2; Isa_66:1-3; and Luk_4:17-21; Joh_3:24; Heb_1:8-9). From all these texts we learn that there were certain qualifications of our Lord’s human nature as essential, in their place and measure, to His success, as the higher attributes which belonged to the divine nature; and that these qualifications were not supplied to the humanity directly and immediately by the simple fact of its personal union with the divinity, but mediately by the unction of the Holy Spirit (Act_10:38). [1351]
[1351] The rational soul in our Lord’s nature was a distinct thing from the principle of Divinity to which it was so united; and being so distinct, like the souls of other men, it owed the right use of its faculties in its exercise of them on religious subjects, and its uncorrupted rectitude of will, to the influence of the Holy Spirit of God.—Horsley.
4. Thus chosen and qualified for the service of God, in the discharge of His functions He is upheld by His Divine Father.
(1.) This may refer partly to the personal succours afforded to our Lord in the course of His life and ministry on earth at seasons of peculiar emergency and trial (Mat_4:11; Luk_22:43).
(2.) But it more especially refers to the divine supports afforded to our Redeemer in His mediatorial administration and government. Every dispensation of Providence toward individuals and nations is arranged in entire subserviency to the great purposes for which Christ lived, died, and rose again. So that while He is the Father’s Servant, all are His servants (Eph_1:20-22).
(3.) This expression also intimates the high sanction and supreme authority of Jesus Christ. From His teaching and administration, though He be a servant, there is no appeal to the Father who employs Him. God will for ever uphold, and in no one case, nor on any account whatsoever, will He counteract or alter the measures of His Son’s government (Joh_5:22-23). Let this teach us how seriously and carefully we ought to study the will of Christ.
5. He is also acceptable and approved; one in whom the Father’s soul delighteth.
(1.) This delight has respect, generally, to Christ Himself, as the Agent of redemption (Joh_5:20; Mat_17:5).
(2.) It has a particular respect to the sacrifice of atonement made by the death of Christ for guilty man (Joh_10:17; Eph_5:2).
(3.) It has a reference to the Mediator in His present character and operations as the Head of the Church, and the Agent by whom the plans for its gradual enlargement and ultimate perfection are constantly superintended, and shall be brought in due season to a prosperous issue. The salvation of man by Jesus Christ is the concern which is nearest and dearest to His heart, and in the process and consummation of which He takes the highest pleasure.
From the view now taken of the official character of our Saviour we may derive instruction in reference to all Christian ministers and missionaries. He that will as such be God’s servant must, like the Mediator Himself, be able to allege God’s choice and call of him to that office (Joh_15:16). Upon all God’s chosen servants Christ is ready to put the same Spirit of power and holiness which the text describes the Father as having put upon Him. For such full baptism of that Spirit, let them apply in prayer and faith. Many other qualifications for their work are desirable, but this is indispensable. Having that, let them be thankful for the high honour God has conferred upon them in putting them into the ministerial office, mindful of its momentous responsibilities, careful to do God’s will faithfully, diligently, and heartily, and, like their great Pattern, be so intent on their Master’s work and glory, as never to allow any selfish interest or gratification to interfere for one moment with their ministerial duties. Such men will be upheld in their work by divine grace and providence; and God will smile with acceptance on their labours of love. Thus, in truth, He in one respect accomplishes the promise made in the text to the Mediator Himself.
To the Church of Christ our text speaks the language of instruction in righteousness. It reminds us of our duty to pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth such labourers into His harvest.
II. THE WORK FOR WHICH MESSIAH HAS RECEIVED THIS OFFICIAL CHARACTER AND QUALIFICATION.
“He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles”—a prediction of the illumination and conversion of heathen tribes. Great privileges were once granted to the Jews exclusively (Psa_147:19-20); now privileges still greater are extended to benighted nations. By “judgment” we are here to understand—
1. A direct, well-attested, and solemnly obligatory revelation of the will of God as to the salvation and duty of man (Psa_119:13; Psa_19:9-11; Isa_51:4). Revealed truth and precepts are called “judgment,” because they contain not only light, but law; not only a rule, but a decision. They are the standard by which we ought to judge ourselves, and by which we shall infallibly be judged of the Lord. When once brought or published to us, they become ipso facto binding on us, and demand our instant acquiescence and obedience. This view of revelation, so admonitory to ourselves, also evinces the propriety of its being communicated to those nations that are unacquainted with it. They need it. Nothing else can root out their inveterate errors, and settle their otherwise interminable disputations.
2. That dispensation of power which accompanies the publication of the Gospel.
(1.) Christianity is not only a system of law, but of soul-subduing grace (Psa_19:7). This energy “brings forth judgment unto truth”—obtains in the hearts of men a sentence in favour of the truth, induces them to become obedient to it, and thus gains for it a glorious victory.
(2.) The power of Christ which accompanies the Gospel extends also to the restraining of Satan, and to the special counteraction of his agency and influence (Joh_12:31; Luk_10:18-19).
How interesting and important is the work of Jesus Christ as the Illuminator and Deliverer of immortal men! What true philanthropist can be indifferent to it?
III. THE MANNER IN WHICH THE MESSIAH EXECUTES HIS TASK.
Isa_42:2-3 teach us that in the exercise of His functions our Saviour was to be—
1. Humble and unostentatious. It was in connection with an instance of our Lord’s aversion to pomp, noise, and parade, and His readiness to sacrifice His personal credit to the great interests of His public mission, that St. Matthew quotes our text (Mat_12:15-21).
2. Peaceable and inoffensive. The kingdom which He administered was opposed “not to Cæsar’s, but to Satan’s empire;” and therefore He submitted in all civil affairs to the government of His country, discountenanced all schemes of ambition and violence, and abstained from everything clamorous and contentious. He was willing to suffer rather than to strive.
3. Gracious and benignant in all His dealings with His people, however weak and unworthy [1354]
[1354] Of such persons a reed, frail and insignificant in itself, and still more so when bruised by an external agency, and the wick of an almost extinguished lamp, which no longer flames, but only smokes in its socket, and cannot be rekindled but by a fresh application of external fire, are striking emblems. Such reeds the Messiah will not break, but strengthen and restore; such smoking wicks He will not quench, but rekindle and revive (H. E. I. 951; P. D. 474).
In all these particulars, our great Master is to be admired and imitated by all who work for Him. Let them study with the closest attention this Divine model. If they work the works of Christ, let them imbibe and exemplify the spirit of Christ (2Ti_2:24-25).
IV. THE SUCCESS WHICH SHALL CROWN THE MESSIAH’S UNDERTAKING.
1. The work of Christ shall ultimately succeed.
(1.) “Judgment shall be set in the earth.”
(2.) This happy effect shall be produced, not only in a few nations, but universally, for even “the isles,” the most distant Gentile nations, “shall wait for Christ’s law” (cf. chap. Isa_2:2-3).
2. Before this work shall be finally accomplished, it will encounter formidable obstacles, but they cannot hinder its triumph. He who is at its head “shall not fail nor be discouraged till He have set judgment in the earth.”
3. The certainty of success rests on such grounds as these:
(1.) The almighty power and inviolable faithfulness of God, who has called the Messiah to this work, and will therefore uphold Him in the discharge of His office (Isa_42:5-6).
(2.) God’s regard to His own honour (Isa_42:8; Isa_42:13-14).
APPLICATION.—The subject teaches us—
1. The great and beneficial results of our Saviour’s advent, and of the dispensation of the Gospel.
2. The duty of perseverance in our endeavours to spread the light and grace of the Gospel.
3. The necessity of a personal submission to Christ.—Jabez Bunting, D.D.: Sermons, vol. i. pp. 21–50.
We find it easier, in human affairs, to discover a fault than to suggest a remedy; we complain without an effort to redeem or to amend. It is not so with Scripture, which is the Word of God. There each word of rebuke is a means to an end. There is no exposure of evil to exhibit the censor’s superiority. There is no delight in the merciless anatomy of sin. There is no mockery of distress by the presentation of sorrow that is hopeless, or leprosy beyond cure. Equal to the need and surpassing it, present as soon as the need is felt and acknowledged—there is redemption To illustrate this thought you have only to look at the verses immediately before the text (Isa_41:28-29). As soon as you have realised this necessity, while the heart is yet paining under the sadness which the thought of it has created, the bright light is in the clouds, and in the midst the vision of the Redeemer: “Behold My Servant,” &c. This passage refers to Christ and His great work in the world (Mat_12:18, &c.)
I. THE NEED OF THE WORLD.
This is affirmed in this passage to be the bringing forth or establishment of God’s “judgment.” The word has many senses in Scripture, but there are three to which we may especially refer (cf. first, Psa_147:19-20, and Isa_1:17; secondly, Luk_11:42 and Psa_119:20; thirdly, in the quotation of the text in Matthew’s Gospel it would seem to have reference to the dispensation of grace). These meanings discover the world’s strongest necessity to-day—a bringing forth of “judgment”—
1. As a revelation of God’s Word and will. Who that looks abroad upon the world but must mourn over the bewilderment and confusion of its inhabitants in relation to the things of God? Where there is no revelation there is obscure and distorted vision, and the people perish. Who that looks into his own heart, and frets himself with the many problems of existence which the human mind hath no skill to solve, can forbear the longing for a higher wisdom, for a voice which can make itself heard, and which, when heard, can silence the battle of strange tongues, and in imperial tones proclaim to us the true? This yearning is answered when the judgments of God are revealed to men. In the life and teaching of our Lord we have this revelation.
2. As essential rightness. The original derangement, how thoroughly has it infused itself into every part of the universe, and into every faculty of man! There is no light, no hope. Through the long darkness the eyes strain upward for the glimpse of the day; “the isles wait for the law;” the universal conscience cries out for its coming, and for lack of it “the whole creation travaileth together until now.”
3. As a dispensation of power, because ignorance and impurity are helpless and “without strength,” until “in due time Christ dies for the ungodly.” Without the revelation of this power all other would be an aggravation of the torture. The effect of the Saviour’s mediatorial work is described as the “judgment of this world,” and the casting out of its prince from his usurped dominion. As the special anointing for the great work of deliverance, God says of Christ, “I have put My Spirit upon Him.” That Spirit is a spirit of power. Where He works there can be blindness and feebleness no longer. Here, then, are the wants of the world met by the bringing forth of judgment from the Lord. The world needs nothing “save Jesus only.” All its wants are met in the person of its Surety. Let Him work to the completion of His purpose, and Aceldama must bloom into Paradise. All social wrongs will vanish. All religious evils will be ended. Scepticism will not shake the faith, nor blasphemy curdle the blood. Fanaticism will no longer be grafted upon the reasonable service of the Gospel; men will rejoice in the white light of truth, and blush that they have been accustomed to obscure or distemper its rays; Charity will be no longer a fugitive, housed by stealth in hearts warmer than their fellows, but her rejoicing shall be in the habitable parts of the earth, and her spirit the inspiration of the kingdom “which cannot be moved,” for He shall reign whose right it is, and Christ shall be all in all.
II. THE DESIGNATION OF THE WORLD’S DELIVERER.
The terms here applied to Jesus abundantly show the harmony of counsel in the Godhead touching the great work of man’s rescue from ruin.
1. Christ is called “the Servant” of the Father. In at least three other places in this prophecy is this term used (Isa_52:13; Isa_53:11; Isa_49:6). It is evident from these passages that our Lord is called the Servant of the Father in reference only to His Mediatorial work. He is not essentially a servant. He “took upon Him the form of a servant,” and, with glad heart and willing feet, went forth to do a servant’s work. There was confided to Him a task which no other could accomplish.
2. He is called again the “Elect” or Chosen of God, in whom His soul delighteth; or, as Matthew renders it, almost in the very words in which the Father attested the Son from heaven, “My Beloved, in whom I am well pleased.” If proof were wanting of His essential equality with the Father, and that He was “Emmanuel, God with us,” we might surely find it here. Though in the form of a servant, He had the heart and love of a son. He was chosen to this work because none other was trustworthy. He only could “perfect for ever, by one offering, them that are sanctified.” He was not only chosen to this work, but beloved on its account. Deep and everlasting as had been the love of the Father to the Son, it was intensified on account of this (Joh_10:17). And He was the subject of special anointing from the Spirit. To this the text refers. Again, Isa_11:1-2; Isa_61:1; Isa_61:3, quoted by the Saviour in the synagogue of Nazareth. In unmeasured fulness the influences of the Spirit were upon Christ, to hallow and to counsel, to sustain and to make mighty, every act of His incarnate life. Even His sinless human nature needed the anointing of the Spirit to reunite it with all suitable qualifications. Thus we see the whole Deity at work for man. This should hush rebellion and scatter unbelief and indifference.
III. THE MANNER AND ISSUE OF THE REDEEMER’S WORK.
We are told that He works—
1. Unostentatiously. “He shall not cry,” &c. This is in keeping with all the characteristics of the Saviour. And so quietly has Christianity spread its influences upon men. It does not “strive nor cry,” but without strife or crying makes its way into the conscience of the world.
2. Tenderly. “A bruised reed,” &c. The perfection of gentleness. If man were in question, how would the bruised reed and smoking flax be treated? The Saviour is great in gentleness; His mightiest energy is to redeem and save. And so tenderly does He watch over the progress of the Gospel in the world.
3. Perseveringly and successfully. “He shall not fail,” &c. It is a plain and unmistakable prediction. This is a settled matter, which the risen Saviour “sits expecting” to realise, and which the faith of believers may anticipate on the warrant of His Word. He is not discouraged by sinister omens or unwonted opposition, by faithless traitors or by wearied friends. Against embattled earth and gathered forces of the pit He shall bring forth judgment unto victory, until He rests from His labour, until He gathers His children, until He wears His crown.—W. M. Punshon, LL. D.: Sermons, vol. i. pp. 18, &c.
I. THE CHARACTER OF THE MESSIAH.
1. He was God’s Servant. Supposes—
(1.) Subordination and inferiority. Should this appear mysterious, so it must remain.
(2.) Service or work to be done. Jehovah had work to be done in this part of His dominions. Could be effected by Christ alone.
(3.) Subjection (Mat_21:39).
2. He was God’s Elect. To elect is to choose: Christ was chosen (Psa_89:19; 1Pe_2:4-6). This shows that the act of redemption originated in the Divine will; that it was free and not necessitated; that man’s salvation is infinitely dear to God.
3. He was God’s Elect, in whom His soul delighted. He was God’s “dear Son,” and His “beloved Son,” who was in the bosom of the Father; and “yet He spared not,” &c.
II. THE QUALIFICATION OF THE MESSIAH.
“I have put My Spirit upon Him.” God put His Spirit upon Christ—
1. As a public recognition of His Messiahship (Mar_1:9-11).
2. To fortify Him against the attacks of temptation (Luk_4:1-2).
3. To anoint Him for preaching the Gospel (Luk_4:18).
4. For the purpose of working miracles (Mat_12:28; Act_10:38).
III. THE WORK OF THE MESSIAH (Isa_42:1). The term “judgment” is differently interpreted. (See other Outlines.)
IV. THE TEMPER OF THE MESSIAH (Isa_42:2-4). “He did His work.—
1. Unostentatiously.
2. Tenderly and compassionately.
3. Courageously and fearlessly. An example for all who are now working for Him.
CONCLUSION.—
1. Seek to have the Messiah’s work accomplished in you.
2. Seek the baptism of the Holy Spirit, in order that you may be able to accomplish any work to which He has called you.—Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons, vol. iv. p. 284 (new ed.)
THE ELECT AND BELOVED SERVANT
(Christmas or Missionary Sermon.)
Isa_42:1. Behold My Servant, &c.
