16“Come near to me and hear this: “From the beginning I have not spoken in secret; from the time that it happened, I was there.” Now the Lord Yahweh has sent me with his Spirit.
17Yahweh, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel says: “I am Yahweh your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you by the way that you should go.
16 “Come near to me and hear this: “From the beginning I have not spoken in secret; from the time that it happened, I was there.” Now the Lord Yahweh has sent me with his Spirit.
17 Yahweh, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel says: “I am Yahweh your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you by the way that you should go.
KJVKing James Version
16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there am I: and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me.
17 Thus saith the LORD, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; I am the LORD thy God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.
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JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
16 Come ye near unto Me, hear ye this: From the beginning I have not spoken in secret; from the time that it was, there am I; and now the Lord GOD hath sent me, and His spirit.
17 Thus saith the LORD, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: I am the LORD thy God, who teacheth thee for thy profit, who leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.
Psalms 32:8(v17)I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you shall go. I will counsel you with my eye on you.
Psalms 25:12(v17)What man is he who fears Yahweh? He shall instruct him in the way that he shall choose.
Job 22:21-22(v17)“Acquaint yourself with him, now, and be at peace. By it, good will come to you. Please receive instruction from his mouth, and lay up his…
Deuteronomy 8:17-18(v17)and lest you say in your heart, “My power and the might of my hand has gotten me this wealth.” But you shall remember Yahweh your God, for…
Isaiah 30:20(v17)Though the Lord may give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your teachers won’t be hidden any more, but your eyes…
Show all 34 cross-references
Psalms 73:24(v17)You will guide me with your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.
Isaiah 54:13(v17)All your children will be taught by Yahweh; and your children’s peace will be great.
Job 36:22(v17)Behold, God is exalted in his power. Who is a teacher like him?
John 6:45(v17)It is written in the prophets, ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Therefore everyone who hears from the Father and has learned, comes to me.
Psalms 25:8-9(v17)Good and upright is Yahweh, therefore he will instruct sinners in the way. He will guide the humble in justice. He will teach the humble…
Micah 4:2(v17)Many nations will go and say, “Come! Let’s go up to the mountain of Yahweh, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of…
Psalms 71:17(v17)God, you have taught me from my youth. Until now, I have declared your wondrous works.
Isaiah 54:5(v17)For your Maker is your husband; Yahweh of Armies is his name. The Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer. He will be called the God of the…
Jeremiah 6:16(v17)Yahweh says, “Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, ‘Where is the good way?’ and walk in it, and you will find rest for…
Isaiah 43:16(v17)Yahweh, who makes a way in the sea, and a path in the mighty waters,
1 Kings 8:36(v17)then hear in heaven, and forgive the sin of your servants, and of your people Israel, when you teach them the good way in which they should…
Jeremiah 31:33-34(v17)“But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” says Yahweh: “I will put my law in their inward…
Isaiah 2:3(v17)Many peoples shall go and say, “Come, let’s go up to the mountain of Yahweh, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his…
Ephesians 4:21(v17)if indeed you heard him, and were taught in him, even as truth is in Jesus:
Isaiah 49:9-10(v17)saying to those who are bound, ‘Come out!’; to those who are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves!’ “They shall feed along the paths, and their…
Isaiah 44:6-24(v17)This is what Yahweh, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, Yahweh of Armies, says: “I am the first, and I am the last; and besides me there…
Isaiah 49:7(v17)Yahweh, the Redeemer of Israel, and his Holy One, says to him whom man despises, to him whom the nation abhors, to a servant of rulers:…
Isaiah 48:20(v17)Leave Babylon! Flee from the Chaldeans! With a voice of singing announce this, tell it even to the end of the earth: say, “Yahweh has…
Isaiah 43:14(v17)Yahweh, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel says: “For your sake, I have sent to Babylon, and I will bring all of them down as fugitives,…
John 18:20(v16)Jesus answered him, “I spoke openly to the world. I always taught in synagogues, and in the temple, where the Jews always meet. I said…
John 20:21-22(v16)Jesus therefore said to them again, “Peace be to you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on…
Isaiah 45:19(v16)I have not spoken in secret, in a place of the land of darkness. I didn’t say to the offspring of Jacob, ‘Seek me in vain.’ I, Yahweh,…
John 3:34(v16)For he whom God has sent speaks the words of God; for God gives the Spirit without measure.
Isaiah 11:1-5(v16)A shoot will come out of the stock of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots will bear fruit. Yahweh’s Spirit will rest on him: the spirit of…
Isaiah 61:1-3(v16)The Lord Yahweh’s Spirit is on me, because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken…
Luke 4:18(v16)“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to heal the broken hearted, to…
Isaiah 48:3-6(v16)I have declared the former things from of old. Yes, they went out of my mouth, and I revealed them. I did them suddenly, and they happened.…
Zechariah 2:8-11(v16)For Yahweh of Armies says: ‘For honor he has sent me to the nations which plundered you; for he who touches you touches the apple of his…
Isaiah 41:1(v16)“Keep silent before me, islands, and let the peoples renew their strength. Let them come near, then let them speak. Let’s meet together for…
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (21 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Thus the Prophet speaketh for himself, and to assure…
Thus the Prophet speaketh for himself, and to assure them of these things.
Since the time that I declared myself to your fathers.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Isa 48:16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye…
Isa 48:16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there [am] I: and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me.
Ver. 16. Come ye near unto me and hear this.] God calleth often for audience, as knowing our dulness and crossness, our oscitance and inadvertence: a good mirror for ministers.
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I have not spoken in secret.] See Isa 41:26.
From the time that it was, there am I,] viz., At the creation. {as Pro 8:22-23} Or, I have from everlasting been the author of that counsel by which all these things have had, as it were, their first beginning; and afterwards, in their appointed time, I have brought them forth by my power. {a}
And now the Lord God and his Spirit hath sent me,] i.e., Me, Isaiah the prophet, whose writings should therefore be prized and believed by us as most authentic and authoritative, because he was commissioned by the blessed Trinity.
{a} Diod.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Come ye near unto me, that you may the…
Come ye near unto me, that you may the better hear me, as it follows. A speech of God after the manner of men.
I have not spoken in secret; I have not smothered the counsel and word of God, but have plainly and publicly declared it. unto you; or, I have openly revealed my mind to you. See Poole "Isa 45:19", where these very words are spoken by God in his own name, as here by the prophet in God’s name; and so all comes to one.