This is a call to attention. It is the announcement of a Saviour. When the infant Jesus was brought to the Temple, Simeon recognised in Him the Lord’s Anointed, whom he was to see before his death. He concluded his song with words borrowed from the sixth verse of this chapter: “A light to lighten the Gentiles.” The whole passage is quoted Mat_12:18-21.
“Behold the man,” said Pilate. “Behold My Servant,” says God.
I. His DIVINE APPOINTMENT
The text is the Father’s authentication of His Son’s commission and appointment to His redeeming work.
1. As a servant. A servant is subordinate to his employer. There may be equality of nature while there is subordination in office. The son of a king is equal in nature to his father, while he takes a subordinate position as appointed by him to some office. The Son of God took upon Him “the form of a servant.” He was “made of a woman, made under the law.” He took the nature of man, that He might be in the position of servitude proper to man, render a full obedience to the law, and suffer on the cross the curse due to those who had failed to render the obedience to which they were bound.
2. As a chosen servant. “No man taketh this honour unto himself” (Heb_5:4-5). Among all beings in the universe, human or angelic, no other was found competent to the great redeeming work. He was therefore chosen and appointed from eternity. “Mine Elect.”
3. As a satisfactory servant. “In whom My soul delighteth.” At His baptism, and again at His transfiguration, the Voice from heaven was heard saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him.” By the resurrection from the dead He was “declared to be the Son of God with power.” The Father was well pleased with Him from all eternity. He was well pleased with the manner in which He performed His work on earth.
4. As a supported servant. “Whom I uphold.” Although for a season He veiled the splendours of His divine nature, His human nature was not left without divine support. During all His earthly career there was the most intimate fellowship between the Father and Himself. Some of His mightiest works were performed after special seasons of prayer. The consciousness of His Father’s supporting presence kept Him from breaking down beneath the load of suffering, care, and human sin that continually pressed upon Him.
II. HIS SPECIAL ENDOWMENT.
“I have put my Spirit upon Him.” Read Isa_61:1-3, with Luk_4:17-21. The relation between the persons of the Godhead cannot be fully apprehended by us; nor can we fully apprehend the action of the Father upon the Son, nor of the Spirit in connection with the Father and the Son. It becomes us to keep close to the letter of Scripture. Still Scripture speaks clearly of some distinction between the Persons of the Godhead, and of a mutual action or going forth of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost in connection with the redemption work. Thus the Son of God, who became a servant, received His qualification and anointing as man for His work. God gave not the Spirit by measure unto Him. He possessed it during His earthly ministry; and then, after His glorification, shed it forth on His Church.
This anointing of the Saviour, corresponding to the ancient anointing of the prophets, priests, and kings of the former dispensation, answers to the threefold office of Christ, which relates to the threefold requirement of our nature.
1. We are ignorant and blinded by sin. Christ received the Spirit as the Teacher of the Church. All that heard Him were astonished.
2. We are guilty and condemned. An atonement was necessary, but was out of our power. He is the anointed Priest. In that capacity He has offered the sacrifice of Himself.
3. We are unholy and depraved. Yet we are under obligation to be holy. Christ is the anointed King. He sends His Spirit into our hearts, and we willingly submit to His authority. “Being by the right hand of God exalted, He hath shed forth this”—
(1.) On the Apostles, so that they were endowed for their work of preaching and teaching (Joh_14:26). Hence we have the record of His words, the inspired Epistles, the doctrine of Christ.
(2.) On such as are called to service and office in the Church. His ministers must be called and qualified by His Spirit. He gives sympathy with His work of saving men; willingness to consecrate life to it; love that seeks no personal interest, regards only the grand spiritual end and the immortal issues of labour for Christ.
(3.) On all who are interested in His grace (Rom_8:9; 1Jn_2:19).
III. HIS EXPANSIVE WORK.
“He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.” Observe—
1. What He will bring forth. “Judgment.” Synonymous, as in Psalms 119, with the divine law or revelation. Hence the method of the divine government, and eventually the manifestation of the Gospel.
2. To whom. “The Gentiles.” The old prophets frequently dwell on the incorporation of the Gentiles with the Church. The opposite of the spirit of exclusiveness that characterised the Jews. The Gospel is expansive. It contemplates the day when the knowledge of Christ shall be diffused over the wide world.
3. How. By the universal proclamation of Christ as the world’s Saviour.
Christ is the manifestation of God’s wisdom and love. Let us remember His love. Let us yield to His claim of expansive love and devoted service. Let us be co-workers with God in the endeavour to attract attention to Him who is chosen and appointed, as He is exclusively qualified to be the centre of faith and hope to human souls. Cry, Behold Him!—J. Rawlinson.
I. “Behold My Servant, whom I uphold.” These words must be understood of Christ in His mediatorial capacity. If He be not viewed as Jesus upheld by the Father, there is something unintelligible in the prediction; if our Redeemer be not God, in every sense equal to the Father, co-eternal, co-essential, the whole of revelation is flimsy and worthless. But it is often necessary to speak exclusively of His humanity; and Christ Jesus, as man, is the subject of the prophetic announcement. As perfect man, He was the Father’s servant (Php_2:7; Joh_4:34; Joh_7:16, &c.) Is it necessary to suppose that His nature was fallen nature in order that such a sacrifice might have its force? Not so; but believing as we do that His human nature was not fallen nature, we still believe that it was preserved from becoming so by the energies of the Holy Spirit, communicated without measure by the Father. It is to deny the nature of a creature to suppose it incapable of falling; we cannot ascribe to man properties that would make him cease to be man. God upheld Christ’s humanity by the power of the indwelling Spirit, so that the potentiality of sinning never passed over into actuality. He was so completely upheld, that not the least element of sinfulness could ever be traced to a single action of His. Still, by being allowed—if the expression be not too bold—to become, sometimes almost overpowered, He learned to have a fellow-feeling—sympathy in the true sense of that word—with the believer in his conflict, though He never had partnership with him in his transgression (Heb_5:7; H. E. I. 849, 866, 873).
II. “Mine Elect, in whom My soul delighteth.” Christ Jesus was the Elect of God, in that from all eternity Infinite Wisdom had chosen Him to execute the sovereign purposes of infinite mercy (Heb_5:4-5). It lay beyond human conception to imagine the Father reconciling the sinner to Himself in the complex person of our Surety. Had the thought been suggested, we should have expected to see the human temple burned up and turned into ashes by such a sublime and mysterious union.
Why should God delight in this elect Mediator? Because—
1. The mediation of Christ magnified every Divine attribute (2Co_3:18; Heb_1:3). Christ became the shining forth of God’s glory to man (Joh_14:9). He stood in the midst of an evil generation, but He made it manifest that He was a Being of another world; He was armed with power, before which every created thing bowed down. Note especially, the degree in which Christ Jesus glorified God by His vicarious sufferings and obedience. Contrast holiness, truth, power, and wisdom, as manifested (for they should have been manifested) in man, left an outcast through the first Adam, and man made perfect through the mediation of the Son, and you will not fail to perceive that Christ crucified is the Father glorified—that Christ suspended on the cross for man is God exalted, and avenged, and vindicated.
2. It met every human necessity. Man had been brought under condemnation, and Christ endured that condemnation. Man, even when freed from condemnation, has no righteousness of his own that can be acceptable in the sight of God; but Christ obeyed in all points of the law; and now, where God does not impute sin, He does impute the righteousness of His Son. Man, though pardoned through Christ’s death, though justified through Christ’s life, is yet unfit to enter into the association of the pure; but Christ has risen to intercede for him and procure the gift of the Holy Spirit for his sanctification; and thus, beyond his title, he acquires a meetness for his inheritance (1Co_1:30). “Behold,” then, “Mine Elect, in whom My soul delighteth!”
CONCLUSION.—Try yourselves by the simple criterion which this subject presents. Is your dependence placed on the might by which the Mediator was upheld? Do you delight in Christ for any of the reasons which made the Father well-pleased in Him, or are you wrapped up in that formality which is the pestilential blight of so much religion?—Henry Melvill, B.D.: Sermons, vol. i. pp. 67–74.
Religion, if it be important, is all-important. However little importance we may attach to it, God attaches a great deal. Mark its personal aspect. “Behold!”—a message to every member of the human family. We are not addressed in the mass, but in our individual characters. As in the judgment-day each shall find himself singled out from the crowd, so every man in Scripture has a distinct and personal message sent to him, as having the deepest personal interest in the promises and threatenings of the Word of God. We love to escape this personality, to mingle in the crowd, to escape reflection. But God mercifully will not permit this, for we should lose much by it. To young and old, rich and poor, He says, “Behold My Servant,” &c.
I. BEHOLD AND WONDER at the extent of love which pervades the scheme of our redemption. “Behold!”—it is a word of wonder, and indeed there is in Christ a world of wonders. Everything is wonderful in Him. The whole Christian religion is a concatenation of wonders, “a chaining together of mystery upon mystery.” He is wonderful in His person, in His name, in His offices, in the design and character of His work—bringing into life by His death, to glory by His shame. He is the great centre of attraction to heaven and earth; the Father loves Him, angels adore Him, all the redeemed repose their eternal confidence in Him.
“Behold” the display of love that reigns in our redemption—in the selection of such a Saviour, in the benefits that flow to us through Him. Consider the depth of degradation from which it raises, the height of glory to which it conducts. Study this love! In all times the world has been astonished at the extent of God’s love to His people—in their deliverance from their greatest enemies, in the establishment of their brightest hopes. Jethro was astonished at their deliverance from Egypt (Exo_18:9-11); the neighbouring natives at their rescue from Babylon (Psa_126:2). But the love of Christ is more surprising still. When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, the Jews said, “Behold, how He loved him!” But His love for us passes the knowledge of the holiest saint on earth, of the wisest angel in heaven. Mourn the apathy of the world—let us mourn our own—to the claims of Christ.
II. BEHOLD AND TRUST. If God intrusts Him with the weight of His glory, you may with all the weight of your salvation. He is God’s “Servant,” God’s “Elect,” the object of God’s delight. Why is this said but to show that whatever He did in the business of our salvation He did under the seal of Divine authority? He was God’s Chosen—chosen to be the Head of the Church, the great Peacemaker between earth and heaven. It is a great prop and encouragement to our sinking faith, a great satisfaction to the troubled conscience, that in all that Christ did for us, and in all that He works in us, He is the object of Divine complacency and delight. In all our approaches and applications to God, let this minister boldness to us, that we go to Him in the name of One whom He loves (P. D. 2314).
III. BEHOLD AND LOVE. If God delights in Christ, we should too. The estimate in which Christ is held by us is the most decisive test of oneness of sentiment between God and us. “If God were your Father, ye would love me.” Christ is God’s Elect, God’s Chosen; if He be not ours, there is a great contrariety between Him and us. Great is His love for us; let us return it. He sets a high value on the pardoned sinner’s love. “Unto you that believe, He is precious” (H. E. I. 1003, 1004, 3367, 3369, 3909; P. D. 2338, 2341).
IV. BEHOLD AND LIVE (Col_3:3-4).—Samuel Thodey.
THE UNITY OF THE GODHEAD MANIFESTED IN THE SALVATION OF MAN
(Trinity Sunday.)
Isa_42:1. Behold My Servant, &c.
“The Lord our God is one Lord.” But He has been pleased to reveal Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The mystery of the Holy Trinity is inexplicable by us, but it is certainly Scriptural. Three Persons, but one God! By our text we are reminded that the unity of the Persons in the Holy Trinity has been manifested in the salvation of man.
I. THE LOVE OF THE FATHER.
We must never forget that the mission of the Son had its origin in the Father’s pitying love for us [1357]
[1357] If we have any saving acquaintance with the Gospel, we are at all times disposed to offer to the Son of God the homage of gratitude and praise for the work of redemption. But there are times when we are in danger of falling into the mistake of regarding the Saviour as offering Himself as a sacrifice to propitiate an angry God. We are prone to contemplate the Father as a stern, uncompromising, and unpitying Judge, actuated by vindictive feelings, taking pleasure in exacting punishment and inflicting pain; or a personification (so to speak) of the attributes of almighty power, unerring wisdom, and unswerving justice. But there our view of the great Creator stops, and there our apprehension of Him who is the Moral Governor of the world becomes defective.… Contemplating the bleeding Victim, voluntarily bleeding to atone for the guilty, and to bring back rebels to reconciliation and peace, the justice, power, and love of the Father are well-nigh forgotten in the sight of the tenderness and self-abandonment displayed by the Son.… But this Scripture combines with others to teach us that if we would love Him “who first loved us,” we must pass on from Calvary to Him whose will is accomplished by the death and passion of His Son.—Kemble.
1. The Son was sent forth by the Father. He came to accomplish the Father’s purposes (1Jn_4:9-10; Joh_3:16).
2. It was because our Lord undertook to fulfil the purpose of the Father’s heart that the Father loved Him: “Mine Elect, in whom My soul delighteth.” The Father loved the Son eternally as God in the heaven of His own glory; but it is of the Father’s love to the Son while living in a servant’s form that He speaks here. Our text teaches us not only that the Father appointed the Son to the work, and was willing that He should succeed, but was well pleased when He saw Him going forth on His high enterprise of mercy. Thus the whole scheme of redemption redounds to the glory of the Father.
3. How near that scheme lay to the Father’s heart was manifested also in the manner in which He upheld His Son while He was engaged in its accomplishment: “My Servant, whom I uphold.” It was by means of the grace of the Father that He was enabled to make the sacrifice needed for our salvation (Heb_2:9). He not only appointed His Son to the task, but ensured its fulfilment by supplying the strength required, and sustaining Him through the protracted conflict with the powers of darkness [1360]
[1360] Concerning this great mystery, see Dr. Bunting’s comments in the Outline THE FATHER’S ELECT SERVANT, and the note by Bishop Horaley appended thereto.
All this serves to confirm the inspired announcement, “God is love.” Oh, that we could more fully realise the Father’s love to our souls, and yield some larger measure of gratitude to Him who thus so wonderfully, even from everlasting, “first loved us” (H. E. I. 390, 2319–2321).
II. THE CONDESCENSION OF THE SON.
Though Lord of all, He became a “servant;” though worshipped by the seraphic hosts, He voluntarily became the despised and rejected of men. Though of spotless holiness, He took upon Him the world’s sin, became a “curse” for His people, and humbled Himself to the worst male factor’s most ignominious death, “even the death of the cross.”
III. THE CO-OPERATION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.
“I have put My Spirit upon Him.”
1. It was by the Holy Spirit that the Son was qualified for the accomplishment of the work He had undertaken (Joh_1:16; Joh_3:34).
2. It is by the Holy Spirit that the work of Christ is now carried on in the hearts of men (Joh_16:7-8).—Charles Kemble, M. A.: Seventeen Sermons, pp. 325–349.
CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE AS THE SERVANT OF GOD
Isa_42:1. Behold My Servant, whom I uphold, &c.
We need have no doubt about this text applying to Christ, for it is so stated by the Holy Spirit, (Mat_12:17-21). Our Lord in His human nature, “in the form of a servant,” needed to be “upheld,” even as we do, by the Divine power. It was this that carried Him through the work given Him to do (Psa_16:8; Isa_50:7). “Though He were a Son”, yet learned He obedience “as a servant.” It is so with all God’s servants here on earth; they are sons of God, but they are called to prove their sonship by their service.
“Mine Elect.” He was chosen of God for this service, called of God, sent of God to do God’s work. It is so with all God’s servants. They do not choose God’s service, but are chosen and sent of God. Just as in common life a master selects his own servants.
“In whom My soul delighteth.” This was from all eternity, and throughout the whole period of His earthly service (Pro_8:30; Mat_3:17; Mat_17:5).
“I have put My Spirit upon Him.” This was to qualify Him, as man, for His undertaking, as He declared in the synagogue at Nazareth (Isa_61:1; Isa_11:2). So is it again with all God’s servants: His Spirit rests upon them, and only by His help can they serve.
“He shall bring forth judgment unto the Gentiles,”—declare God’s will to them, and set up His statutes and ordinances throughout the world.
In these things we see the reality of His manhood, and what was needed to qualify Him for His work as the servant of God.
In speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ as the servant of God, we must understand it of the office He undertook, and actually did accomplish, through the union of His manhood with the Godhead. Remembering this, let us consider the characteristics of a good servant, and see how they were exemplified in our Lord.
A servant is one who is under a master; who does as he is told; who is willing to do and not to do; who receives his master’s will as his rule, and does not evade, nor qualify, nor object, but does it all; who has his master’s honour and interest at heart, always working and labouring for him. Such was Christ. The object of His whole life was to show Himself the servant of God. This should be our object. Observe—
1. How absorbing this service was to Him. It swallowed up all besides. Nothing was ever allowed to interfere with it (Joh_4:6; Joh_4:34; Joh_6:38; Joh_9:4; Mat_26:39; Joh_17:4).
2. How love animated Him in all His service (Psa_40:6-10). Especially notice, “Mine ears hast Thou opened;” or margin, “digged.” The meaning of this we learn in Exo_21:2-6. Christ served voluntarily and cheerfully, because He loved Him whose will He came into the world to accomplish (Joh_10:18).
3. How thorough was His service. He had but one object—to do the will of God. For this He lived, for this He died.
Are you following Christ as your example? Is your service of God absorbing, loving, thorough? What do you live for? To do God’s will? If not, there is no conformity to Christ.
To follow Christ’s example, a man must be born again of God’s Spirit. It is the renewed will which desires and strives to do God’s will. The desire may be but as a grain of mustard seed, but if cherished by prayer and practice, it will grow; though at first faint and feeble, it will become supreme (Mat_25:29).
Every creature must be a servant, either of God or of self—of self in its lowest sense, the self of the “old man.” But in serving God we serve self in its noblest sense.
Do you really long to serve Christ as He served His Father? But you are thinking to yourself, “What a character mine is! Mine is no fit character to take service with such a Master; I am such a sinner.” Well, then, listen—
1. Christ takes His servants without a character. We know how important character is among men; how many fail of service for want of it; how hard it is to gain when once it is lost. If we never entered Christ’s service until we had become fit for it, we never should enter. But He takes us just as we are. He asks only, “Are you willing to be My servant?” Where He finds this will, He gives character. Christian character is formed in Christ’s service. Nowhere else can it be formed. Many try to form a character before they come to Him, but in vain. Come first.
2. He gives the best wages: pardon, peace, acceptance with God here, everlasting life hereafter. Look at the world’s wages and see the difference (Rom_6:23). There are good wages in the service as well as for it (Psa_19:11; Isa_48:18; Pro_3:17).
3. His work is light. It is called a cross, a yoke, a burden, that no man may take it up without counting the cost; but, when once taken up, it is light (Mat_11:29-30; 1Jn_5:3). Besides, who ever felt work hard for one he loved? (Gen_29:20; H. E. I. 3336–3341).
4. There is no dismissal. No; they who enter Christ’s service are taken for life—not for this life only (Joh_10:28). When their period of service is done here, He says, “Friend, come up higher,” and the believer goes to Christ for ever (Rev_7:15).
Will you be Christ’s servant? Give yourself to Him heartily, wholly. Think of the difference between the servant of sin and the Lord’s freeman, now and hereafter. Come to Christ, and He will say of you what God says of Him, “Behold My servant, whom I uphold.”—J. W. Reeve, M.A.: Doctrine and Practice, pp. 182–205.
BRUISED, NOT BROKEN
Isa_42:1-4. Behold My Servant, &c.
There is no difficulty in determining the subject of this passage,; one interpretation alone is equal to its demands. In inviting attention to its terms, let us consider it as affording—
I. A DIVINE ESTIMATE OF MAN. A crushed reed, a dimly burning wick. These are symbols of impaired, broken, perishing life; they convey the ideas of feebleness, helplessness, almost of worthlessness. There is in the crushed reed no power of self-recovery; the dimly burning wick is the merest mockery of a light. So is man as seen by the eye of God. We can estimate the reed and the lamp; what we see them to be, God sees man to be.
The estimate is not limited to the penitent and broken-hearted; the words signify apostate humanity. The scope of the passage implies the larger application. He is to bring forth judgment to the Gentiles; He has to set judgment on the earth, and the isles are to wait for His law; He is to encounter opposition—the reed and the wick will refuse His ministrations. But “He shall not cry,” &c. Note the undertone of suffering. Men sneer, laugh, jeer, shout, rave, and gnash their teeth; His heart of pity yearns, and He says, “Bruised reeds and smoking wicks!” None more maimed and nearer to death than the impenitent.
II. THE DIVINE METHOD OF TREATING MAN.
“A bruised reed shall He not break,” &c. He does not use mere naked power, but patience.
1. Think of how He might have treated man. The text does not say, cannot break, cannot extinguish. Nothing hindered but grace. Christ was that truth unto which judgment should be brought; He was, and He declared, God’s everlasting righteousness and love.
2. Think of Him, the Truth, taking hold of weak, helpless humanity to give it life, health, and soundness. He will not use force for man’s destruction; neither by force will He restore, but by truth. As force is discarded, suffering is incurred. He who will save by truth must suffer; there is no help. Christ must be made a curse for man that He may bring redemption to him. The idea of suffering pervades the text; the “Elect” One must be upheld; for the salvation of the bruised must He be sustained; there is upon Him a grinding pressure, and under Him He will need, and must have, the Eternal Hand. The Immortal King must be succoured while He stands bearing the tremendous burden of a world’s sin and sorrow. By no omnipotence will He put that burden away, yet He will put it away. He triumphs by the Cross. He is God, bent on saving man by love and truth. The Incarnation and Atonement are both here (Joh_18:33-37). He must suffer, and He must wait. “But He will not fail nor be discouraged.” He knows that patience will triumph. Truth has ever to wait for victory. The light cannot chase the darkness till its hour comes.
3. The text is, among other things, a brief but wonderful exposition of the providence and government of God upon earth. It reveals the principles of that government and is an interpreter of human history (Lam_3:22).
III. THE DIVINE CERTAINTY OF RECOVERING MAN.
The Servant, the Son, has not been sent forth on a chance or fruitless errand; the King is a triumphant Sufferer (Isa_42:4, Isa_53:11, &c.; H. E. I. 979, 1168).—W. Hubbard: Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiv. pp. 291–293.
It is agreed on all hands that the text alludes to weak and afflicted believers, setting forth the care and gentleness of the Lord. It is not quite so clear as to the source of the metaphor. Adopt the theory that the reed referred to is the shepherd’s reed, his instrument of music. The reed is bruised. It was a mean instrument before, but now it is almost useless. The shepherd does not break it up and throw it away; it may recover its injuries, or, if it should not, it will emit some sort of sounds. The shepherd does not break his reed, for—
I. He remembers its former services. Often has its strains cheered him and others; old and precious memories are connected with it. Our Lord does not forget the services the weak and afflicted have rendered.
II. He remembers there is a paucity of such reeds. The shepherd would rather have the imperfect instrument than no reed at all. There is a scarcity of music in the moral world. The sweet notes of gratitude, and love, and hope are sung by few. The Lord loves the song of the upright, and when they lose the power of rejoicing He bears with them.
III. He knows the possibility of the reed being rectified. It is only bruised. The shepherd will use every means to restore it. The Lord knows the certainty of the recovery of His bruised ones. He teaches them to say, “Why art thou cast down, O my soul? for I shall yet praise Him.” He will not cast off those who say they are useless. Not cast off the aged. His design is by means of the bruising to make His children more joyful and useful in His house.
IV. He prizes it because He fashioned it.
1. The Lord chose the reed. He delights in the possession.
2. It cost Him very much. 3. He bruised the reed—by design.
CONCLUSION.—Recognise the fitness of the metaphor. Believe the declaration. “He will not break.” Believe much more. The bruised reed shall be restored. He will carefully keep, and constantly seek to make it more useful than it was before.—R. A. Griffin: Stems and Twigs, p. 241.
THE BRUISED REED
Isa_42:3. A bruised reed shall He not break.
Of all the plants mentioned in Scripture, perhaps the reed was the most obscure and inconspicuous, the weakest and most worthless [1363] It was peculiarly obnoxious to mischances; it grew where the wild beasts had their lairs, and it was so slim and fragile. Yet, abject and homely as it looked, a skilful hand could turn it to good account [1366]
[1363] The vine; the palm, the pomegranate yielded delicious fruit; the pine, the oak, the cedar were invaluable for their solid timber; and though the rose and the lily yielded no fruit, and could not be cut into timber, they owed a special endearment to their lovely tints and exquisite perfume. But this poor waif of the wilderness was bereft of every attraction. No one saw any beauty in its russet plume; no one could have tried to rub a morning meal from its chaffy husks, or to rear his cottage from its frail and hollow stems. And instead of growing in picturesque localities—instead of mooring its roots in the sides of Lebanon, or tossing healthfully in the breezes which sported and frolicked over the hills of Galilee—like a recluse or a reprobate, it sought the miry places, and grew in those oozy solitudes where fevers lurk and the foul air rises. So that for uselessness and ungainliness it became a perfect proverb; and of all errands it was the idlest to go out into the wilderness to see “a reed shaking in the wind.”—Hamilton.
[1366] The stronger sorts were converted into that measuring-rod or mete-yard of which we read so frequently, or they furnished the light but serviceable staff on which the traveller leaned, or with which Bartimæus, old and blind. would grope his way. And the more slender sorts supplied with their appropriate weapons the warrior and the scribe. Shaped into arrows, they filled the archer’s quiver or rang from the strings of Jonathan; and shaped into the writer’s pen, a little sheaf was always suspended in the scholar’s girdle; and if that scholar were a man of God, a Moses, a Daniel, or a John, the reed which erst shook in the wilderness would be consigning to immortal leaves the mind of Inspiration.—Hamilton.
Here we read of One whose heart is as kind as His hand is skilful. Though so mighty that nothing can obstruct the progress of His purposes (Isa_42:4), He is as remarkable for His benignity as He is for His prowess. It is by kindness that He conquers. It is by cherishing the smoking flax till it burst into flame that, with knowledge of Himself, He lightens every land, and by cementing and healing the bruised reed that He fashions those sharp arrows, those polished shafts by which He subdues the nations under Him.
The lesson which this passage teaches is, that the Saviour is infinite in kindness. Let three classes of persons lay it to heart.
I. Some of you have had dull feelings from thinking you were too inconsiderable for the Saviour’s notice; you are not a rose of Sharon nor a cedar of Lebanon, but only one reed in a marshy thicket. But it is a chief glory of the Saviour that no littleness can evade His eye, no multitude of objects divide His heart. He is like His Heavenly Father (Mat_10:29-31). In that forest of reeds He can take account of every blade that grows as easily as He can reckon the angels in each legion or the stars of heaven. Moreover, remember that your own is the very nature which Immanuel wore and still wears. He is not ashamed to be called your Brother; He who best understands what immortality means is pervaded by a profound and tender solicitude for all the deathless interests of your soul (H. E. I. 4631). If no man cares for your soul, the Saviour cares (Isa_49:15; H. E. I. 947).
II. This omniscient Saviour is gracious and gentle, and does not break the bruised reed. However high we may hold our heads, we are all bruised reeds.
1. Sin has bruised us. Just as far as we have broken God’s com mandments, our integrity, our uprightness, our rightness with God is broken. It is well when the sinner becomes aware of his ruined condition, and recognises himself as a bruised reed; for this is just the mood in which He longs to find us (Psa_51:17; Psa_147:3).
2. Afflictions bruise us. Nay, Christ sends them that they may bruise us. There are evils in us that cannot be got rid of in any other way. It would seem as if even Omnipotence could not sanctify a fallen and sinful spirit without the employment of sorrow. But when we are like a reed snapped asunder and all but broken through, let us remember how tender and sympathetic the Saviour is in applying these painful processes. He does not break the bruised reed; He apportions the trial to the exigency; He supports the fatigued or fainting soul (H. E. I. 179).
III. The reed is bruised, but the Saviour will not fail nor be discouraged until He have made it an implement of use, of beauty, or of majesty (H. E. I. 951). Its very weakness will elicit His divine power and matchless skill.
1. The sinner is obscure, but the Saviour is omniscient
2. The sinner is a thing of grief and guilt, but the Saviour is gentleness and grace impersonate.
3. The sinner is in Himself worthless, but the Saviour is mighty, and out of the most worth less can make a vessel of mercy meet for the Master’s use [1369]James Hamilton, D.D.: Works, vol. vi. pp. 163–177.
[1369] In the days of His flesh the Saviour went out among the hills of Galilee and into the wilderness of Judah, and there He found reeds shaking in the wind. He found a few peasants, plain, ignorant, incompetent, carnal and coarse-minded, a crop as unattractive and unpromising as ever tried the patience of Infinite Love or the resources of Infinite Power. But still the Saviour set His heart upon them. He chose them out, and commenced His transforming process on them; and, notwithstanding their refractoriness, He did not fail nor get discouraged, till—Whence came those pens, so nimble and so apt, with which the Holy Spirit wrote the things which Jesus began to do and to teach until the day that He was taken up? That one so steady, broad, and clear in its Hebrew strokes? That other, so like “a feather from an angel’s wing,” so limpid, pure, and loving? And those arrows in the Gospel’s first crusade, so sharp in the hearts of the King’s enemies—those bolts of fire which subdued the people in Pentecostal hours—what are they, and whence came they? Ah! these were reeds of the wilderness once—reeds growing on the edge of Gennesareth, shaking, battered reeds; but passing by, Jesus set His love upon them. Dingy, He did not despise them; bruised, He did not break them; but by dint of His divine painstaking He sharpened some into the pen of a ready writer, and, barbed with truth and winged with zeal, He polished others into shafts of celestial power. He did not fail nor get discouraged till, with pen and arrow forged from a bruised reed, He conquered the world, judgment was set in the earth, and the isles waited for His law.—Hamilton.
THE GENTLENESS OF CHRIST
Isa_42:3. A bruised reed shall He not break, &c.
In this prophecy Isaiah foretells the gentleness of Christ (H. E. I. 951–961; P. D. 47, 1630). St. Matthew quotes it when he is recording the long-suffering of our Lord with the Pharisees. His ministry was not a public disputation, with clamour and popular applause, with factions in the city, and a following of people; it was silent and penetrating, “as the light that goeth forth; “spreading everywhere with resistless power, and yet from a source often withdrawn from sight. So soft and light, the text seems to say, shall be His touch, that the reed which is nearly asunder shall not be broken down, and the flax which has only not left off to smoke shall not be put out. It was in His gentleness, His tender compassion, His long-suffering and patient endurance of sinners, that this and other like prophecies were fulfilled.
I. EXAMPLES OF CHRIST’S GENTLENESS RECORDED IN SCRIPTURE.
1. In all His dealing with His disciples. The first faint stirrings of faith and love He cherished and sheltered with tender care; in His teaching He led them on little by little (Luk_9:55; Joh_14:9; Mar_9:33-34; Joh_20:27; Joh_21:15-17).
2. And so in like manner to all the people (Mat_11:28-30). He permitted so near an access to all men that it was turned to His reproach; He was “a friend of publicans and sinners;” “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them” (Luk_7:36-48; Joh_8:3-11).