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From the beginning; either,
1. From the first time that I began to prophesy until this time. Or,
2. From the beginning of my taking you to be my people, and of revealing my mind to you. See Poole "Isa 41:26".
From the time that it was these words also, as well as the former, are the words, either,
1. Of the prophet; and so the sense seems to be this, From the time that I was first called to be a prophet, I have been there, i.e. I have diligently pursued my prophetical function; I have hearkened from time to time, to hear what God would speak to me, that I might impart it to you. Or,
2. Of God; and then the sense may be this, From the time that I first spoke of it, or foretold it, I am or was there, to take care to effect what I had foretold; I minded it carefully from that time, as being then more especially obliged to do it, lest my truth or power should be questioned. Or the words may be thus rendered and explained, from the time that this shall be, when the time appointed for the doing of this work shall come, there I will be, to encourage and assist Cyrus in the work. There am I: this is opposed to those foregoing words, from the beginning. God and his Spirit; God by his Spirit; or, God, even the Spirit or the Holy Ghost, to whom the sending and inspiring of God’s prophets is ascribed, 2Pe 1:21. Hath sent me, to wit, the prophet Isaiah; who yet was a type of Christ, and so this may have a respect to him also.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry1710 · Public DomainOn v16Here, as before, Jacob and Israel are summoned to…
Here, as before, Jacob and Israel are summoned to hearken to the prophet speaking in God's name, or rather to God speaking in and by the prophet, and that as a type of the great prophet by whom God has in these last days spoken unto us, and that is sufficient: Come near therefore, and hear this. Note, Those that would hear and understand what God says must come near, and approach to him; let them come as near as they can. Let those that have hearkened to the tempter now come near, and hear this, that they may be confirmed in their resolutions to serve God. Those that draw nigh to God may depend upon this, that his secret shall be with them. Here,
I. God refers them to what he hath both said to them and done for them formerly, which if they would reflect upon, they might thence fetch great encouragement to trust in God at this time. 1. He had always spoken plainly to them from the beginning, by Moses and all the prophets: I have not spoken in secret, but publicly, from the top of Mount Sinai, and in the chief places of concourse, the solemn assemblies of their tribes; he did not deliver his oracles obscurely and ambiguously, but so that they might be understood, Hab 2:2. 2. He had always acted wonderfully for them: "From the time that they were first formed into a people there I am, there have I been resident among them and presiding in their affairs (he sent them prophets, raised them up judges, and frequently appeared for them), and therefore there I will be still." He that has been with his people hitherto will be to the end.
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II. The prophet himself, as a type of the great prophet, asserts his own commission to deliver this message: Now the Lord God (the same that spoke from the beginning and did not speak in secret) has by his Spirit sent me, Isa 48:16. The Spirit of God is here spoken of as a person distinct from the Father and the Son, and having a divine authority to send prophets. Note, Whom God sends the Spirit sends. Those whom God commissions for any service the Spirit in some measure qualifies for it; and those may speak boldly, and must be heard obediently, whom God and his Spirit send. As that which the prophet says to the same purport with this (Isa 61:1) is applied to Christ (Luk 4:21), so may this be; the Lord God sent him, and he had the Spirit without measure.
III. God by the prophet sends them a gracious message for their support and comfort under their affliction. The preface to this message is both awful and encouraging (Isa 48:17): Thus saith Jehovah, the eternal God, thy Redeemer, that has often been so, that has engaged to be so, and will be faithful to the engagement, for he is the Holy One, that cannot deceive, the Holy One of Israel, that will not deceive them. The same words that introduce the law, and give authority to that, introduce the promise, and give validity to that: "I am the Lord thy God, whom thou mayest depend upon as in relation to thee and in covenant with thee."
1. Here is the good work which God undertakes to fulfil in them. He that is their Redeemer, in order to that, will be, (1.) Their instructor: "I am thy God that teaches thee to profit, that is, teaches thee such things as are profitable for thee, things that belong to thy peace." By this God shows himself to be a God in covenant with us, by his teaching us (Heb 8:10, Heb 8:11); and none teaches like him, for he gives an understanding. Whom God redeems he teaches; whom he designs to deliver out of their afflictions he first teaches to profit by their afflictions, makes them partakers of his holiness, for that is the profit for which he chastens us, Heb 12:10. (2.) Their guide: He leads them to the way and in the way by which they should go. He not only enlightens their eyes, but directs their steps. By his grace he leads them in the way of duty, by his providence he leads them in the way of deliverance. Happy are those that are under such a guidance!
2. Here is the good-will which God declares he had for them by his good wishes concerning them, Isa 48:18, Isa 48:19. He had indeed brought them into captivity, but it was owing to themselves, nor did he afflict them willingly. (1.) As when he gave them his law he earnestly wished they might be obedient (O that there were such a heart in them! Deu 5:29. O that they were wise! Deu 32:29), so, when he had punished them for the breach of his law, he wished they had been obedient: O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! Isa 48:18. O that my people had hearkened unto me! Psa 81:13. This confirms what God had said and sworn, that he has no pleasure in the death of sinners. (2.) He assures them that, if they had been obedient, that would not only have prevented their captivity, but would have advanced and perpetuated their prosperity. He had abundance of good things ready to bestow upon them if their sins had not turned them away, Isa 59:1, Isa 59:2. [1.] They should have been carried on in a constant uninterrupted stream of prosperity: "Thy peace should have been as a river; thou shouldst have enjoyed a series of mercies, one continually following another, as the waters of a river, which always last." Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis aevum - It flows, and will for ever flow; not like the waters of a land-flood, which are soon gone. [2.] Their virtue and honour, and the justice of their cause, should in all cases have borne down opposition by their own strength, as the waves of the sea. Such should their righteousness have been that nothing should have stood before it; whereas, now they had been disobedient, the current of their prosperity was interrupted, and their righteousness overpowered. [3.] The rising generation should have been very numerous and very prosperous; whereas they were now very few, as appears by the small number of the returning captives (Ezr 2:64), not so many as of one tribe when they came out of Egypt. They should have been numberless as the sand, according to the promise (Gen 22:17), which they had forfeited the benefit of: "The offspring of thy bowels would have been innumerable, like the gravel of the sea, if thy righteousness had been irresistible and unconquerable as the waves of the sea." [4.] The honour of Israel should still have been unstained, untouched: His name should not have been cut off, as now it is in the land of Israel, which is either desolate or inhabited by strangers; nor should it have been destroyed from before God. We cannot reckon the name either of a family or of a kingdom destroyed till it is destroyed from before God, till it ceases to be a name in his holy place. Now God tells them thus what he would have done for them if they had persevered in their obedience, First, That they might be the more humbled for their sins, by which they had forfeited such rich mercies. Note, This should engage us (I might say, enrage us) against sin, that it has not only deprived us of the good things we have enjoyed, but prevented the good things God had in store for us. It will make the misery of the disobedient the more intolerable to think how happy they might have been. Secondly, That his mercy might appear the more illustrious in working deliverance for them, though they had forfeited it and rendered themselves unworthy of it. Nothing but a prerogative of mercy would have saved them.
3. Here is assurance given of the great work which God designed to work for them, even their salvation out of their captivity, when he had accomplished his work in them.
(1.) Here is a commission granted them to leave Babylon. God proclaimed, long before Cyrus did, that whoever would might return to his own land (Isa 48:20): "You have a full discharge sent you: Go you forth out of Babylon; the prison-doors are thrown open, and the trumpet sounds, proclaiming a release." Perhaps with this word, as a means, the Spirit of the Lord stirred up the spirits of those that did take the benefit of Cyrus's proclamation (Ezr 1:5): Flee you from the Chaldeans, not with an ignominious stolen flight, as Jacob fled from Laban, but with a holy disdain, as scorning to stay any longer among them; flee you, not silently and sorrowfully, but with a voice, with a voice of singing, as they fled of old out of Egypt, Exo 15:1.
(2.) Here is the news of this sent to all parts: "Let it be declared; let it be told; let it be uttered; make it to be heard by the most remote, by the most remiss; send the tidings of it by word of mouth; send it by writing, from city to city, from kingdom to kingdom, even to the utmost regions, to the ends of the earth." This was a figure of the publishing of the gospel to all the world; but that brings glad tidings which all the world is concerned in, this only that which it is fit all should take notice of, that they may be invited by it to forsake their idols and come into the service of the God of Israel. Let them all know then, [1.] That those whom God owns for his are such as he has dearly bought and paid for: The Lord has redeemed his servant Jacob; he has done it formerly, when he brought them out of Egypt, and now he is about to do it again. Jacob was God's servant, and therefore he redeemed him; for what had other masters to do with God's servants? Israel is God's son, therefore Pharaoh must let him go. God redeemed Jacob, and therefore it was fit that he should be his servant (Psa 116:16); the bonds God had loosed tied them the faster to him. He that redeemed us has an unquestionable right to us. [2.] That those whom God designs to bring home to himself he will take care of, that they want not for the necessary expenses of their journey. When he brought them out of Egypt, and led them through the deserts, they thirsted not (Isa 48:21), for in all their removals the water out of the rock followed them; thence he caused the waters to flow, and, since rock-water is the clearest and finest, God clave the rock, and the waters gushed out; for he can fetch in necessary supplies for his people in a way that they think the least likely. This refers to what he did for them when he brought them out of Egypt; when all this was literally true. But it should now be in effect done again, in their return out of Babylon, so well provided for should they and theirs be in their return. God does his work as effectually by marvellous providences as by miracles, though perhaps they are not so much taken notice of. This is applicable to those treasures of grace laid up for us in Jesus Christ, from which all good flows to us as the water did to Israel out of the rock, for that rock is Christ.