II. SOME GREAT TRUTHS TAUGHT US BY CHRIST’S GENTLENESS.
1. It implies that where there is so much as a spark of life in the conscience, there is possibility of entire conversion to God. Where there is room to hope anything, there is room to hope all things. Such is the nature of sin and of the human soul; such, also, the virtue of the blood of Christ and such the power of the Holy Ghost, that the greatest of sinners may become we dare not say how great a saint (Isa_1:18; H. E.I. 1071). Illustrations often become our snares; e.g., we speak of the stains of sin, the soils of lust; but the spiritual nature, though really sustaining these, is capable, as the body is not, of a perfect healing. The very life of sin is the will. By conversion, from being corrupt and unclean, it becomes cleansed and pure. It is imperfect, as subjected to the flesh; but when disembodied, what shall hinder its being as pure as if it had never sinned? And if so, how can we limit its purification in this world? In a moment the human spirit may virtually and truly anticipate an habitual condition of the soul; in a true death-bed repentance there is contained a life of purity though it be never here developed into act.
2. The only sure way of fostering the beginnings of repentance is to receive them with gentleness and compassion. This is a truth which is in the mouth of more than rightly understand it. Some Christ received with a Divine love and pity, and some with a piercing severity; but these last were those only of whom, it seems, there was hope no longer; the reed was already broken and the flax quenched (Mat_23:13-15; Mat_21:31-32; Luk_7:30). But sometimes the pure severity of compassion is confounded with personal harshness of temper. Truth told without love is perilous in the measure in which it is true; but encouragement of sinners before they are penitents is even more dangerous. With ineffable compassion Christ spake words of fear and warning (Luk_13:3; Mat_18:3; Luk_13:24; Mat_20:16; Mat_10:22; Luk_9:62, &c.) One great hindrance to true conversion is an imperfect knowledge of His Divine character; sinners fear to come within the range of those eyes that are “as a flame of fire.” It was in this peculiar wretchedness of sin that the gentleness of Christ gave to sinners both solace and hope; it was a strange courage—boldness without trembling, awe without alarm—which came upon them in His presence; it was an affinity of the Spirit working in penitents with His Spirit that made them draw to Him; their fears were quelled, and this opened a new future to them. Knowing the nature of man, its strange depths and windings, He knew that this was the surest way of winning them to Himself”. And have we not made trial of this same gracious and tender compassion? How long some of us have neglected or rejected Him! How is His forbearance and compassion tried in the slow formation of our religious character! Our trials are all so wisely measured to our strength that the bruised reed is never broken.
CONCLUSION.—How great a consolation there is in this Divine tenderness of Christ! Be your beginning never so late, yet if it be true, all shall one day be well. It is a word of cheer to us all. Alas! for us if He were soon wearied out as we are, soon provoked, ready to upbraid, sharp in the strokes of His hand; where should we have been long ago?—Henry Edward Manning: Sermons, vol. ii. pp. 377–400.
Strictly interpreted, this is a description of the manner in which the Saviour will effect the triumphs of His kingdom. Unlike other conquerors, He will not proceed by destroying the weak. As His progress is to be unostentatious (Isa_42:2), so it is to be merciful. But this is to be because He is merciful; and so this verse may be regarded as an intimation of His personal character, and may be used to comfort sincere but desponding Christians. Consider—
1. THE EMBLEMS OF OUR TEXT
A bruised reed. A reed is a slender, tender, and exceedingly fragile plant, and is therefore a very-suitable emblem of weakness. If you lean upon it it will break; the slightest collision may bruise it. A reed in its best estate is of little value; a bruised reed is altogether worthless.
Smoking flax, or, as it might be rendered, “a smoking wick,” referring to the wick of a lamp, whose flame is not bright, because it has only just been kindled, or of which the flame has died away, and in which nothing but a spark of fire remains.
These emblems set forth—
1. What we all are. We are all reeds, feeble, fragile, bruised; in us all the flame of piety burns faint and dim. Alas! in how many it is dying utterly!
2. What many feel themselves to be. This consciousness of weakness and worthlessness is very humbling and painful. Yet it is a step towards safety and true blessedness (Mat_5:3; Isa_66:2).
II. THE DECLARATIONS OF OUR TEXT.
“A bruised reed shall He not break, and the smoking flax shall He not quench.” More is intended than is here expressed. The reed must break if He will not strengthen it; the smoking flax must be quenched if He keep not the flame alive. In each of these declarations there is an expression of the tenderness of Jesus to the feeblest of His followers.
A bruised reed shall He not break, that is—
1. He will not leave those who are impressed with a sense of their guilt to sink into despair.
2. He will not leave those who have been overthrown by some fierce blast of temptation and almost broken off from Him to perish.
The smoking flax shall He not quench, that is—He will not despise the day of small things in relation to our piety. He will fan the feeble spark of our devotion into a flame.
III. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS.
1. Let none but sincere believers dare to draw comfort from this text. There is a broad line of demarcation to be drawn between the man who willingly remains weak and immature in Christian excellences, and the weak Christian who is sincerely endeavouring to grow in grace, but makes slow progress therein, and thereby is tempted to despair.
2. There may be perfect sincerity where there is great weakness. It is about our sincerity that we should be most concerned, and there are certain infallible tests by which it may be ascertained. The feeblest saint is the sworn and steadfast enemy of sin; he longs to be like God; he diligently uses the means of grace; he clings to the Saviour, acknowledges Him before the world, and endeavours to live to His glory.
3. Where there is great weakness, Christ will manifest great tenderness (Isa_40:11). Let us not dishonour Him by distrust of His mercy.
4. Let us learn to imitate the tenderness of our Redeemer (Rom_14:1; Rom_15:1-7). A censorious Christian is utterly unlike Christ. Unnecessary wounds innumerable have been inflicted, unspeakable mischief done, by the severe and rash judgments of narrow-minded Christians. Let us remember what we once were, to whom we are indebted for our attainments, and our Lord’s warning respecting humble Christians (Mat_18:10).—William Reeve.
The virtues of mortals, when carried to a high degree, very often run into those vices which have a kind of affinity to them. “Right too rigid hardens into wrong.” Strict justice steels itself into excessive severity, and the man is lost in the judge. Goodness and mercy sometimes degenerate into softness and irrational compassion inconsistent with government. But in Jesus Christ these seemingly opposite virtues centre and harmonise in the highest perfection. Hence He is at once characterised as a Lamb and as the Lion of the tribe of Judah: a lamb for gentleness towards humble penitents, and a lion to tear His enemies in pieces. He is said to “judge and make war,” and yet He is called “The Prince of Peace.”
The general meaning of the text seems to be, that the Lord Jesus has the tenderest and most compassionate regard to the feeblest penitent, however oppressed and desponding, and that He will approve and cherish the least spark of true love toward Himself. Regard—
I. The character of a weak believer as represented by “a bruised reed.” The idea conveyed is that of a state of weakness and oppression. Under some burden or other many an honest-hearted believer groans out the most part of His life. He finds himself weak in knowledge, in love, in faith, in hope, in joy, in everything in which he should be strong. These weaknesses or defects the believer feels painfully and tenderly, and bitterly laments them; and in this is the grand distinction between him and the rest of the world. He is sensible that his weakness has guilt in it, and therefore he laments it with ingenuous sorrow. He is a bruised reed (H. E. I. 1276–1285, 1995–2003, 2513–2516, 2633, 3366, 4475).
II. The character of a weak believer as represented by “smoking flax.” The idea conveyed is that of grace true and sincere, but languishing and just expiring, like a candle just blown out, which still smokes and retains a feeble spark of fire. It signifies a susceptibility of a further grace, or a readiness to catch that sacred fire, as a candle just put out is easily rekindled. It means religion in a low degree. The weak Christian has very few, and but superficial, exercises of mind about divine things; but he feels an uneasiness, an emptiness, an anxiety within, under which he pines, and all the world cannot heal the disease. His soul “pants for God;” the evaporations of the smoking flax naturally ascend toward heaven. He cannot be reconciled to his sins,—not through fear of punishment, but from a sense of the intrinsic baseness of sin.
He is jealous of the sincerity of his religion, and afraid that all his past experiences were delusive. Hell would be a sevenfold hell to a lover of God. Sometimes he seems driven by the tempest of temptation from off the rock of Jesus Christ; but he makes towards it on the stormy billows.
In short, the weakest Christian sensibly feels that his comfort rises and falls as he lives nearer to or farther from his God.
III. The care and compassion of Jesus Christ for such poor weaklings. Who is there that does not believe it? But it is no easy thing to establish a trembling soul in the full belief of this truth. The understanding may be convinced, but the heart may need to be more deeply affected with this truth.
Dwell, then, upon the emphatic testimony of Holy Scripture that Christ has a peculiar tenderness for the poor, the mourners, the broken-hearted (Isa_56:1-3; Isa_66:1-2; Isa_57:15). He charges Peter to feed His “lambs” as well as His sheep, i.e., to take the tenderest care of the weakest in His flock; and He severely rebukes the shepherds of Israel (Eze_34:1-4). See the contrast in the character of the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls! (Isa_40:10-11; Psa_102:16-20). His people in every age have ever found these promises made good. David (Psa_34:4). But why multiply instances? Go to His cross! There you may read the same evidence of His compassion as Thomas had of His resurrection.
CONCLUSION.—Why should the bruised reed shrink from Him when He comes not to tread it down, but raise it up? Do not indulge causeless doubts and fears concerning your sincerity. Examine them, and search whether there be any sufficient reason for them; and if you discover there is not, then reject them and set them at defiance (Psa_43:5).—President Davies: Great Sermons of Great Preachers, pp. 433–445.
I. In seasons of sorrow and dejection the words of our text are all-powerful to supply consolation.
II. They are not less instructive as a directory of our conduct towards the young and inexperienced. That great tenderness and forbearance combined with wisdom and discretion are necessary in the moral and intellectual training of youth, the recollection of our own early years may well enforce. Great diversity of means and method will be found necessary to adapt our measures to the various capacities, dispositions, and tempers of the young (H. E. I. 817–821).
III. These words are to be remembered in the exercise of discipline within the Church. While wilful inconsistency is not to be tolerated in its members (1Co_5:11-13), those who are unwillingly betrayed into sin, and are sorrowfully struggling against it, are to be treated compassionately and helpfully (Gal_6:1-2).—Samuel Warren, LL.D.: Sermons on Practical Subjects, pp. 358–360.
THE PERSEVERANCE OF THE MESSIAH
(Missionary Sermon.)
Isa_42:4. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, &c.
The coming of Christ was the great object of expectation to the Church for 4000 years. The leading design of all prophecy was to keep alive that expectation. The text introduces Christ to us (Mat_12:18-21).
I. THE GRAND AND COMPREHENSIVE OBJECT WHICH CHRIST CONTEMPLATES. “Till He have set salvation in the earth.” This was—
1. A very needful object. Man, guilty and depraved, needed both a Saviour and a Sanctifier.
2. A very benevolent object, and accords with the large and extensive grace of the Son of God.
3. A very difficult object—one to which none but Christ was equal. The claims of the law must be met, the honours of the Divine administration upheld and repaired, the enmity of the human heart subdued, all the powers of evil overcome. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested; from these difficulties He did not shrink. He descended to Bethlehem, to the wilderness of the Temptation; exposed Himself to the contradiction of sinners through life; agonised in Gethsemane, bled on Calvary, ascended from Olivet. In its prosecution He never faltered while He was on earth; and in heaven He devotes to it His Divine power. It is indeed a work that requires the constant agency and superintendence of Him who commenced it.
II. THE SPIRIT AND CONSTANCY WITH WHICH HE CARRIES IT ON. The prophecy is true still that He shall not fail nor be discouraged till all the results of His mediation are complete in the final spread of the Gospel. To a human eye there are in the moral state and condition of society, after Christianity has been in the world so many hundred years, many grounds for discouragement, such as—
(1.) The benighted condition of the heathen world. Calculate the numbers upon whom the light of truth has never shone.
(2.) The present state of Christendom at large—those nations which possess the Gospel, and have partially acknowledged its claims, but through the blinding influences of corrupt forms of Christianity are almost hopelessly involved in mental delusion and error.
(3.) The controversies that prevail at home, and the slow progress of vital Christianity in the most-favoured circles, in our congregations, in religious families. In all these fields we perceive what we might easily suppose are omens of failure.
But by none of them are we to be discouraged. By them all Christ is not moved. Let me assign some reasons why He is not apprehensive as to the results of His sacrifices and endeavours, and why we should not hesitate in our efforts to extend the Gospel.
1. The long reign of evil and the long contest between truth and error have been distinctly foretold, and are parts therefore of His own system of moral government, and are all comprehended in His calculations. Foretold from the beginning. First promise asserts it. All the prophecies suppose it. Our Lord’s parables declare it. The Book of Revelation announces it: the woman is to be a long time in the wilderness, &c. Religion in our world is a strange plant in an ungenial soil. The boar out of the wood will try to waste it; the wild beast to devour the vine. The poison is slowly extirpated. The Son of Man goes on conquering and to conquer. It is a part of the Divine designs that evil should display itself; that truth and error should meet in open conflict; that no unsettled controversy should remain.
2. The victory obtained upon the Cross, when the empire of darkness was essentially broken, contains the germ and the pledge of final and complete triumph (Joh_12:31-32). The power that conquered then can conquer always. We know not the nature and extent of the conquest, how much was involved in it, and what great results were comprehended in it; but other and superior natures do. Angels rejoice in it (Psa_68:17-18). Devils tremble at it. They always knew that in Christ was their conqueror (Mar_1:24, &c.) No attempt was made by the infernal powers during the forty days after the resurrection; a sufficient proof that they felt their overthrow.
3. There is in the works of God a character of progressive developmnt, of which we find strong traces in religion itself. The progress in the dispensations: Antediluvian, Patriarchal, Mosaic, Prophetic, Christian. Our questionings respecting the slow progress of Christianity seem to imply that while human works admit preparation, the works of God must be done instantly. But this expectation is contradicted by the whole course of Nature. For though God may at once do all His pleasure, yet for wise reasons He employs means, and allows such a gradual operation of those means as admits of a progress in which one thing prepares the way for another, giving notice of its approach. God in the revelation of religion seems always to have proportioned His discoveries not only to the actual wants of mankind, but to their capacity of receiving truth and their means of communicating it to others. The same means must be used for diffusing Christianity as for spreading any other system of truth; but in addition to these it has the twofold support of Divine providence and Divine influence. Having these, though the progress is slow, we must not fail in our efforts, nor be discouraged. In that which sometimes saddens us there is nothing surprising.
4. God has given to the Church an instrument of proved efficiency and power—truth, Divine truth! Falsehood has no unity, no stability. In Scriptural truth there is a real adaptation to man (H. E. I. 1151, 2421–2427). When fairly propounded before him, it is felt to be “a faithful saying.” “The power of God unto salvation.” The weapons of this holy war, what victories have been already achieved by them! (2Co_10:4). Jesus retains in His own hands the influences that make the truth effectual (Joh_14:16; Mat_3:11).
5. The inherent vitality of religion encourages the hope of its final prevalence. Religion is in the world—that is something. Religion, though long opposed, hated, despised, is not extinguished! Had Divine truth been capable of being crushed by power, it would have been crushed long since—by the giants before the Flood, by the Pharaohs of Egypt, by the monarchs of Babylon, by ancient Rome under the Cæsars (H. E. I. 643, 1165).
6. The agencies of Providence are constantly going on to prepare the world for the truth, and to send the truth to the world (H. E. I. 979, 4029, 4030).
III. LESSONS.
1. Hope much for the world from Christianity.
2. Cordially co-operate with all who love the Gospel.
3. Act as though all depended on your individual exertion.
4. Be sure you are on the right side yourselves.—Samuel Thodey.
Assuming, what the context abundantly confirms, that this is spoken of our Lord and Saviour, we have here a prophetic picture of the constancy which characterised our Redeemer in pursuing His work on earth. It has been common enough for the Christian pulpit to discuss “the final perseverance of the saints;” it may not be amiss, for once, to consider the “final perseverance of their Saviour.”
I. THE FACT OF HIS PERSEVERANCE IN THE WORK WHICH HIS FATHER GAVE HIM TO DO.
1. The fact implies His true humanity. If He were not “very man” as well as very God,” we could hardly speak of His persevering.
2. It also bids us behold Him pursuing His glorious enterprise. It was a unique as well as a noble spectacle. It was verily “a new thing in the earth.” The world had had its warriors, statesmen, judges, kings, patriarchs, poets, and prophets; but in His purpose this “Servant” of God differed from them all.
II. THE DIFFICULTY OF HIS PERSEVERANCE.
To realise this we must remember that He was “the man Christ Jesus.”
1. He was almost alone in His great work. Often He felt that only “the Father was with Him,” so out of joint was He with all around Him (Joh_16:32).
2. He was very poor; and a man is heavily weighted in doing a great work if he is very poor.
3. His views were unpopular. In His principles and practices He ran counter to all parties in the Church and State, and especially was He out of accord with the religious thought and people of His day. He carried on His great work not only without any such aid, but in the teeth of a strong and united opposition.
4. His own family derided Him (Joh_7:5). No light thing or trifling hindrance.
5. He had recreant followers. Some evinced pride, some anger, some ambition, some fear; one was covetous, most were ignorant and carnal, one denied Him shockingly, another betrayed Him foully, while “all forsook Him and fled.” What a trial and difficulty this was to the Master to have such weak human elements in His chosen companions we can never fully know.
6. He was terribly tempted; and this, I take it, was by far the worst of all. Really tempted “in all points as we are;” terribly tempted, for “He suffered” through it. After this brief review who will dare to say Christ’s difficulties were small or that He had nothing to discourage Him?
III. THE SUCCESS OF CHRIST’S PERSEVERANCE.
The prophecy became fact. He did not “fail” nor was He “discouraged till He had set judgment in the earth.” His success is seen in the fact that—
1. He taught the truth He came to teach (Joh_18:37).
2. He did the work He was sent to accomplish. He could cry at last, “It is finished.”
3. He suffered all it was necessary He should endure, even to death itself. He was taunted and tempted to “save Himself and come down from the cross,” but He would not; He persevered to the “bitter end.”
4. He showed His victory over sin and death by rising from the grave and ascending into heaven.
5. We see His success through His Apostles and His Church since. Let the Pentecosts and the world-wide spread of the Gospel at the first, and the reformations and revivals of more modern times, be the proof. The remotest “islands” have not only “waited” for, but have actually and joyfully received, “His law.” His success is still thus accruing, and it shall yet go on till “the whole earth shall be filled with His glory,” and He has seen “of the travail of His soul” and is “satisfied.”
IV. THE SECRET OF HIS PERSEVERANCE.
What was it? Let us “spoil the Egyptians” by finding the answer in the taunt of His foes. He trusted in God! Jesus Christ was the Greatest Believer as well as the only Saviour (Joh_14:10). His strong, and abiding, and incomparable faith in God is the secret of His constancy. This led Him to pray to God and work for God as none ever prayed or toiled before or since. And all for the glory of God. “I have put my Spirit upon Him,” is the prophetic explanation in the context, and that of the New Testament is like unto it (Joh_3:34-35).
V. THE PRACTICAL LESSON OF HIS PERSEVERANCE.
It is twofold—
1. There is example and encouragement here for those who are Christ’s followers. Example as to how they should persevere; encouragement to hold on their way (Php_1:6).
2. Here is also something to induce those “without” to come and live. “He will not fail,” whatever you need, “nor be discouraged,” though you have done so much to make Him so. “He saveth to the uttermost.” He “receiveth sinners” still.—John Collins: The Study and the Pulpit, New Series, pp. 119–122.
A revelation of Christ’s tenderness and constancy in His mediatorial work. Perseverance is a high virtue.
I. The work in which the Saviour is engaged. It is described as “setting judgment in the earth.” Denotes the benevolence and rectitude of His undertaking. It is no selfish work—no attempt to overreach and destroy His enemies. But He saw that the laws of God had been set aside in this earth, &c., and He came to correct these flagrant evils, and restore the world to purity and peace.
II. The discouragements that rise up before Him. The assurance that He will not fail nor be discouraged implies that He will meet with much to discourage Him, and His work will be inconceivably difficult and painful. This was verified all through His personal residence on earth. In what state did He find the world?
1. Sin.
2. Selfishness—a cold individualism.
III. The victory that will eventually crown His cause. The assurance of this fact rests not on a single passage or promise of Scripture. There shall be the triumph—
1. Of the moral over the physical.
2. Of the real over the ideal.
3. Of the social over the selfish.
4. Of the true over the false.
1. Great will be the results of these mighty changes.
2. Let us take encouragement from the Saviour’s example.—J. T. Peck, D.D.: Sermons by Fifty American Preachers, pp. 193.
I. THE OBSTACLES WHICH OUR LORD MEETS IN HIS WORK OF KINDNESS TO MAN. The assurance that the Servant of the Lord will “not fail nor be discouraged” implies that His work will be difficult and painful, and that He will meet with much to discourage Him. We might consider these obstacles as they were presented in the world He came to redeem. His own people were involved in such pride and earthliness, that although His advent had been amongst them the subject of prophecy during many hundreds of years, they scorned His instructions and resisted His claims (Joh_1:11). The Gentile nations, ignorant, desperately corrupt, hopeless (1Co_1:21; Rom_1:21-32; Eph_2:12). What a world to visit, what a race to address, what a work to accomplish! But the world had, and still has, to be redeemed by the redemption of individuals. Let us, therefore, call to mind the obstacles which any single human being presents to Christ when He comes forth in the power of His grace to seek and to save.
1. What is the bent of his inclinations? Whither run his affections? What is the tendency of his will? Of what character are his moral instincts? He is an earthly creature. He may be more or less intellectual in his pursuits, but he is still earthly and sensual. He desires earthly things as the means of his enjoyment. He lives to himself, not to his Maker. Unholy selfishness is the principle which puts into motion his activity in all its forms. Yet he has the most exalted conceptions of his personal merits and security. What obstacles are here to Christianity, to the salvation offered by Christ! what strongholds must be demolished, what fierce animosities must be subdued, ere the dominion of Christ can be established in any human soul!
2. Consider the indisposedness of man to receive instruction. How vast is the influence of all this pride and worldliness upon the mind. Its distinctions of good and evil are confounded, the understanding is blinded, the affections are enslaved. Man has no disposition honestly to seek the truth or to retrace his steps to the paths of godliness (Pro_14:12; Joh_3:20). The approach of spiritual light is painful to him. Religious instruction alarms rather than delights his mind. The corrupt heart resists the admission of God’s claims (Psa_58:3-5). We love the sounds that lull, and the counsels which gratify our passions (H. E. I. 2669–2679).
3. Observe the use which we make of instruction when actually received. With what unequal steps do we advance along the paths of heavenly science! Into how many by-roads do we turn! What inconsistency and irresolution are visible in our daily conduct! How prone to let go the truth and to take up error! What dulness to discern, and what indolence to pursue, the whole will and counsel of God!
Let these facts be considered, and the obstacles in the way of Christ will appear insuperably great.
II. THE PATIENCE AND TENDERNESS WITH WHICH HE MEETS ALL THESE OBSTACLES.
With what constancy He pursues His gracious object amid all the difficulties by which it is encompassed! He counted the cost ere He engaged in the work of redemption; He fully understood the human heart, and had anticipated all the baseness of its ingratitude; and therefore nothing could turn Him away from the fulfilment of the errand of mercy on which He came (Heb_12:2-3). He remains the same, unchanged in His counsels of peace, unwearied in His efforts to enlighten and to save. And not in vain. His religion has overthrown the polytheism of ancient nations. Into how many a cold, reluctant, rebellious heart has His Gospel at length forced its way, and shed a late though lasting peace over the tumults of conscience and the perturbations of passion! What a history of forbearance and compassion on the part of Christ would the secret but detailed memoirs of individual believers compose!
III. THE ULTIMATE TRIUMPHS OF HIS GRACE. “He will not fail nor be discouraged.” Viewed separately, many events may appear contradictory to His purpose; but, under the silent and strong control of an unseen Agency, the complicated system of this world’s occurrences in really “working together for good” (H. E. I. 4024, 4030).
1. Numerous as are the strongholds of idolatry and superstition, truth shall yet brighten every land, and religion have dominion over a willing and converted world (Rev_11:15; H. E. I. 979, 1166–1168, 2541, 4829, 4831).
2. It is in reference to the completion of Christ’s work of love upon the individual heart that the subject assumes to us the deepest interest. If towards His redeemed servant, notwithstanding all his inconstancy, our Lord has hitherto been compassionate and indulged, it is with the intention to cleanse him from all iniquity. It is a consideration full of comfort for an honest mind which trembles under a sense of weakness and unworthiness, that redemption is a settled and deliberate plan of mercy to bless the wretched and save the lost; that Christ is the Mediator of an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure; and that God has connected the manifestation of His own glory with the deliverance of His people from the captivity of sin. To what conclusion do these considerations bring me? To love my Benefactor more warmly, and to throw myself afresh into the combat with evil (1Jn_4:4; Rom_8:37; Jud_1:24; H. E. I. 1070).—Hon. Gerard T. Noel, M.A.: Sermons, pp. 142–158.
Introduction.—Briefly give the spirit of Isa_42:1-3, dwelling especially on the greatness of the work to be done, as contrasted with the apparent feebleness of the means to be employed.
I. The hopeful spirit of this Servant of Jehovah. Draw attention to the discouragements arising from the character of the work, and to the hindrances alike in the world, the Church, and the individual. The tendency of workers to lose heart, to grow “weary in well-doing.” The effect of this losing heart on the quality of the work and its efficiency.
Two things essential to hopeful working—
1. Faith in truth.
2. Faith in the possibility of accomplishing the work (H. E. I. 1928–1931; P. D. 1162, 1176).
See both these in the Servant of Jehovah.
1. His trust in God; in God’s word, “it shall not return void;” His calm outlook and untroubled mind, giving dignity and power to every word He spake.
2. His unbounded faith in the power of the Gospel to subdue and save men; in the ultimate triumph of the truth.
II. This spirit of hopefulness is essential to all successful working for Christ. Give illustrations of the power of faith to quicken and inspire, and also to generate faith in others. Luther’s words have been said to be “half battles.” Men felt that he believed in the truth he proclaimed, and had no doubts as to the ultimate issue. Trace this hopeful spirit in the life and work of the Apostles, and of some of the most successful workers for Christ. Contrast the jubilant love of scientific workers in our time with the Elijah-like depression among Christians. They are on the scent of the truth; their past successes embolden them to hope for greater things. Sometimes they may be over-confident, yet their spirit inspires others. So let Christians be hopeful. Give illustrations of the well-grounded character of hope here. As the Jew could look back upon his eventful history, bright with tokens of Divine favour and power, so we can look back to the triumphs of the past, e.g., success of mission work in nineteenth century; some recent triumphs of Christianity showing that the power is the same.
Close by urging the importance of faith in Christ, in His promises, and in the power of the Gospel to save men and nations (H. E. I. 1161–1168).—J. Fordyce, M.A.: The Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i. p. 20.
IS CHRISTIANITY A FAILURE?
Isa_42:4. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, &c.
In these days we often hear it said that Christianity is a failure; and on this theme many pens have been employed and many addresses have been made. As if foreseeing this state of mind, two thousand five hundred years ago the prophet took up his harp and sung these sweet notes, saying, “He shall not fail nor be discouraged.” These words apply to the Lord Jesus Christ (Mat_12:18).
I. The purpose of Christ is the conquest of this world; and, in carrying out this great work, He is not to fail or be discouraged until He has set judgment in the earth—that is, until the system of truth which He teaches is everywhere understood; until the principles of all government shall be brought into harmony with His Word, and men everywhere shall understand and practise the great lessons of truth and holiness.
II. Men are very ready to say that this purpose must be a failure; for—
1. The project is so vast, that it seems to man impossible. There have been great kingdoms set up on this earth of ours, but there was never a kingdom which reached to its utmost bounds. But this purpose is to found a kingdom embracing all lands, taking in its vast sweep of authority all nations of all languages and of all customs. And not only for a time, but enduring through all ages. Such a project seems to man impossible.
2. Men think Christianity must be a failure because the agencies seem to them inadequate. If the earth is to be conquered, they look for the sword, for vast armies, for the employment of agencies vast-reaching and of vast compass. But Christ sent forth His disciples to conquer this world, saying simply, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature.”
3. Men say Christianity is a failure because it has not accomplished its work. More than fifty generations have risen and gone down, and as yet not half the population of this earth has been reached. And how can it be that this earth is to be conquered since in eighteen centuries so little, comparatively, of this work has been done?
4. They tell us that Christianity is likely to be a failure because, they say, there is a conflict between science and religion. They tell us that the advance of science has shown errors in the accounts of the Bible; that the Bible has become effete; that the system of Christianity has served its day; that we must look for something grander, and nobler, and stronger to call and hold the attention of the human mind.
III. It is one of the favoured expressions of these men who fancy Christianity is a failure, that in the order of this world there shall be the “survival of the fittest”—that the weaker shall pass away, and the stronger and the mightier shall remain. Now, if we contrast Christianity with other forms of religion, where shall we find its failure? We may say to-day, simply as a fact, that it still remains, and, surpassing any other system in its strength and beauty, we shall see its survival over all.
Compare it with paganism. Not that low, degrading paganism we find among the Indians of our continent or the tribes of Africa, but paganism in its palmiest hours—in the days of the philosophy of Greece and of the power of Rome, when its temples shone with splendour, when its poets sang with grace, when sculpture and architecture gathered around it their forms of beauty. Scepticism then doubted and denied; but all the scepticism of Greece or Rome never closed one temple, never dethroned one of their imaginary deities. In the midst of scepticism popular faith went right on, and the temples had their devotees and worshippers. Judaism taught the knowledge of the one true God, yet it made no advances against idolatry. But what sceptical philosophy and Judaism could not do, Christianity has accomplished. Men without earthly power, men persecuted, men in prison, men reproached, went telling the story of a living and dying and ascended Christ, and as they told this story, the temples became deserted and the idols fell, until to-day there is not a god worshipped on earth that was worshipped in the time of the philosophy and glory of Greece and Rome.
Compare it with Brahmanism—a system that has much in it that is beautiful, with many of its precepts sublime, and many of its declarations grand. We have India brought up under this system, and what is it? I have not time to dwell on its suffering, darkness, and degradation. Two hundred millions of the people of India, with their Brahmanism, are controlled by less than thirty millions of Englishmen, who used to be on an island just at one extremity of the earth. Why? How? Because the system fails to develop men. Because Christianity does develop manhood, and gives its strength to power.
Compare Christianity with the teachings of Confucius, as we find them embodied in the Chinese. Voltaire, Volney, and others spoke of the wonderful influence of this form of heathenism, and made some of us think, in our earlier hours, there was something grand in the system. But what are the results of the teachings of Confucius? What kind of men do they produce? What is the result of the teaching? China, with her four thousand years or more on her head, is bowing to young America, and sending her sons here to be educated. Japan, by her side, is asking for our teachers and our schools. Japan is the object of a resurrection; for to-day in Japan the Bible is becoming the text-book in some of the schools, and the young people are beginning to see the light and the glory that emanate from Christianity.