(3.) Here is a caveat put in against the wicked who go on still in their trespasses. Let not them think to have any benefit among God's people. Though in show and profession they herd themselves among them, let them not expect to come in sharers; no (Isa 48:22), though God's thoughts concerning the body of that people were thoughts of peace, yet to those among them that were wicked and hated to be reformed there is no peace, no peace with God or their own consciences, no real good, whatever is pretended to. What have those to do with peace who are enemies to God? Their false prophets cried Peace to those to whom it did not belong; but God tells them that there shall be no peace, nor any think like it, to the wicked. The quarrel sinners have commenced with God, if not taken up in time by repentance, will be an everlasting quarrel.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Come ye near unto me, hear ye this,.... An…
Come ye near unto me, hear ye this,.... An address to the Jews, to attend the ministry of Christ, and hear the doctrine he had delivered to them:
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the beginning of his ministry; which be exercised not in private houses, but in the synagogues of the Jews, and in the temple, whither a large concourse of people resorted, Joh 18:20,
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from the time that it was, there am I; from the time that his ministry began there, he was in the same places, in Judea and Galilee, always publicly preaching the Gospel, and doing good: or rather, "before the time that it was, there was I" (n); Christ existed before his incarnation, before he appeared as the great Prophet in Israel; he existed as the Word and Son of God from all eternity, and was with God his Father from everlasting; he was by him, and brought up with him, and lay in his bosom so early:
and now the Lord God and his Spirit hath sent me; in the fulness of time, in the likeness of sinful flesh, to preach the Gospel, fulfil the law, and to redeem and save the Lord's people. Here is a glorious testimony of a trinity of Persons in the Godhead; Christ the Son of God is sent in human nature, and as Mediator Jehovah the Father and the Spirit are the senders of him; and so is a proof of the mission, commission, and authority of Christ, who came not of himself, but was sent of God, Joh 8:42, it may be rendered, "and now the Lord God hath sent me and his Spirit" (o); both were sent of God, and in this order; first, Christ, to be the Redeemer and Saviour; and then the Spirit, to be the Convincer and Comforter; see Joh 14:26.
(n) "ex tempore antequam fieret", V. L. "nondum existente tempore horum eventuum", Forerius. (o) "misit me et spiritum ejus", Lutherus, Castalio; "et spiritum suum", Cocceius, Vitringa.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv16–17In secret - l have openly revealed my mind…
In secret - l have openly revealed my mind to you. The beginning - Either from the first time that I began to prophecy until this time: or from the beginning of my taking you to be my people, and of revealing my mind unto you. From the time - From the time that I first spoke of it, I am or was there, to effect what I had foretold. The Lord - God by his Spirit. Me - The prophet Isaiah; who was a type of Christ, and so this may have a respect to him also.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn v16Verse 16. Come ye near unto me] After the…
Verse 16. Come ye near unto me] After the word קרבו kirbu, "draw near," a MS. adds גוים goyim, "O ye nations;" which, as this and the two preceding verses are plainly addressed to the idolatrous nations, reproaching their gods as unable to predict future events, is probably genuine.
Hear ye this - "And hear ye this"] A MS. adds the conjunction, ושמעו vashimu; and so the Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate.
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I have not spoken in secret] The Alexandrine copy of the Septuagint adds here, ουδε εν τοπῳ γης σκοτεινω, "nor in a dark place of the earth," as in Isa 45:19. That it stands rightly, or at least stood very early, in this place of the Version of the Septuagint, is highly probable, because it is acknowledged by the Arabic Version, and by the Coptic MS. St. Germain de Prez, Paris, translated likewise from the Septuagint. But whether it should be inserted, as of right belonging to the Hebrew text, may be doubted; for a transcriber of the Greek Version might easily add it by memory from the parallel place; and it is not necessary to the sense.
From the time that it was - "Before the time when it began to exist"] An ancient MS. has היותם heyotham, "they began to exist;" and so another had it at first. From the time that the expedition of Cyrus was planned, there was God managing the whole by the economy of his providence.
There am I - "I had decreed it"] I take שם sham for a verb, not an adverb.
And now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me - "And now the Lord JEHOVAH hath sent me, and his Spirit"]
Τις εστιν ὁ εν τῳ Ησαιῳ λεγων, Και νυν Κυριος απεστειλε με και το Πνευμα αυτου; εν ᾡ, αμφιβολου οντος του ῥητου, ποτερον ὁ Πατηρ και το Ἁγιον Πνευμα απεστειλαν του Ιησουν, η ὁ Πατηρ απεστειλε τον τε Χριστον και το Ἁγιον Πνευμα το δευτερον εστιν αληθες.
"Who is it that saith in Isaiah, And now the Lord hath sent me and his Spirit? in which, as the expression is ambiguous, is it the Father and the Holy Spirit who have sent Jesus; or the Father, who hath sent both Christ and the Holy Spirit. The latter is the true interpretation." - Origen cont. Cels. lib. i. I have kept to the order of the words of the original, on purpose that the ambiguity, which Origen remarks in the Version of the Septuagint, and which is the same in the Hebrew might still remain; and the sense which he gives to it, be offered to the reader's judgment, which is wholly excluded in our translation.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Isa 48:16. Come ye near unto me, &c. —…
Isa 48:16. Come ye near unto me, &c. — That you may the better hear me. Here, as in Isa 48:14, Jacob and Israel are summoned to hearken to the prophet speaking in God’s name, and as a type of the great prophet, by whom God has in these last days spoken unto us. I have not spoken in secret — I have not suppressed, concealed, or kept back the counsel and word of God, or any part thereof, but have declared it openly and publicly. See note on Isa 45:19, where these very words are spoken by God in his own name, as they are here by the prophet in God’s name. From the beginning — From the first time that I began to prophesy until now: or, if the prophet be considered as uttering God’s words, the meaning is, From the beginning of my taking you to be my people, and revealing my mind to you. From the time that it was, there am, or rather, was, I — These words also, as well as the former, are the words either, 1st, Of the prophet; and so the sense is, From the time that I was first called to be a prophet, I have been there, that is, I have diligently pursued my prophetical function; I have hearkened, from time to time, to hear what God would speak to me, that I might impart it to you: or, 2d, Of God; and then the sense may be this: From the time that I first foretold it, I was there to take care to effect what I predicted. And now — This is opposed to the foregoing words, from the beginning; the Lord God and his Spirit — God, by his Spirit, or God, even the Spirit, namely, the Holy Ghost, to whom the sending and inspiring of God’s prophets is ascribed, 2Pe 1:21; hath sent me — Namely, the prophet, who yet was a type of Christ, and so this may have a respect to him also.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Come ye near unto me - (see Isa 48:14).
Come ye near unto me - (see Isa 48:14).
I have not spoken in secret - (See the notes at Isa 45:19). The idea here is, that he had foretold the raising up of Cyrus, and his agency in delivering his people, in terms so plain that it could not be pretended that it was conjectured, and so clear that there was no ambiguity.