On the principle of the survival of the fittest, is Christianity a failure? Paganism has gone, Brahmanism is going, and Confucianism is going down. Christianity is just raising herself. Oh, I see her! There is beauty on her brow; there is lustre in her eye; there is glory on her cheek. I see her stepping on the mountains, passing over the plains; I see her with wide-open hand distributing blessings on the sons of men. She is yet young. The dew of youth is yet upon her, and she comes as an angel, having the everlasting Gospel to preach unto men.
But there is infidelity! Yes; and what is infidelity? It is a negation; it has no system. Where are its temples, its schools, its hospitals? What did it ever try to do for man anywhere, or at any time, as an organised system? There was one nation, and only one, that ever tried this system of infidelity. France decreed, “There is no God, and death is an eternal sleep,” and the result was that the streets of Paris ran with blood. Society was upheaved from its very foundations, and men were glad to go back even to poor temples, for the sake of finding some relief from the error and terror into which infidelity had thrown them. Infidelity has had its era. Voltaire said he lived in the “twilight of Christianity;” and so he did. But it was not, as he fancied, a twilight deepening into darkness, it was a twilight opening up into the brighter day; and the Sun of Righteousness shines now in spiritual beauty over our entire world. England, a century ago or more, was under the dominion of infidelity. The result was a degradation of morals and of general society. But as a reaction there came forth those works of Butler and Godwin, and a host of others who defended the principles of Christianity. And we have to-day a purer and clearer and stronger Christianity because of those attacks of infidelity. But who survived? Where are the infidels of that day? Where are their writings? They have scarcely left a mark. But Christian Churches are all over England and America.
The times are full of promise. I look over the earth, and nearly everything is hopeful. Christianity is growing stronger. It is visiting heathen nations and raising man to his full height of stature before the throne of God. Where are our discoverers? Where are our inventors? Where sit power, wealth, and learning? In Christian lands. All these are gathering around Christianity, and they make us hopeful for the future. We have our mission stations; we have our Bible translated. Our missionaries know the way to the very ends of the earth, and there have been more converts this year than in any other year since the Gospel was preached in Galilee. No danger of Christianity falling. No! Dispel all fear. There is no danger of Christianity. It is standing securely. The glory of God is on it. In the last days there shall be scoffers walking in their own ungodly lusts. If there were no scoffers at Christianity, I might doubt its truth. I know there are such scoffers, and I hear them around; but they are few and far between. A lecturer might come and occupy a hall, but the churches are full. There are crowds of the nations gathering around the Cross, and the beauty of our Lord Jesus Christ is atracting more and more (H. E. I. 979, 1166–1168).—Bishop Simpson: Christian Age, vol. xix. pp. 115–117.
Some say Christianity is a failure—others that it will never convert the world. Take the text as replying to both. Two standpoints to view the text—
I. That occupied by the prophet himself. Seven hundred years before Christ. So his predictions, as well as all that was written concerning Him, had to cover that space. From Isaiah’s standpoint, He shall not fail—
1. To appear as the promised and predicted Messiah. From the Fall He had been promised. He did not fail as to time, place, or manner.
2. In the great offices and work He would fulfil. Teacher, Prophet, Priest, and Lord.
3. Notwithstanding the opposition and sorrows of His life.
4. To survive and set up His kingdom. Hence His resurrection. Preached in Jerusalem. Reigns in the midst of His enemies. Triumphs of His grace.
II. First Church did not fail. Success everywhere. Now let us take our stand in our own age, and see some reasons for reiterating the declaration of the prophet.
He shall not fail,
1. To overcome all the opposition of His enemies. None more bitter than the past, or more formidable. Recent victories.
2. To attain the universal dominion. The grounds of this are manifold.
(1.) The divine covenant (Isa_53:10-11, with Php_2:6).
(2.) The divinely repeated prophecies and declarations (Psa_2:6; Psa_77:17; Hab_2:14).
(3.) The efficacy and sufficiency of the Gospel.
(4.) The impossibility of Christ’s failure. As the Divine, &c. The failure of Christ would be the triumph of ignorance, &c.
CONCLUSION.—The world has been full of failures. Christ never fails to be all that sinners need. Labour on and in hope. How futile all opposition. Emmanuel’s victories will be sung for ever.—J. Burns, D.D., LL.D.: Sketches and Outlines, p. 228.
THE PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY
Isa_42:4. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, &c.
Besides meeting its fulfilment in the ministry of Christ on earth, the text is fulfilled in Christianity, regarded as the Spirit of Christ moving in the world. Moving noiselessly, almost unperceived, Christianity was to accomplish the establishment of a universal kingdom.
I. The progress of Christianity shall continue until the principles of Christ’s Kingdom pervade the entire globe. In human affairs there are oftentimes failures and discouragements. In nature, in all the works of God, and in all the history of man, there are periods of progress and periods of retrogression. Men change their plans and try new instrumentalities; but “He shall not fail nor be discouraged,” or, as the margin reads, “broken;” that is, His plans shall not be broken or changed; and He shall not be discouraged, but shall wait until the great work shall be accomplished (Heb_10:12-13). His perseverance is indomitable.
II. But there is a modern tendency to speak of the failure of Christianity. Men speak of the failure of Christianity, “It is not answering its great design; some other system must take its place; Christianity will become one of the world’s past institutions,” &c. The cry comes to-day from the literary circle; from men of scientific pretensions. The youth of the land are taught to expect something better and higher than Christianity.
III. In what direction do indications around us point? It is thought that Christianity attempts too much. “It suits us and our civilisation; Mohammedanism suits a certain part of the earth better; Buddhism suits India,” &c. But is not the tendency of civilisation everywhere to bring man up to one great standard?
(1.) It is so in the material world.
(2.) All the discoveries of science are leading us to see a wonderful unity—a unity in all varieties—a unity in the heaven above us.
(3.) The whole human family is yet to be one brotherhood. If this be so, one religious tie is needed to bind all hearts together to the Father above.
(4.) Difference in the religious sentiment will give rise to varieties of taste, varieties in our modes of worship, &c.; but there will be one great revelation of faith.
2. It is thought that the agency is wholly inadequate to accomplish the work proposed. Men still imagine that the preaching of the Cross is foolishness. “How can it change national customs and institutions?” But the same men talk about the power of thought, about the control of the human mind. Christianity is emphatically a religion of thought. It proposes to conquer, not by the sword, but by entering into the mind of man, transforming his whole being, and changing, by this means, the order of society. Remember
(1.)—The power of thought. It has changed the face of nature; revolutionised empires. Primarily, there is no power in the universe but thought. God thought: “He spake, and it was done,” &c. It is Christian thought that is to conquer the world. Christ is represented as having a two-edged sword proceeding out of His mouth.
(2.) Every man that receives Christianity seeks to communicate it. It is like the spread of fire (H. E. I. 1162). When we think what Christianity promises, and the unseen spiritual influences that act in harmony with it to give it efficiency, we find the means adequate.
IV. The sure future of Christianity.
1. Christianity has already made a great change; and the future conquests of the earth, so far as we can see, will come under the control of the Christian nations (H. E. I. 1161).
2. Christianity has this peculiarity, that it takes up childhood in its arms. Infidelity and Paganism neglect childhood. “Give me the rising generation, and you give me the world.”
3. Out of the work Christianity is doing there comes a feeling of peace. The principle of arbitration is spreading among the Christian nations of the earth. Such is the blessing of Christianity to men. It shall not fail; for our great Leader is at the right hand of the throne; the power of the Father is His.—Bishop Simpson: Clerical World, vol. i. pp. 290–292.
THE SERVANT OF THE LORD
Isa_42:1-11. Behold My servant, &c.
It is difficult for us who have history, with all its definiteness, to realise the inestimable value of prophecy, notwithstanding its vagueness, to God’s ancient people. But try to put yourself in their place. It was very difficult for them to be God’s people, because it is difficult always to be loyal to an unpopular and apparently hopeless cause. How small was the true Israel! a little speck of light surrounded by a vast continent of darkness. The thought that that darkness would ever be dispelled seemed a vain dream. Besides, there was the terribly depressing influence of the apparent failure of all previous efforts to dispel it. The Law appeared to have been given in vain, kings and prophets raised up to no purpose. In spite of all that the most faithful of them had accomplished, the vast mass even of the chosen people were given over to iniquity, and over all the other nations there brooded gross darkness, the very shadow of death. Idolatry with all its abominations prevailed the whole world over. How, then, could any man reasonably hope that the earth should ever be “full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea”? It was contrary to reason to cherish this hope; but yet God’s little band of faithful people did cherish it. In this they were mightily helped by prophecy. The confident assurances of the prophets enabled them to look beyond the things that were seen and temporal, to those that were unseen but eternal. So they walked by faith, not by sight, and rejoiced in hope of the glory of God.
Chief among the predictions that were thus helpful to them was that of a Messiah—an Anointed One—who should triumphantly accomplish all the purposes of God in regard to this earth. In this particular prophecy He was held up before them as the “Servant” of God. This was a phrase with which they were familiar. By other discourses of Isaiah, they had been taught to regard themselves—their nation—as called to be the servant of God—the instrumentality by which the knowledge of God was to be diffused throughout the earth and men everywhere won to His service (Isa_41:8-9). This was in accordance with the terms of the covenant into which God had originally entered with them (Exo_19:6). A glorious calling, but how poorly had they responded to it! But now they were taught to look for One who should be all that they ought to have been, and accomplish all that they ought to have accomplished.
This prediction they would study with minutest care, and as they did so they would think much and often of such points as these:—
I. THE PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THIS “SERVANT OF GOD.”.
This much would be clear to them—
1. That His character would be more than blameless; that all conceivable moral and spiritual excellences would meet in it. “In whom My soul delighteth”
2. That He would be unostentatious, thus differing wonderfully from all earthly conquerors (Isa_42:2).
3. That He would be gentle (Isa_42:3).
4. Yet that this gentleness would not arise from weakness. He Himself would never be broken nor extinguished; over all opposition He would triumph.
We, who have history to guide us, know how wonderfully all these predictions have been fulfilled in Jesus Christ.
II. HIS MISSION.
1. He was to be the maker of a new covenant with God’s ancient people (Isa_42:6), that “new covenant” of which other prophets wrote and spoke (Jer_31:31-34).
2. He was to be “a light of the Gentiles.” He was to dispel the darkness that brooded over them by bringing “judgment,” i.e., true religion, to them. The effects of the accomplishment of His mission are set forth in beautiful figures in Isa_42:7. How blessed and glorious the task assigned to this Servant of the Lord!
III. THE MANNER IN WHICH HE WOULD ACCOMPLISH IT.
His conquests were not to be accomplished as earthly conquests had been.
1. His progress was not to be violent or clamorous (Isa_42:2). He was to conquer by simply doing what was right and speaking what was true (Mat_13:14-21; Joh_18:36-37). The kingdom of God cannot be extended by legal enactments or force of arms.
2. His triumphs were to be advanced by strengthening what was bruised and fainting. Here history comes to the help of the students of prophecy; it is by His gentle treatment of His feeble followers that our Lord has made them strong, and so made His Church a power in the earth (H. E. I. 951; P.D. 474).
3. His triumphs were to be secured by unwearied perseverance (Isa_42:4).
IV. THE GUARANTEES THAT IN THIS MISSION HE WOULD SUCCEED.
1. He would not undertake it in His own strength (Isa_42:1; Isa_42:6).
2. He who had called Him to it was no other than the Almighty (Isa_42:5).
3. The mission which He had undertaken was one that this Almighty Creator could not fail to sympathise with (Isa_42:8).
V. THE REASON ASSIGNED WHY THEY SHOULD TRUST IN THIS GLOWING PREDICTION (Isa_42:9).
This promise was made by Him who had fulfilled His former promises: in this He would not fail.
These were the hopes and expectations which sustained God’s ancient people, and we may derive comfort from them to-day. Christ’s triumphs are incomplete. Much remains to be accomplished; so much, that we sometimes doubt whether it can be accomplished. But these doubts are condemned—
1. by history;
2. by God’s Word. The kingdoms of this world shall yet become the kingdoms of God and of His Christ—M. N.
I. THE PERSON HERE REFERRED TO.
“The Servant of the Lord.” Who is intended by that phrase? Some have answered, Cyrus, because there is an undeniable reference to him in the beginning of the 41st chapter, where he is spoken of as “the righteous man from the east.” But the allusion cannot be to Cyrus here, for he was far from answering to the description given in Isa_42:2-3 : his sternness and severity are inconsistent with tenderness. Others allege that the prophet means himself. But how was “he a light to lighten the Gentiles”? And may we not presume that the phrase here designates the same person as in the other places in which it is employed, in many of which it is clearly impossible to hold that it describes Isaiah? Others think that it means Israel; but this servant was to be given “for a covenant of the people,” and, therefore, he must be distinct from the people. In a sense, indeed, the true spiritual Israel are one with Jesus, and they may be regarded as identified. This is the view of Alexander. But even in this view the passage must be taken first of Him, and is true of them only through their union to Him. So we adopt the view that this passage is purely Messianic,—a view which is adopted even by some eminent Jewish interpreters, and which has the sanction of Mat_12:17-21. When, therefore, the question is put, “Of whom speaketh the prophet this—of himself, or of some other man?” we answer without any hesitation, of Jesus who is called Christ.
II. THE DESCRIPTION HERE GIVEN OF HIM.
This is comprised in Isa_42:1-4. He is the beloved and the chosen of God, and to this prediction corresponds the declaration at the baptism of Jesus, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” He is endued with the Spirit of God, and to this answers the descent of the Holy Ghost on Jesus as He came up from Jordan (Act_10:38). It is added, “He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles,” which means that He should set up or establish His religion among the Gentiles, and for that the way was prepared in His death and resurrection, and by His great commission to His followers. But the most interesting part of this description is that which follows, and which brings out the humility and tenderness of Jesus (Isa_42:2). There was nothing of the love of ostentation about Him. Unlike the Pharisees of His time. When they did anything they supposed to be meritorious, they sounded a trumpet before them. He left His works to speak for themselves. Nay, even sometimes, when He saw that they were not moved by a proper spirit, He forbade those who had been benefited by His miracles from blazing abroad a report concerning them. He said, “The kingdom of God cometh not with observation.” And the whole system of getting up attractions of a factitious character to herald the preaching of the Gospel is out of harmony with His spirit and example. If crowds came after Him, that was an effect of something they had seen in Him, or received from Him. They were not collected by any flourish of trumpets which He caused to be sounded before Him. Few things in these days would do more good in the Churches than the study and imitation of this feature of the Redeemer’s character.
Akin to this humility is the tenderness here described. How beautiful the words, “A bruised reed shall He not break, and the smoking flax shall He not quench!” In the shepherd’s pipe, if a reed be bruised it gives forth a false note, and the player forthwith takes it out, breaks it, and throws it away. In the lamp, if the wick has gone out it emits an evil odour, and the attendant utterly extinguishes it. But not so with Jesus. That which others would reject as useless, He will endeavour to save (P. D. 475). He will receive even the outcasts, whom the world itself would throw away, and make of them trophies of His grace. We see this illustrated in the Gospel: in His treatment of the most degraded class of sinners (Luk_7:36-50; Joh_8:1-11; Joh_4:7-28). In His reception of those who came inquiringly to Him (Joh_3:1-17; Mar_10:17-22; Mar_12:28-34). In His dealings with the weak in faith (Mar_5:25-34); and in His reception of the backsliding, of which the case of Peter is a conspicuous illustration.