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From the time that it was, there am I - From the moment when the purpose was formed, and when it began to be accomplished, I was present. The meaning is, that everything in regard to raising up Cyrus, and to the delivery of his people from Babylon, had been entirely under his direction.
And now the Lord God and his Spirit hath sent me - There is evidently a change in the speaker here. In the former part of the verse, it is God who is the speaker. But here it is he who is sent to bear the message. Or, if this should be regarded, as Lowth and many others suppose, as the Messiah who is speaking to the exiled Jews, then it is an assertion that he had been sent by the Lord God and his Spirit. There is an ambiguity in the original, which is not retained in our common translation. The Hebrew is, ‘And now the Lord Yahweh hath sent me, and his Spirit;’ and the meaning may be either, as in our version, that Yahweh and his Spirit were united in sending the person referred to; or that Yahweh had sent him, and at the same time had also sent his Spirit to accompany what he said. Grotius renders it, ‘The Lord by his Spirit bas given me these commands.’ Jerome understands the word ‘Spirit’ as in the nominative case, and as meaning that the Spirit united with Yahweh in sending the person referred to - Dominus Deus misit me, et spiritus ejus.
The Septuagint, like the Hebrew, is ambiguous - Νῦν κύριος κύριος ἀπέστειλέ με, καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα αὐτοῦ Nun kurios kurios apesteile me, kai to pneuma autou. The Syriac has the same ambiguity. The Targum of Jonathan renders it, ‘And now Jehovah (יי yeyâ) God hath sent me and his word.’ It is perhaps not possible to determine, where there is such ambiguity in the form of the sentence, what is the exact meaning. As it is not common, however, in the Scriptures, to speak of the Spirit of God as sending, or commissioning his servants; and as the object of the speaker here is evidently to conciliate respect for his message as being inspired, it is probably to be regarded as meaning that he had been sent by Yahweh and was accompanied wish the influences of his Spirit. Many of the reformers, and others since their time have supposed that this refers to the Messiah, and have endeavored to derive a demonstration from this verse of the doctrine of the Trinity. The argument which it has been supposed these words furnish on that subject is, that three persons are here spoken of, the person who sends, that is, God the Father; the person who is sent, that is, the Messiah; and the Spirit, who concurs in sending him, or by whom he is endowed.
But the evidence that this refers to the Messiah is too slight to lay the foundation for such an argument; and nothing is gained to the cause of truth by such forced interpretations. “It would require more time, and toil, and ingenuity to demonstrate that this passage had reference to the Messiah, than it would to demontstrate the doctrine of the Trinity, and the divinity of the Redeemer, from the unequivocal declarations of the New Testament.” The remark of Calvin on this verse, and on this mode of interpretation, is full of good sense: ‘This verse interpreters explain in different ways. Many refer it to Christ, but the prophet designs no such thing. Cavendoe autem sunt nobis violentoe et coactoe interpretations - (such forced and violent interpretations are to be avoided).’ The scope of the passage demands, as it seems to me, that it should be referred to the prophet himself. His object is, to state that he had not come at his own instance, or without being commissioned. He had been sent by God, and was attended by the Spirit of inspiration. He foretold events which the Spirit of God alone could make known to mankind. It is, therefore, a strong asseveration that his words demanded their attention, and that they had every ground of consolation, and every possible evidence that they would be rescued from their bondage. It is a full claim to divine inspiration, and is one of the many assertions which are found in the Scriptures where the sacred writers claim to have been sent by God, and taught by his Spirit.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary1859 · Public DomainOn v16Spirit. The Fathers here find the three Persons of…
Spirit. The Fathers here find the three Persons of the blessed Trinity specified. Isaias was not from the beginning, though the text may also speak of him (Calmet) as the spoke long before the event, by divine inspiration. (Chaldean) (St. Jerome)
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 Scriptures1864 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Isa_48:20-21 connect naturally with Isa_48:14-15. For Isa_48:14 foretells the…
4. TWO INSERTIONS
Isa_48:16-19
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Isa_48:20-21 connect naturally with Isa_48:14-15. For Isa_48:14 foretells the victory of Cyrus over Babylon; Isa_48:20 summons Israel to flee out of vanquished Babylon as a prison opened by Cyrus. Isa_48:16, however, contains a personal remark of the Prophet; and though Isa_48:17-19 are a revealed word of God (com. כֹּה אָמַר י׳ Isa_48:17), they are yet of so general a nature, that they would be perfectly in place, indeed, after Isa_48:21, as expressive of a regret that Israel did not follow the direct way to salvation, but had made necessary the detour through the Exile; but coming between Isa_48:15; Isa_48:20, they can only be regarded as a break of the connection. How Isa_48:16-19 came where they are will hardly be made out by any one. Their proper place would be between Isa_48:21-22. Perhaps they first stood in the margin (occasioned by the personal nature of Isa_48:16 and the retrospective nature of Isa_48:17-19 in the midst of the current of prospective prophecy), and then they were, through misunderstanding, inserted before instead of after Isa_48:21. [The Author’s difficulty as to the order of the verses will not be felt by many, any more than they are, e.g., by Lowth, Maurer, Barnes, J. A. Alex., who comment right on without being aware of anything to stumble at. Yet J. A. A. pauses to say, that the objection as presented by others is entirely unfounded; vide. his comm. on Isa_48:18. Those that fail to see the difficulty with the Author, will equally discard the caption he adopts, by which he stamps these verses 16–19 as interpolations.—Tr.).
a) FIRST INSERTION
Isa_48:16
A personal remark of the Prophet
16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this;
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning;
From the time that it was, there am I:
And now the Lord God, 9and his Spirit, hath sent me.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
These words are enigmatical, and I despair of explaining them in a convincing way. I do not believe that “come ye near unto me, hear ye this” are in parallelism with “all ye assemble yourselves and hear” Isa_48:14, and that therefore they are to be construed also as words of Jehovah. [“As certainly now as הִקָבְצוּ Isa_48:14 is the word of Jehovah, so certain is it that קִרְבוּ אֵלַי is the same. He summons to Himself the members of His nation, that they may hear still further His own testimony concerning Himself.” Delitzsch]. For, as has been shown, the initial words of Isa_48:14 are references to something said before. But Isa_48:16 begins a thought of another sort. It makes on me the impression of a separate remark, which the Prophet had directed to a narrower circle of immediate hearers, such as, say, the narrower circle of his disciples may have been (comp. on Isa_8:16 sqq.). Some might be surprised regarding the prophecies beginning with chap. 40, that the Prophet foretells so positively a Babylonian Exile, and the deliverance by a prince by the name of Cyrus. The Prophet explains this Isa_48:16. By “come ye near unto me” he intimates that he would make a particularly confidential communication. It consists in the statement that he must not be supposed to have known of these things already, say from the beginning of (מֵרֹאשׁ) his prophetic activity, and to have announced or may-be made a written record of them, as esoteric secrets, only in the narrowest circle. Rather he did not himself know of these things from the beginning. Only מעת היותה, “from the time that it was,” was he there. That is, only since these things “were created” (נִבְרְאוּ Isa_48:7) in the sense that we have explained Isa_48:7, did he become familiar with them and they stand visible before his prophetic eye. היותה seems to me to remind one of אָמַר וַיְהִי and of הַדָּבָר הָיָה. The Prophet regards as created, as come to pass, what has been announced to him. Hence he says here, he for his person was present, as an inward, spiritual witness and spectator, when these things, in a prophetic sense, came to pass. But now the LORD Jehovah (see List) has sent him, i.e., has sent him with the commission of announcing, and His Spirit. Therefore he distinguishes between the moment of prophetic seeing and that of prophetic announcement. I cannot construe רוּחוֹ as accusative. For then he would make himself like the Spirit, or put himself on a level with the Spirit. He can only make the Spirit equal with the Lord. But he distinguishes the Lord and His Spirit, by recognizing the first as the one from whom the Spirit proceeds (1Ki_22:22) or is sent.