Isa_42:4 is a prediction of the universal diffusion of the Gospel which yet awaits its complete fulfilment. Meanwhile, as Christ does not fail and is not discouraged by the delay, why should we?
III. THE COMMISSION HERE GIVEN HIM.
This commission is issued by the Lord God (Isa_42:5). Behold the monotheism which so distinguished the literature of Judaism from that of other systems! This Jehovah has called Messiah “in righteousness,” or for a righteous purpose, or in such a way as shall at once manifest and promote righteousness. And the ultimate design is to fulfil His covenant with His people and bless the Gentiles. In doing that He will, by His Spirit, enlighten men in the knowledge of things concerning which they were formerly in the dark, and give them a nobler liberty than they had ever enjoyed, namely, freedom from the slavery of sin. And the result of all this would be an advancement of happiness, so that the people should sing a new song unto the Lord, and His praise should fill the earth. Could anything better describe the effect of the preaching of the Gospel by the Apostles at the first, or the results which follow, even in our days, the labours of faithful missionaries among the heathen?
LESSONS.—
1. If Christ needed the Spirit of the Lord upon Him, how much more do we? Let us supplicate God to put His Spirit upon us, that we may do His work in His way, and with the greatest possible success.
2. If Christ does not manifest ostentation, why should we? He who seeks to make himself or any particular feature of his own character prominent, thereby proves that he has not the Spirit of Christ. The wish to make a sensation is one thing; the desire to serve our generation by the will of God is quite another.
3. If Christ, who is all purity, could be gentle with the erring, why should not we? He did not sin, and, therefore, made no demand upon the charity of others; but we are always needing that others shall be tender with us; and, therefore, we ought to be all the more gentle with others.
“Forget not thou hast often sinned,
And sinful yet must be;
Deal gently with the erring one,
As thy God hath dealt with thee.”
—W. M. Taylor, D.D.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 The servitude of Jesus.
Isa 42:1
The servitude of Jesus.
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I. In Christ, service and freedom were perfectly combined. He gave the service of being, the service of work, the service of suffering, the service of worship, the service of rest, each to the very highest point of which that service is capable. But when He came, knowing, as He did, all to which He was coming, He came with these words upon His lips, "I delight to do it."
II. Christ had many masters, and He served them all with perfect service. (1) There was His own high purpose, which had armed Him for His mission, and never by a hair’s-breadth did He ever swerve from that. (2) And there was the law. The law had no right over Christ, and yet how He served the law, in every requirement, moral, political, ceremonial, to the smallest tittle. (3) And there was death, that fearful master with his giant hand. Step by step, inch by inch, slowly, measuredly, He put Himself under its spell, He obeyed its mandate, and He owned its power. (4) And to His Heavenly Father what a true Servant He was, not only in fulfilling all the Father’s will, but as He did it, in always tracing to Him all the power, and giving back to Him all the glory.
III. There is a depth of beauty and power, of liberty and humiliation, of abandonment and love, in that word "servant," which none ever know who have not considered it as one of the titles of Jesus. But there is another name of Jesus, very dear to His people, "the Master." To understand "the Master" you must yourself have felt "the Servant."
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 9th series, p. 27.
References: Isa 42:1, Isa 42:2.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 17. Isa 42:1-4.—W. M. Punshon, Penny Pulpit, No. 871 (see also Old Testament Outlines, p. 206); W. Hubbard, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiv., p. 291; C. Short, Ibid., vol. xv., p. 241.
Isa 42:3
(Mat 12:20)
I. The first reference of this passage is to Christ’s cause in the world. Thus interpreted, the passage is full of inspiration to each Christian philanthropist. Christ’s cause—the cause of virtuous happiness here on earth, and of glory to God in the highest—this cause, amidst its seeming feebleness, is divinely secure. The same principle pervades the Lord’s dealing with each individual soul. The entire eventual holiness of His people—i.e. their perfection in knowledge, faith, and goodness—is the Saviour’s steadfast purpose; and in carrying out that purpose He exerts an unwearying and victorious patience.
II. Those who are seeking salvation should (1) avoid what would quench the smoking flax. There are regions so very cold, the icy realms of everlasting winter, that it is hardly possible to get anything to ignite. And so it is with cold companions. You will find that religion perishes whenever you walk in the counsel of the ungodly or stand in the way of sinners. (2) When once a brand of wick is fairly lighted, its tendency is to aid its own incandescence and keep up its clearer shining. And so the grace which has already grown most is likely to be most growthful; the piety which has become habitual will be not only permanent but progressive. For a smoking flax there is no specific like heaven’s oxygen; for a faint and flickering piety there is no cure comparable to the one without which all our exertions are but an effort to light a lamp in vacuo—the breath of the Holy Spirit.
J. Hamilton, Works, vol. vi., p. 178.
Isa 42:3
The lesson which this passage teaches is that the Saviour is infinite in kindness.
I. The sinner is obscure, but the Saviour is omniscient.
II. The sinner is a thing of grief and guilt, but the Saviour is gentleness and grace impersonate.
III. The sinner is in himself worthless, but the Saviour is mighty; and out of the most worthless can make a vessel of mercy meet for the Master’s use.
J. Hamilton, Works, vol. vi., p. 164.
The source of Christ’s perfect tenderness to sinners is none other than the Divine compassion. It was the love and pity of the Word made flesh. It teaches us, however, some great truths, full of instruction, which we will now consider.
I. It is plain that this gentle reception even of the greatest sinners implies that, where there is so much as a spark of life in the conscience, there is possibility of an entire conversion to God. Where there is room to hope anything, there is room to hope all things. Such is the mysterious nature of the human spirit, of its affections and will, such its energies and intensity, that it may at any time be so renewed by the spirit of the new creation as to expel, with the most perfect rejection, all the powers, qualities, visions, and thoughts of evil.
II. Another great truth implied in our Lord’s conduct to sinners is, that the only sure way of fostering the beginning of repentance is to receive them with gentleness and compassion. On those in whom there is the faintest stirring of repentance the love of Christ falls with a soft but penetrating force. To receive sinners coldly, or with an averted eye, an estranged heart, and a hasty, unsparing tongue, will seldom fail to drive them into defiance or self-abandonment. A sinner that is out of hope is lost. Hope is the last thing left. If this be crushed the flax is extinct. Truth told without love is perilous in the measure in which it is true. There is in every sinner a great burden of misery, soreness, and alarm; but even these, instead of driving him to confession, make him shut himself up in a fevered and brooding fear. And it was in this peculiar wretchedness of sin that the gentleness of our Lord gave them courage and hope. It was a strange courage that came upon them; a boldness without trembling, yet an awe without alarm. What little motions of good were in them, what little stirrings of conscience, what faint remainder of better resolutions, what feeble gleams of all but extinguished light,—all seemed to revive, and to turn in sympathy towards some source of kindred nature, and to stretch itself out in hope to something long desired, with a dim unconscious love. It is an affinity of the spirit working in penitents with the Spirit of Christ that made them draw to Him. It was not only because of His infinite compassion as God that Christ so dealt with sinners; but because, knowing the nature of man, its strange depths and windings, its weakness and fears, He knew that this was the surest way of winning them to Himself.
H. E. Manning, Sermons, vol. ii., p. 377.
References: Isa 42:3.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. xii., p. 19; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 18.
Isa 42:3-4
I. Consider, first, the representation of the servant of the Lord as the restorer of the bruise that it may not be broken. "He shall not break the bruised reed." Here is the picture. A slender bulrush, growing by the margin of some tarn or pond, its sides crushed and dinted in by some outward power, some gust of wind, some sudden blow, the foot of some passing animal. The head is hanging by a thread, but it is not yet snapped or broken off from the stem. And so, says my text, there are reeds bruised and shaken by the wind, but yet not broken. And the tender Christ comes with His gentle, wise, skilful surgery, to bind these up and to make them strong again. The text applies (1) to mankind generally, (2) especially to those whose hearts have been crushed by the consciousness of their sins.
II. Look next at the completing thought that is here in the second clause, which represents Christ as the Fosterer of incipient and imperfect good. "The dimly burning wick He shall not quench." There is something in the nature of every man which corresponds to this dim flame that needs to be fostered in order to blaze brightly abroad. In a narrower sense the words may be applied to a class. There are some of us who have in us a little spark, as we believe, of a Divine life, the faint beginnings of a Christian character. We call ourselves Christ’s disciples. We are; but how dimly the flax burns. How do you make "smoking flax" burn? You give it oil, you give it air, and you take away the charred portions. And Christ will give you, in your feebleness, the oil of His Spirit, that you may burn brightly as one of the candlesticks in His temple; and He will let air in, and take away the charred portions, by the wise discipline of sorrow and trial sometimes, in order that the smoking flax may become the shining light.
III. Lastly, we have the representation of the servant of the Lord as exempt from human evil and weakness, as the foundation of His restoring and fostering work. "He shall not burn dimly nor be broken till He hath set judgment in the earth." There are no bruises in this reed. Christ’s manhood is free from all scars and wounds of evil or of sin. There is no dimness in this light. Christ’s character is perfect. His goodness needs no increase. And because of these things, because of His perfect exemption from human infirmity, because in Him was no sin, He is manifested to take away our sins.
A. Maclaren, Christian Commonwealth, Jan. 28th, 1886.
References: Isa 42:4.—Archbishop Benson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxii., p. 232; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 20, vol. x., p. 288. Isa 42:7.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xvii., No. 986. Isa 42:9.—Ibid., vol. xxv., No. 1508.
Isa 42:14-16
The solemn practical truth of the text is that God can do the most terrible things and the most gentle; that power belongeth unto God and also mercy; that He is either glorious as heaven or fearful as hell.
I. Look at the doctrine of the text in relation to bad men who pride themselves upon their success and their strength. The doctrine of the text is that there is a Power beyond man’s, and that nothing is held safely which is not held by consent of that Power. As he would be infinitely foolish who should build his house without thinking of the natural forces that will try its strength, so is he cursed with insanity who builds his character without thinking of the fire with which God will try every man’s work of what sort it is. The so-called success of the bad man has yet to stand the strain of Divine trial. Though his strength be as a mountain, it shall be wasted; though it be as a hill it shall be blown away, and the world shall see how poorly they build who build only for the light and quietness of summer. Remember, we are not stronger than our weakest point, and that true wisdom binds us to watch even the least gate that is insufficient or insecure.
II. Look at the doctrine of the text as an encouragement to all men who work under the guidance of God. God declares Himself gentle to those who truly need Him. He promises nothing to the self-sufficient; He promises much to the needy. The text shows the principle on which Divine help is given to men,—the principle of conscious need and of willingness to be guided. A true apprehension of this doctrine will give us a new view of daily providences, viz., that men who are apparently most destitute may in reality be most richly enjoying the blessings of God. Clearly, we are not to judge human life by outward conditions. Blindness may not be merely so much defect, it may be but another condition of happiness. It is because we are blind that He will lead us. It is because we are weak that He will carry us. It is because we have nothing that He offers to give us all things.
Parker, City Temple, 1870, p. 277.
References: Isa 42:16.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ix., p. 32; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xiv., No. 847, vol. xxii., No. 1310.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v3 Isa 42:3 - Isa 42:4.
Isaiah
CHRIST THE ARRESTER OF INCIPIENT EVIL AND THE NOURISHER OF INCIPIENT GOOD
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Isa 42:3 - Isa 42:4.
The two metaphors which we have in the former part of these words are not altogether parallel. ‘A bruised reed’ has suffered an injury which, however, is neither complete nor irreparable. ‘Smoking flax,’ on the other hand-by which, of course, is meant flax used as a wick in an old-fashioned oil lamp-is partially lit. In the one a process has been begun which, if continued, ends in destruction; in the other, a process has been begun which, if continued, ends in a bright flame. So the one metaphor may refer to the beginnings of evil which may still be averted, and the other the beginnings of incipient and incomplete good. If we keep this distinction in mind, the words of our text gain wonderfully in comprehensiveness.
Then again, it is to be noticed that in the last words of our text, which are separated from the former by a clause which we omit, we have an echo of these metaphors. The word translated ‘fail’ is the same as that rendered in the previous verse ‘smoking,’ or ‘dimly burning’; and the word ‘discouraged’ is the same as that rendered in the previous verse ‘bruised.’ So then, this ‘Servant of the Lord,’ who is not to break the bruised reed nor quench the smoking flax, is fitted for His work, because He Himself has no share in the evils which He would heal, and none in the weaknesses which He would strengthen. His perfect manhood knows no flaws nor bruises; His complete goodness is capable of and needs no increase. Neither outward force nor inward weakness can hinder His power to heal and bless; therefore His work can never cease till it has attained its ultimate purpose. ‘He shall not fail nor be discouraged’; shall neither be broken by outward violence, nor shall the flame of His fading energy burn faint until He hath ‘set judgment in the earth,’ and crowned His purposes with complete success.
We have, then, here set before us three significant representations of the servant of the Lord, which may well commend Him to our confidence and our love. I shall not spend any time in answering the question: Of whom speaketh the prophet this? The answer is plain for us. He speaks of the personal Servant of the Lord, and the personal Servant of the Lord is Jesus Christ our Saviour. I ask you then to come with me while I deal, as simply as may be, with these three ideas that lie before us in this great prophecy.
I. Consider then, first, the representation of the Servant of the Lord as the arrester of incipient ruin.
‘He shall not break the bruised reed.’ Here is the picture-a slender bulrush, growing by the margin of some tarn or pond; its sides crushed and dented in by some outward power, a gust of wind, a sudden blow, the foot of a passing animal. The head is hanging by a thread, but it is not yet snapped or broken off from the stem.
But, blessed be God! there emerges from the metaphor not only the solemn thought of the bruises by sin that all men bear, but the other blessed one, that there is no man so bruised as that he is broken; none so injured as that restoration is impossible, no depravity so total but that it may be healed, none so far off but that he may be brought nigh. On no man has sin fastened its venomous claws so deeply but that these may be wrenched away. In none of us has the virus so gone through our veins but that it is capable of being expelled. The reeds are all bruised, the reeds are none of them broken. And so my text comes with its great triumphant hopefulness, and gathers into one mass as capable of restoration the most abject, the most worthless, the most ignorant, the most sensuous, the most godless, the most Christ-hating of the race. Jesus looks on all the tremendous bulk of a world’s sins with the confidence that He can move that mountain and cast it into the depths of the sea.
There is a man in Paris that says he has found a cure for that horrible disease of hydrophobia, and who therefore regards the poor sufferers of whom others despair as not beyond the reach of hope. Christ looks upon a world of men smitten with madness, and in whose breasts awful poison is working, with the calm confidence that He carries in His hand an elixir, one drop of which inoculated into the veins of the furious patient will save him from death, and make him whole. ‘The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin.’ ‘He will not break,’ and that means He will restore, ‘the bruised reed.’ There are no hopeless outcasts. None of you are beyond the reach of a Saviour’s love, a Saviour’s blood, a Saviour’s healing.
But then the words in my text may be taken in a somewhat narrower sense, applying more particularly to a class. In accordance with other metaphors of Scripture, we may think of ‘the bruised reed’ as expressive of the condition of men whose hearts have been crushed by the consciousness of their sins. ‘The broken and the contrite heart,’ bruised and pulverised, as it were, by a sense of evil, may be typified for us by this bruised reed. And then from the words of my text there emerges the great and blessed hope that such a heart, wholesomely removed from its self-complacent fancy of soundness, shall certainly be healed and bound up by His tender hand. Did you ever see a gardener dealing with some plant, a spray of which may have been wounded? How delicately and tenderly the big, clumsy hand busies itself about the tiny spray, and by stays and bandages brings it into an erect position, and then gives it water and loving care. Just so does Jesus Christ deal with the conscious and sensitive heart of a man who has begun to find out how bad he is, and has been driven away from all his foolish confidence. Christ comes to such an one and restores him, and just because he is crushed deals with him gently, pouring in His consolation. Wheresoever there is a touch of penitence, there is present a restoring Christ.
And the words may be looked at from yet another point of view. We may think of them as representing to us the merciful dealing of the Master with the spirits which are beaten and bruised, sore and wounded, by sorrows and calamities; to whom the Christ comes in all the tenderness of His gentleness, and lays a hand upon them-the only hand in all the universe that can touch a bleeding heart without hurting it.
Brother and sister suffering from any sorrow, and bleeding from any wound, there is a balm and a physician. There is one hand that will never be laid with blundering kindness or with harshness upon our sore hearts, but whose touch will be healing, and whose presence will be peace.
The Christ who knows our sins and sorrows will not break the bruised reed. The whole race of man may be represented in that parable that came from His own lips, as fallen among thieves that have robbed him and wounded him and left him bruised, but, blessed be God! only ‘half dead’; sorely wounded, indeed, but not so sorely but that he may be restored. And there comes One with the wine and the oil, and pours them into the wounds. ‘The bruised reed shall He not break.’
II. Now, in the next place, look at the completing thought that is here, in the second clause, which represents Christ as the fosterer of incipient and imperfect good.
‘The dimly-burning wick He shall not quench.’ A process, as I have said, is begun in the smoking flax, which only needs to be carried on to lead to a brilliant flame. That represents for us not the beginnings of a not irreparable evil, but the commencement of very dim and imperfect good. Now, then, who are represented by this ‘smoking flax’? You will not misunderstand me, nor think that I am contradicting what I have already been saying, if I claim for this second metaphor as wide a universality as the former, and say that in all men, just because the process of evil and the wounds from it are not so deep and complete as that restoration is impossible, therefore is there something in their nature which corresponds to this dim flame that needs to be fostered in order to blaze brightly abroad. There is no man out of hell but has in him something that needs but to be brought to sovereign power in his life in order to make him a light in the world. You have consciences at the least; you have convictions, you know you have, which if you followed them out would make Christians of you straight away. You have aspirations after good, desires, some of you, after purity and nobleness of living, which only need to be raised to the height and the dominance in your lives which they ought to possess, in order to revolutionise your whole course. There is a spark in every man which, fanned and cared for, will change him from darkness into light. Fanned and cared for it needs to be, and fanned and cared for it can only be by a divine power coming down upon it from without. This second metaphor of my text, as truly as the other, belongs to every soul of man upon the earth. He from whom all sparks and light have died out is not a man but a devil. And for all of us the exhortation comes: ‘Thou hast a voice within testifying to God and to duty’; listen to it and care for it.
Then again, dear brethren, in a narrower way, the words may be applied to a class. There are some of us who have in us a little spark, as we believe, of a divine life, the faint beginnings of a Christian character. We call ourselves Christ’s disciples. We are; but oh! how dimly the flax burns. They say that where there is smoke there is fire. There is a great deal more smoke than fire in the most of Christian people in this generation, and if it were not for such thoughts as this of my text about that dear Christ who will not lay a hasty hand upon some little tremulous spark, and by one rash movement extinguish it for ever, there would be but small hope for a great many of us.
Whether, then, the dimly-burning wick be taken to symbolise the lingering remains of a better nature which still abides with all sinful men, yet capable of redemption, or whether it be taken to mean the low and imperfect and inconsistent and feeble Christianity of us professing Christians, the words of my text are equally blessed and equally true. Christ will neither despise, nor so bring down His hand upon it as to extinguish, the feeblest spark. Look at His life on earth, think how He bore with those blundering, foolish, selfish disciples of His; how patient the divine Teacher was with their slow learning of His meaning and catching of His character. Remember how, when a man came to Him with a very imperfect goodness, the Evangelist tells us that Jesus, beholding him, loved him. And take out of these blessed stories this great hope, that howsoever small men ‘despise the day of small things,’ the Greatest does not; and howsoever men may say ‘Such a little spark can never be kindled into flame, the fire is out, you may as well let it alone,’ He never says that, but by patient teaching and fostering and continual care and wise treatment will nourish and nurture it until it leaps into a blaze.
How do you make ‘smoking flax’ burn? You give it oil, you give it air, and you take away the charred portions. And Christ will give you, in your feebleness, the oil of His Spirit, that you may burn brightly as one of the candlesticks in His Temple; and He will let air in, and sometimes take away the charred portions by the wise discipline of sorrow and trial, in order that the smoking flax may become a shining light. But by whatsoever means He may work, be sure of this, that He will neither despise nor neglect the feeblest inclination of good after Him, but will nourish it to perfection and to beauty.
The reason why so many Christian men’s Christian light is so fuliginous and dim is just that they keep away from Jesus Christ. ‘Abide in Me and I in you.’ ‘As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye, except ye abide in Me.’ How can the Temple lamps burn bright unless the Priest of the Temple tends them? Keep near Him that His hand may nourish your smoking dimness into a pure flame, leaping heavenward and illuminating your lives.
III. And now, lastly, we have here the representation of the servant of the Lord’s exemption from human evil and weakness, as the foundation of His restoring and fostering work.
‘He shall not burn dimly nor be broken till He hath set judgment in the earth.’ There are no bruises in this reed; that is to say, Christ’s manhood is free from all scars and wounds of evil or of sin. There is no dimness in this light, that is to say, Christ’s character is perfect, His goodness needs no increase. There is no trace of effort in His holiness, no growth manifest in His God-likeness, from the beginning to the end. There is no outward violence that can be brought to bear upon Him that will stay Him in His purpose. There is no inward failure of strength in Him that may lead us to fear that His work shall not be completed. And because of these things, because of His perfect exemption from human infirmity, because in Him was no sin. He is manifested to take away our sins. Because in Him there was goodness incapable of increase, being perfect from the beginning, therefore He is manifested to make us participants of His own unalterable and infinite goodness and purity. Because no outward violence, no inward weakness, can ever stay His course, nor make Him abandon His purpose, therefore His gospel looks upon the world with boundless hopefulness, with calm triumph; will not hear of there being any outcast and irreclaimable classes; declares it to be a blasphemy against God and Christ to say that any men or any nations are incapable of receiving the gospel and of being redeemed by it, and comes with supreme love and a calm consciousness of infinite power to you, my brother, in your deepest darkness, in your moods most removed from God and purity, and insures you that it will heal you, and will raise all that in you is feeble to its own strength. Every man may pray to that strong Christ who fails not nor is discouraged-
‘What in me is dark
Illumine; what is low, raise and support,’
in the confidence that He will hear and answer. If you do that you will not do it in vain, but His gentle hand laid upon you will heal the bruises that sin has made. Out of your weakness, as of ‘a reed shaken with the wind,’ the Restorer will make a pillar of marble in the Temple of His God. And out of your smoking dimness and wavering light, a spark at the best, almost buried in the thick smoke that accompanies it, the fostering Christ will make a brightness which shall flame as the perfect light that ‘shineth more and more unto the noontide of the day.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 The Ideal Servant
The Ideal Servant
1-9. The characteristics and functions of Israel as the ideal Servant of Jehovah.
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10-17 A song of praise to Jehovah.
18-25. The deficiencies of the actual Israel, considered as Jehovah's Servant.
1. My servant] On the conception of these chapters see Intro. Judgment] or 'right.' The Servant's office is to teach the world true religion.
2, 3. He will not be ostentatious nor unduly severe. How Christ corresponded to the ideal is noted in Mat_12:17-21;
3. Smoking flax] RM 'dimly-burning wick.' Unto truth] RV 'in truth.'
4. The v. implies that the Servant's work will be attended with difficulty, which he will face and overcome. Set judgment] established true religion.
6. Two purposes of the Servant's call indidicated, (a) to be the embodiment of a new covenant with Israel (the people), (b) to be the instrument of a revelation to the Gentiles.
In righteousness] i.e. in faithfulness to My purpose as declared in My promises (Isa_41:2, Isa_41:10; Isa_45:13).
7. The thought of enlightenment continued, the imagery being suggested by the condition of the Jews in exile.
8, 9. A return to the thought of Jehovah's superiority to heathen gods. He shows His control of events by foretelling them.
11. Kedar] the tribes of Arabia. The rock] RV 'Sela,' the rock-city of Edom.
13-17. The vv. refer to the coming deliverance: in Isa_42:14. the speaker is Jehovah.
13. Jealousy] on behalf of His people: cp. Isa_9:7.
14. Holden my peace] leaving prayers unanswered (Psa_28:1; Hab_1:13). Refrained myself] not interposing by miracles or mighty acts. During the period of the exile there had been no divine interposition on behalf of Israel. Destroy and devour] RV 'gasp and pant.'
15, 16. The difficulties in the way of the returning exiles will disappear.
18-20. Israel, though called to be Jehovah's Servant, cannot comprehend Has message given through the prophet. Note the contrast to the ideal Servant (Isa_42:1-4), which suggests that, in the end, the Servant will be an Israel within Israel.
19. Perfect] RV 'at peace with me.'
20. Opening the ears] RV 'his ears are open.'
21. RV 'It pleased the Lord, for his righteousness' sake, to magnify,' etc. In accordance with His purpose, Jehovah had sent prophetic teachers: their teaching had been great and glorious, both in itself and in its fulfilment. The law] RM 'the teaching,' given through His prophets. Jehovah, on His part, graciously taught His people, but their insensibility (Isa_42:18-20) has brought them to their present condition of misery and exile (Isa_42:22-25).
23. Who among you, etc.] i.e. who will learn the lesson of the past?
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv1, 6 There is a twofold account of the Coming Servant:
servant
There is a twofold account of the Coming Servant:
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(1) he is represented as weak, despised, rejected, slain:
(2) and also as a mighty conqueror, taking vengeance on the nations and restoring Israel (e.g. Isa 40:10; Isa 63:1-4). The former class of passages relate to the first advent, and are fulfilled; the latter to the second advent, and are unfulfilled.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 The True Servant of Jehovah
CHAPTER 42
The True Servant of Jehovah
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1. The Servant of Jehovah and His mission (Isa 42:1-4) 2. His future work among the nations (Isa 42:5-9) 3. The future song of redemption glory (Isa 42:10-13) 4. Jehovah’s manifestation in power (Isa 42:14-17) 5. The address of exhortation to the deaf and blind nation (Isa 42:18-25) Matthew’s Gospel (Mat 12:20) tells us that this servant is the Lord Jesus Christ. Mark the different phases of His character and work while on earth and His future work when He appears again. The song of redemption glory will be sung only when He is manifested. Israel is seen as a people robbed and spoiled. None saith “Restore.” This is their present condition.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 The True Servant of the Lord
The True Servant of the Lord
v. 1. Behold My Servant, the designation here used in its most restricted sense, of the Messiah, whom I uphold, having established Him in His office, the Lord is now also confirming Him, standing behind Him with the fullness of His divine power; Mine Elect, chosen or selected for a special purpose, in whom My soul delighteth, whom He regards with unmixed pleasure, Mat 3:17; Luk 9:35; 2Pe 1:17; I have put My Spirit upon Him, Isa 11:2. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles, namely, the rights and the privileges of the New Covenant, of the Gospel of mercy in Jesus Christ, for it is in this message that God declares us to be righteous in and through the merits of our Savior.
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v. 2. He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause His voice to be heard in the street, the expressions being heaped in the form of a climax, in order to emphasize the meekness and humility of Jesus of Nazareth, which He applied throughout His work.
v. 3. A bruised reed, the fragile stem of a plant which has been bent to the point of breaking off, shall He not break, and the smoking flax, a wick which is at the point of becoming extinguished, shall He not quench, not put out entirely, that is, the Savior would make use of true pastoral mildness in dealing with hearts which are broken and contrite, not only by not driving them to despair, but by seeking them and caring for them with His full Savior’s love. He shall bring forth judgment unto truth, bringing it to the Gentiles, making it known to them in deed and in truth, working faith in their hearts.
v. 4. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, not give way to weakness in all the great work which lie has undertaken, till He have set judgment in the earth, till His righteous cause gains the victory; and the isles shall wait for His Law, the longing of the heathen for a deliverance from this present world, unconscious and inarticulate as it is, being satisfied only in the redemption earned and offered by Christ. That this entire paragraph was fulfilled in the person and work of Jesus is plainly stated Mat 12:18-21.
v. 5. Thus saith God the Lord, the covenant God, He that created the heavens and stretched them out, like an immense curtain suspended on nothing; He that spread forth the earth, for man’s use and delight, and that which cometh out of it, all its plants and products of the soil; He that giveth breath unto the people upon it, Act 17:25, and spirit, reason and personality, to them that walk therein, to all its inhabitants:
v. 6. I, the Lord, have called Thee, namely, the Messiah, whom He here addresses in words of encouragement, in righteousness, in His zeal for the salvation of Israel, in the merciful expression of His love for fallen mankind, by virtue of which the true righteousness is imputed to all believers, and will hold Thine hand, take a firm and reassuring grasp, transmitting His divine power, and will keep Thee and give Thee for a covenant of the people, as the Mediator of the covenant made with the patriarchs, for a Light of the Gentiles, to bring true spiritual light to the Gentiles;
v. 7. to open the blind eyes, those stricken by the blindness of the natural sinfulness and enmity against God, to bring out the prisoners, those held by the fetters of sin, from the prison, and them that sit in darkness, namely, in the darkness which fills the heart of all men by nature, Eph 5:8, out of the prison-house. All of this was fulfilled in Jesus, as the New Testament so abundantly testifies, this section being quoted or used by the evangelists and apostles at least fifteen times. That this work of the Servant of Jehovah will be carried out successfully is vouched for by the name and the honor of God Himself.
v. 8. I am the Lord, Jehovah, the Unchangeable One; that is My name, Exo 3:14; and My glory will I not give to another, neither My praise to graven images. The honor of His holy name, over against the false claims of the idols and their servants, demanded this solemn pledge. If He does not send the promised Mediator of the covenant to bring salvation to Jews and Gentiles alike, then He has lost the right to be called Jehovah and to be adored as the true God.
v. 9. Behold, the former things are come to pass, namely, the deliverance of Israel at the time of their passage through the Red Sea, Exodus 14, 15, and new things do I declare, the fulfillment of former promises being the guarantee that those herewith uttered will also come to pass; before they spring forth, I tell you of them. "All the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him Amen, unto the glory of God by us. " 2Co 1:20.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 5, 7 General Information:
General Information:
Yahweh continues speaking.
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Behold, my servant
"Look, my servant" or "Here is my servant"
in him I take delight
"with whom I am very happy"
translationWords
servant
chosen one
Holy Spirit
just
nation
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 42:1-4 The servant here is not the people Israel…
42:1-4 The servant here is not the people Israel (as in 41:8-28 and elsewhere in chs 41–48; see 49:5-6) but is a royal figure who accomplishes his mission with care for people, especially for those who are hurting. The passage is the first of four songs about this servant (42:1-4; 49:1-13; 50:4-11; 52:13–53:12). He brings in an era of universal justice. For the connection of the servant with Jesus Christ, see Matt 12:18-21.
42:1 who pleases me: God used similar language at Jesus’ baptism (Matt 3:17). • I have put my Spirit upon him: Any leader might be called a servant, but the presence of the Spirit suggests a king of David’s line or a prophet like Moses (see Num 11:17, 24-29). • Establishing justice is the responsibility of a king (see Isa 9:6-7; Ps 72:1). • This king’s mission will be a greater mission to the nations than simply governing the small nation of Judah.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.