This is an attempt at exposition, which however I by no means set forth as an assured assertion. As I cannot hold it to be satisfying, I cannot pretend to have solved the enigma by it. For a Prophet to interrupt his official prophecy by a private remark is, of course, against the rule. Still it is not unexampled. I regard Jer_31:26 as such, where see my comment. In Jeremiah, the occasion of that personal remark was the circumstance, that that moment of awaking out of sleep was for him the brightest point in all his trying prophetic career. For Isaiah the occasion was, that he regarded it as necessary to give his immediate hearers an explanation why he now announced things the like of which no one had ever before heard from him. It might seem as if hitherto he had preserved silence about what he had long known. But he says: The new thing that ye have heard, I myself did not know earlier. It has only now come to pass (in a prophetic sense), and only after it came to pass did I receive commission to reveal it. Of course, this exposition is only possible if the Prophet that speaks is Isaiah himself, and if Isaiah here for once speaks out of the historical moment in which he prophesied. But does not the whole weight of his discoures rest on this, that he is even prophesying, i.e., announcing future things, not present or past? If so, then he must be conscious of the interval between prophecy and fulfilment. He must know that what is prophesied lies far, far before him, too far for any human eye to recognize what lies beyond that interval. Hence I cannot agree with Delitsch in considering that the Prophet lives only in the Exile with his spirit. This were only possible did he forget that he prophesied.
[The comment of Delitzsch directly following his words quoted above is: “From the beginning He has not spoken in secret (see Isa_45:19); but from the time that all which now lies before their eyes—namely, the victorious career of Cyrus—has unfolded itself, He has been there, or has been by (שָׁם, ‘there,’ as in Pro_8:27), to regulate, what was coming to pass, and to cause it to result in the redemption of Israel. ‘I was there’ affirms, that, at the time when the revolution caused by Cyrus was preparing in the distance, He caused it to be publicly foretold, and thereby proclaimed Himself the present Author and Lord of what was then occurring. Up to this point Jehovah is speaking; but who is it that now proceeds to say, ‘And now’—namely, now that the redemption of Israel is about to appear (ועֲתָּה being here, as in many other instances, e.g., Isa_33:10, the turning-point of salvation)—‘now hath the Lord Jehovah seat me and His Spirit.’ The majority of the commentators assume that the Prophet comes forward here in his own person, behind Him whom he has introduced, and interrupts Him. But since the Prophet has not spoken in his own person before, whereas, on the other hand, these words are followed in Isa_49:1 sqq. by an address concerning himself from that Servant of Jehovah who announces Himself as the restorer of Israel and light of the Gentiles, and who cannot therefore be Israel as a nation or the Author of these prophecies, nothing is more natural than to suppose that the words, ‘And now hath the Lord,’ etc., form a prelude to the words of the One unequalled Servant of Jehovah concerning Himself which occur in 49. The surprisingly mysterious way in which the words of Jehovah suddenly pass into those of His messenger, which is only comparable to Zec_2:12 sqq.; Zec_4:9 (where the speaker is also not the prophet, but a divine messenger exalted above him), can only be explained in this manner. And in no other way can we explain the ועתה, which means, that after Jehovah has prepared the way for the redemption of Israel by the raising up of Cyrus, in accordance with prophecy, and by his success in arms, He has sent him, the speaker in this case, to carry out, in a mediatorial capacity, the redemption thus proposed, and that not by force of arms, but in the power of the Spirit of God (Isa_42:1; comp. Zec_4:6). Consequently the Spirit is not spoken of here as joining in the sending (as Umbreit and Stier suppose, after Jerome and the Targum; the LXX is indefinite, καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα αὐτοῦ); nor do we ever find the Spirit mentioned in such co-ordination as this (see, on the other hand, Zec_7:12, per spiritum suum). The meaning is, that it is also sent, i.e., sent in and with the Servant of Jehovah, who is speaking here.” Del. on Isa., vol. II. p. 252 sq. Clark’sFor. Theol. Lib.
We may anticipate here the comment on Isa_48:17-19 for the purpose of saying, in support of the above exposition of Delitzsch, that our Isa_48:16-19 seem to be the scripture (ἡ γραφή) referred to in Joh_7:37-39. In our text, the messenger and the Spirit sent with or after him (Isa_48:16) are presented as the source of the blessings conditionally guaranteed in Isa_48:17-19. The emphatic way in which the mention of the Spirit is introduced (Isa_48:16), and the mention of “teaching,” “hearkening to commandments,” “peace” and “righteousness” (Isa_48:17-18), make it plain that the agent of the blessings described (Isa_48:18-19) must be the Spirit; not, however, excluding the priority of the Redeemer who is the speaker. The blessing described is the blessing of Abraham, as our Author shows below; and (against Del. who translates “grains of sand”) we may, with our Author, translate מֵעוֹת = “viscera, bowels” (Barnes and J. A. Alex. do the same). Of course we must understand the blessing of numerous offspring in a spiritual sense, such as the Spirit will generate, i.e., a spiritual Israel. Our Author has shown this in cognate passages, e.g., see under Isa_44:3-5. Moreover the very parallelisms of Isa_48:18, “peace as the river,” “righteousness as the waves,” show this. In Joh_7:38 the Lord Jesus says: “He that believes on Me, as the Scripture said: rivers of living water shall flow from his bowels (ἐκ τῆς κοιλίας αὐτοῦ).” This is an allusion and interpretation, rather than a quotation. It combines the spiritual figures of Isa_48:18 with the figure of offspring in Isa_48:19, where the LXX. has: καὶ τὰ ἔκγονα τῆς κοιλίας σου. By saying this, our Lord claims that He is the source of the Abrahamic blessing, and reproduces in Himself the speaker of our text. To relieve the obscurity of the allusion the Evangelist adds his comment (Joh_7:39): “But this He spake of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.” By this John completes the allusion to our text, referring to the Spirit which our Isa_48:16 represents as sent with the messenger—but after; “and His Spirit (וְרוּחוֹ),” curiously subjoined grammatically, seeming to express an after-thought, but really expressing an after-act. The day of Pentecost witnessed this sending, and the promised effect of it in the multiplication of off-spring to those that believed on Christ, in the vast increase of the spiritual Israel, rivers of living waters, righteousness like waves, and seed like the offspring of the sea.
The view here given of the correlation of our text and Joh_7:37-39, if correct, is invaluable as aid in understanding the former, confirming the exposition of Delitzsch. At the same time it identifies the reference of ἡ γραφή in Joh_7:38, which, so far as we know, has never been satisfactorily done by any commentator, and at the same time must imperatively control the interpretation put upon “rivers of living water.” Tr.]
Footnotes:
[9]hath sent me and his Spirit.
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 Brown1871 · Public DomainOn vv16–17not . . . in secret-- (Isa 45:19). Jehovah…
not . . . in secret-- (Isa 45:19). Jehovah foretold Cyrus' advent, not with the studied ambiguity of heathen oracles, but plainly.
from the time, &c.--From the moment that the purpose began to be accomplished in the raising up of Cyrus I was present.
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sent me--The prophet here speaks, claiming attention to his announcement as to Cyrus, on the ground of his mission from God and His Spirit. But he speaks not in his own person so much as in that of Messiah, to whom alone in the fullest sense the words apply (Isa 61:1; Joh 10:36). Plainly, Isa 49:1, which is the continuation of the forty-eighth chapter, from Isa 48:16, where the change of speaker from God (Isa 48:1, Isa 48:12-15) begins, is the language of Messiah. Luk 4:1, Luk 4:14, Luk 4:18, shows that the Spirit combined with the Father in sending the Son: therefore "His Spirit" is nominative to "sent," not accusative, following it.
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. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv16–1716. This verse is hard to understand from ambiguity.
16. This verse is hard to understand from ambiguity.
Come ye near unto me, hear ye this — It is scarcely to be doubted that the party summoned is Israel, and that the subject to be communicated is, what follows to the latter member of the verse. But who is the speaker? Some hold it to be the prophet in behalf of Jehovah; but most of the commentators think it is Jehovah himself, summoning his nation to hear still further concerning himself. Moreover, from the interactions of personality in the Godhead of Jehovah in trinity, and from the well-settled facts as deduced from the two Testaments, that the transacting divinity, or the Jehovah of the Old Testament, is the Son of God of the New Testament, not a small number of expositors find a satisfying explanation of the verse in supposing the Second Person of the Trinity to be here the speaker. Among these may be named Basil, Augustine, Vitringa, Alexander, Henderson, Stier, Delitzsch, Birks, Nagelsbach, etc.
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I have not spoken in secret — The coincidence of resembling verbiage in texts known to bespoken by or applying to Christ, is taken as evidence of the truth of this theory, as in Christ’s words. Joh_18:20.
From the time that it was, there am I — See Pro_8:27, and Christ’s words, “Before Abraham was, I am:” — “I am hath sent me,” etc: language quite coincident in expression with passages appertaining to facts and features of Christ.
And now — Antithetic to the previous “from the beginning.” From the foundation of the earth (Proverbs viii) I was present through human history, as the Wisdom of God, aiding the plan looking to man’s redemption.
And (or but) now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me — The prophet is the mouthpiece in these antithetic sentences, but for whom does he speak in this? For himself, as not a few hold, or for Christ, or Messiah, yet unincarnated, as the majority of expositors hold? Evidently, from lack of the conditions required, not for the prophet. The conditions are something more than being the recorder of these statements. The prophet elsewhere (Isa_6:8) speaks of and for the three Persons, and most probably here for the Second Person. See, for the same reference, Exo_23:20; Isa_61:1; Mal_3:1; Joh_3:34; Joh_7:16; Joh_17:18; Joh_20:21. From these citations the clause is by most settled as meaning Christ here, and should read, for this meaning: “The Lord God hath sent me, with his Spirit.” Sent me to Israel, with the Spirit’s aid, to enlarge in Israel’s mind (now about to close his exile) the great consolation, and (as Logos, or Word) also the revelation. Christ’s mission here, then, is not the incarnation, but the signal providence of the return from Babylon. By this interpretation the predicates of the Jehovah of the Old Testament are in nowise changed, who is throughout the divine Regent, the divine Wisdom and Revealer. Co-acting with Jehovah the Father, the source of all divine counsels, and with the Spirit who inspires leadership and prophecy, He, Jehovah the Son, administers, disciplines, consoles, and instructs.
Some of the old reformed theologians have stoutly claimed, in this view of the Old Testament tenor and purport, that strong proofs of the doctrine of the Trinity can be made out. It is to be observed, however, that Calvin, the great exegete of the Reformation, was gravely conservative on this passage. He says: “This verse interpreters explain in various ways. Many refer it to Christ, but the prophet designs no such thing. Such forced and violent interpretations are to be avoided.” Barnes also says, with emphasis: “It would require more time, and toil, and ingenuity, to demonstrate that this passage had reference to Messiah, than it would to demonstrate the doctrines of the Trinity and Divinity of the Redeemer from unequivocal declarations of the New Testament.” No doubt this caution is extreme. In pursuance of a proper caution, this much may be admitted: In so far as the prophet speaks and sets in prophecy as the speaker and writer for Jehovah, who, in the New Testament, by various indications and proofs, appears in the incarnated divinity of Jesus Christ, so far only are these words to be regarded in a Messianic point of view. Further, whether the prophet himself apprehended this dogmatic view of the words is far from certain. The action of the Revealer upon the old prophetic minds in their deliverances was doubtless in proportion to their power at the time to apprehend. See Zec_2:7-9.
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 Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv16–1716. I have not spoken in secret] Cf. ch.…
16. I have not spoken in secret] Cf. ch. Isa_45:19.
from the beginning; from the time that it was] The sense is somewhat obscure. The pronoun “it” cannot refer to the world or the creation, which would require to be expressed; the implied antecedent must be the subject of which the prophet is speaking, the purpose of Jehovah against Babylon. The “beginning” will therefore be either the origin of revelation in general, or of the series of prophecies now being fulfilled. The meaning may be paraphrased thus: Jehovah has never from the beginning spoken in dark and uncertain oracles, and He does not conceal Himself now when events are already moving towards the accomplishment of His words; He is there, interpreting as well as guiding the course of history. That Jehovah is the speaker thus far cannot be questioned, in spite of the last clause of the verse. For the phrase “there am I,” comp. Pro_8:27 (in the mouth of the personified Wisdom of God).
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and now the Lord God &c.] Render: and now the Lord Jehovah hath sent me and (i.e. with) His spirit; “His spirit” being not a second subject along with Jehovah, but a second object. For the idea cf. ch. Isa_61:1 and Zec_7:12. The Spirit is never spoken of in the O.T. as the sender of the prophets, or as an independent agent distinct from Jehovah. The isolation of this sentence from its context raises doubts as to its genuineness. The sudden change of speaker disconnects it from what precedes, and it is equally unsuitable as an introduction to Isa_48:17-19, where Jehovah Himself is again introduced by the ordinary prophetic formula. A prelude to ch. 49. (Delitzsch) it cannot possibly be; and it is utterly arbitrary and unnatural to suppose that the words are spoken by the “Servant of Jehovah.” If they are genuine they are undoubtedly words of the prophet, who here calls attention to himself and his mission, in a way which has no parallel in ch. 40–55. Duhm and Cheyne hold that the words are interpolated; the motive for their insertion being a misunderstanding of the first part of the verse. Taking “from the beginning” and “from the time that it was” to refer to the Creation, the editor supplied the contrast (“and now”), which he believed the author to have in his mind.
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 Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv16–17(16) Come ye near unto me.—Here the address would…
(16) Come ye near unto me.—Here the address would seem to be made to Israel. At first Jehovah appears as the speaker, and as using much the same language as before. At the close the prophet appears abruptly, as speaking in his own person. Perhaps, indeed, the prophet is the speaker throughout. A paraphrase will perhaps help to explain the sequence of thought. “I have not from the beginning of my prophetic work spoken in dark, ambiguous speeches like the oracles of the heathen. From the time that the great work began to unfold itself I was present, contemplating it. Now the time of revelation has come. The Lord God hath sent me (this is the Hebrew order); and His Spirit. This gives, it is believed, an adequate explanation. By some interpreters the closing words are referred to the mysterious “Servant of the Lord,” and by others the Spirit is made the object and not the subject of the word “sent.”
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The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv16–17Vers. 16-22. THE THIRD ADDRESS. Israel is reminded of…
Vers. 16-22. THE THIRD ADDRESS. Israel is reminded of God"s merciful teaching and leading in the past (vers. 16, 17); expostulated with on their disobedience (vers. 18, 19); exhorted to go forth boldly and joyfully from Babylon (vers. 20, 21); and finally warned that God"s blessings even such a blessing as deliverance are no blessings to any but the righteous (ver. 22).
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning. God, "from the beginning," i.e. from his first dealings with Israel, had raised up a succession of prophets, who had declared his will, not "in secret," or ambiguously, but openly and plainly, so that all who heard might understand. (comp. Isa_45:19, and see the comment ad loc.) From the time that it was, there am I; i.e. "from the time that the earth was, there (in the succession of my prophetic messengers) was I" It was I who spake by their mouth, and thus announced my will publicly. And now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me. Dr. Kay supposes that "one Divine Personage is here sent by another the Second Person of the Holy Trinity by the First and by the Third; but it is against the analogy of faith that the Third Person should send the Second. Probably Mr. Cheyne is right in suggesting that "here a fresh speaker is introduced," and also right in his supposition that the fresh speaker is "the prophet himself," who tells us that he is now carrying on the goodly succession which has been "from the beginning," and is sent to deliver his message by God (the Father) and his (Holy) Spirit. On the tendency of Isaiah to "hypostatize" the Spirit of God, see the comment on Isa_40:13; and compare Mr. Cheyne"s note on the same passage ("Prophecies of Isaiah," vol. 1. p. 243).
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The separate personality and Divine authority of the Holy Spirit.
The doctrine of the Holy Trinity, like most of the other great and mysterious doctrines of true religion, was gradually revealed to mankind. In one sense we may call it an exclusively Christian doctrine; but in another we must assign it an antiquity far higher than that of the Christian era. God, in his several revelations to mankind, gradually paved the way for its acceptance. In the revelations which he made to Noah and Abraham, (Gen_9:6, 16 17:7, 8) God announced himself as Elohim a word of plural form. In the revelation which he caused to be put forth by his servant Moses, he distinguished between" God" (Elohim) and "the Spirit of God" (ruakh Elohim) which moved, or brooded, upon the face of the primeval chaos. (Gen_1:2) By David he made it known that there was a God, whose "throne was for ever and ever," whom "God, even his God, would anoint with the oil of gladness above his fellows". (Psa_45:6, Psa_45:7; comp. Heb_1:8, Heb_1:9) To the same great saint he revealed it that his Holy Spirit could be given to man and taken from him. (Psa_51:11) Isaiah, in the present passage, proclaims that he is sent "by the Lord Jehovah" (Adonai Yehovah) and also by "his Spirit." The doctrine of the Trinity in Unity is thus faintly shadowed out, and to a certain extent implied in the books of the Old Testament, though first openly preached and emphatically set forth in those of the New (see a paper by Dr. Paul Kleinert, in the Jahrbuch fur deutsche Theologic for 1867, pp. 3-59).
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 Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn vv16–17And now the Lord God and His Spirit hath…
Isa_48:16
And now the Lord God and His Spirit hath sent me
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The Holy Spirit
And now the Lord God hath sent Me with His Spirit.
The Spirit does not send, hut is sent. (Prof. A. B. Davidson, D. D.)
Note the tendency in chaps. 40-66, to treat the Divine Spirit as a separate personality (Isa_40:13; Isa_63:10; Isa_36:11; Isa_36:14). (Prof. S. R. Driver, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn v16Isa_48:16. Come ye near Me, hear ye this, &c.…
THE UNITY OF THE GODHEAD
Isa_48:16. Come ye near Me, hear ye this, &c. [1483]
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[1483] Some refer this whole verse to Isaiah (Kimchi, Hitzig, Knobel), and many the second clause of it alone (Calv., Zuingl., Musculus, Gesen., Meyer, Hengst., Umbr., Hahn). Others think there is a confusion of style (Jarchi, Rosenm.) But the only consistent view makes the Son of God the Speaker here, as in the last verse (Augustine, Basil, Jerome, Œcolamp., Vitr., Alex., Herd., Stier). The same is true throughout the chapter, though the distinctness of Divine Persons comes into full relief only here at the close. “All things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made that is made” (Joh_1:3).
The voice of love is here the same as in the appeal to Jerusalem in the Gospel, “How often would I have gathered thy children together!” (Mat_23:37). The Word of God “has not spoken in secret from the be-beginning,” but from the hour of creation has been the Revealer of the Father’s will. The limit “from the time it came to be,” is the same as in Pro_8:23; Pro_8:27, “from the beginning, or ever the earth was,” when creation came into being. The construction, “the LORD hath sent me and His Spirit” (Orig., Vitr., Knobel, Gesen., Herd., Alex., Hahn), is disproved by the loss of emphasis, the last clause having thus neither the same subject nor object with the rest of the verse, by the harshness of the construction, and the want of the objective sign. The Word, who speaks, is the mental object of the whole statement, first, as the Divine Revealer, and next, as divinely sent and revealed. The mission here is not the Incarnation, but the signal providence of the Return from Baby lon. So in Zechariah, “After the glory hath He sent me to the nations that spoiled you; for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye, … and ye shall know that the Lord of Hosts hath sent me” (Zec_2:7-9.) This mission of the Word to deliver captive Israel was an earnest of that fuller and later message, when “the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.”—Birh: Coram., pp. 246, 247.
There can be little doubt as to the real character of the personage who utters these words. (Context.) Can it be questioned that the personage who claims such attributes as these claims also to be divine? Yet it is equally clear that although He is divine, there is some sort of distinction to be observed between Him and Jehovah, for He was sent by Jehovah. We have here the mystery of one Divine person sending another. And we are irresistibly reminded of the passages of the New Testament in which our Lord asserts that He cometh forth from the Father, and also that He is furnished and equipped by His Spirit for accomplishing the great work of human redemption. It is clear, then, if we appeal to such statements as those of our text, that we are justified in affirming the fundamental truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ to be imbedded in the teaching of the Old Testament Scripture. This, it may be, is what is meant by the expression, “I have not spoken in secret from the beginning.” Our Lord, during His ministry upon earth, when arguing with certain of the Sadducees, pointed to a saying of Moses, and told them that it implicitly contained the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead (Luk_20:37). It may be, then, that the Messiah meant to indicate, by the expression just quoted, that the doctrine of His true and essential Godhead, although latent in the sacred page, was yet not so much of a secret that it could not have been brought to light by the earnest and diligent search of a God-directed and God-illuminated inquirer. But whether this be so or not, we may be perfectly confident that the doctrine in some form or other is contained in the elder revelation. If it could not be found there, grave doubt would be cast upon it. But there are traces of it to be found—truth, as it were, in embryo, waiting for development—and some of these I shall make it my endeavour to point out. My contention is simply this: that simultaneously with the grand revelation of the unity of the Godhead which was given to Israel, there was revealed in shadowy outline, in hidden rather than in plain and explicit statement, a distinction of persons existing in that Godhead; there was the full stream of doctrine, and side by side with it there was the little rill, but both of them equally proceeding from the throne of God. In the background of the picture, projected before the eyes of the chosen people, stood a second majestic figure, which did not interfere with the main purpose of the scene, but still made itself felt; was seen, though dimly seen; emerged more and more into the light as the ages rolled on, and at last stood out to the view in all the full proportion of its magnificence and its beauty. Abraham was the great founder of Monotheism at a time when the world was overspread by the worship of gods many and lords many; once in all probability a sharer in the general ignorance and superstition, he was brought by God to a knowledge of the truth, and sent forth as a witness to it amongst the nations of the earth. Now, it was obviously of extreme importance to keep such a man’s conception of the Unity of the Godhead distinct and clear, and yet, on a certain occasion, an incident occurred which must have tended in no slight degree to confuse and to bewilder him if his conception of the Unity of the Godhead prohibited his believing in the distinction of persons (Genesis 18.) It is hard to believe, that unless this personage was divine, he would have addressed Him and pleaded with Him as he did. Who was the person here spoken of as “the Lord,” spoken of as “communing with Abraham,” and spoken of as finally departing from him? And no less so when he was upon Mount Moriah (Genesis 22.) “From me!” What a singular confusion there must have been if there be no distinction of persons in the unity of the Godhead, &c. Pass with me now to the story of Jacob (Genesis 32.) Compare with the narrative in Genesis the comment upon it given in Hosea 12. Now, who was this “angel” whom Jacob saw face to face? If he was not divine, I say again, what a frightful mental confusion and perplexity the Monotheist patriarch must have been involved in! Pass on to the time of Moses (Exodus 23.) Very singular language indeed if the angel be only a created angel. But yet, what do we find in chap. 33? We find Moses prostrate on his face before God in an agony of supplication pleading for the restoration of the angel in whom the name of God is. Advance to the book of Joshua (chap. 5.) Who is the speaker? A created angel do you say? Nay, no created angel that was ever created would dare to receive worship. These passages are merely specimens, a few amongst many. In the life of Jacob, of Moses, and of Abraham, especially in that part of it which refers to the Egyptian handmaid, Hagar; in the story of Manoah, at the birth of Samson; in the book of Daniel, where, not Gabriel is the angel of Jehovah, the messenger of the covenant, but the mysterious person “clothed in linen,” &c. In all these and in many similar statements, I might find the corroboration of the view which it has been my desire and endeavour to set before you. In passage after passage of the ancient Scriptures, a personage appears who claims the attributes of Jehovah, who speaks as Jehovah, and directs and commands as Jehovah, who accepts homage and sacrifice as Jehovah, who is, in fact, to use the language of my text, Jehovah sent by Jehovah. Jealously as the Scripture guards the unapproachable majesty of God, is it conceivable that such an intermingling could have been possible if the personage in question had no right or title to be considered divine? Surely not; and I venture, therefore, to consider it satisfactorily established, that together with the great revelation of the Unity of the Godhead came, not as plainly and as explicitly, but quite as truly, not indeed in the development, but in the germ, in shadow, and in outline rather than in solid substance, a revelation of a distinction of persons existing in that unity, a revelation which prepared the way for the great doctrine of the Incarnation of the Eternal Son of God. We are told that we degrade Deity by supposing God to be incarnate. On such a subject I think it is most suitable for such people as we are to keep a reverent silence, for none amongst us is competent to express an opinion as to what is suitable or unsuitable, appropriate or inappropriate, to the Divine essence. But may we not go a step farther, and say that such an objection as this has its root in our human inability to conceive adequately the love of God? (H. E. I. 851, 852, 4809–4815).—Gordon Calthorp, M.A., The Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii. 33–35.
A TREASURY OF GREAT TRUTHS
Isa_48:16-17. Come ye near unto me, &c.
It is God in Christ who here speaks to us (see preceding note by Mr. Birks). A treasury of great truths; we can look only at a few of them.
I. THE GRACIOUS INVITATION GOD GIVES US. “Come ye near unto me.”
In all the means of grace God comes very near to us, and would have us approach Him. He says to us, as Isaac said to Jacob, “Come near to me, my son, that I may bless thee.” He would not have us stand at a distance, but draw nigh; not treat Him as a stranger, but as a personal friend; not be content to be outer-court worshippers, but advance as to a footing of holy personal intimacy (1Jn_1:3; H. E. I. 3427, 3428, 3448, 3449).
God would have us close the ear to the voice of the tempter and the seductions of the world, and open the ear to the whispers of His Word and the pleadings of His Spirit within us. Those who would learn the lessons of heavenly wisdom must approach near to Him, and desire immediate communications from Him. Moses went up into the mount, while the elders stood afar off; we are permitted to imitate Moses, and we should do so. While Martha was troubled about many things, Mary sat at Jesus’ feet.
The tendency of irreligion and worldliness is to separate the soul further and further from God; the tendency of all the influences of the Spirit upon the spiritual mind is to bring us nearer to the God we worship. There should be one continual desire: “Nearer, my God, to Thee,” &c.
II. THE NEEDFUL WORK WHICH GOD ACCOMPLISHES IN HIS PEOPLE.
1. He is their Teacher. “I am the Lord thy God which teacheth thee to profit.” No one can do this effectually but God. None but He has wisdom, patience, or power enough to deal with these hearts of ours which are always prone to depart from Him. The labyrinth of human ignorance has such a maze that none but He can penetrate it.
Divine teaching consists in opening the eyes of the understanding to perceive spiritual objects, and inclining the will to choose and pursue them.
It is most needful. God never acts in vain; unless His children needed His help as their teacher, He would not undertake to help them in this form. The necessity for His teaching arises from our spiritual blindness and native distaste for divine things; through sin all the faculties of the soul are left in the same condition as the body would be without light. Hence certain important Scripture sayings (Psa_119:8; Isa_42:6-7, &c.; H. E. I. 3399, 2877–2882).
2. He is their Guide. “Which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.” He leads them as well as instructs them, and makes dark providences the means of giving them spiritual light; for His Word and His providence are mutual interpreters. How did He teach Job? By philosophical lectures and a large scientific apparatus? No; but by strange and trying providences (H.E.I 99, 100, 133, 134).
III. THE CONDESCENDING RELATIONS HE SUSTAINS TO THEM.
1. He is their Lord—the sovereign of the Church. Let past experience encourage future hope. “This God is our God for ever and ever:” a changeless friend, an endless portion.
2. He is the Redeemer of the Church. He had redeemed the Israelites from Egypt; He was about to redeem them from Babylon. He will finally redeem His people from sin, death, and hell. However much the world overlooks the mystery of redemption, God Himself places the greatest stress upon it. It is that work from which He derives the highest glory, and the Church the noblest comfort. “The Lord thy redeemer” is a title in which He rejoices, and we should too.
3. He is “the Holy One of Israel.” This expresses at once His own perfection and the influence He exerts on His people—not only holy, but also the author of holiness. To produce that in them is the purpose of all His dealings with them (Heb_12:10; Tit_2:14; H. E. I. 2842, 2843).
4. He is thy God. Let this crowning and all-comprehensive fact be kept constantly in mind, prompting us to devout worship and thankful service of Him to whom we owe life, breath, and all things that minister to our present well-being, and enable us to look forward without fear to the eternal future.—Samuel Thodey.
DIVINE NAMES AND DIVINE WORK
Isa_48:17. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer, &c.
These words were spoken in dark and troublous times. They are fraught with instruction and comfort. In them we have—
I. DIVINE NAMES. They convey ideas of overwhelming greatness and glory, mingled with awful mysteriousness, and are worthy our careful consideration.
1. “Lord.” That is, Jehovah, the proper and incommunicable name of the Most High God. Represented in our version by the word LORD, printed in capitals. In the Pentateuch it is God’s personal and covenant name. It is indicative of the attributes of self-existence, eternity, immutability, and perfect independence. How great and glorious is our God! (See outline on Isa_42:8.)
2. “Redeemer”—vindicator or deliverer. Isaiah addresses his countrymen as being actually in a state of captivity.
(1.) Man is in a state of spiritual captivity—the worst sort of captivity. He is in bondage to sin (Joh_8:34). Sin rules and reigns in him. He is a slave to his lusts (2Pe_2:19). To Satan (2Ti_2:16; Eph_2:2). To the law. Not having performed the requirements of that law, he is placed under arrest to it (Gal_4:24-25; Gal_3:10). To death (Heb_2:15; Joh_3:36).
(2.) God, in Christ, is the great deliverer. No other way (Act_4:12; Joh_8:36). The Gospel is glad tidings of salvation to poor, guilty captives ready to perish. Deliverance has been effected through Christ. By a great ransom (1Co_6:20; 1Pe_1:18-19). By conquest. He not merely paid the ransom price, but He destroyed the power of man’s enslavers. See the argument of Christ (Luk_11:21-22; cf. 1Jn_3:8). He rescues sinners from the thraldom of Satan, and gives them the liberty of the sons of God. Multitudes have been delivered, and are now in a state of perfect freedom (Rom_8:1). You may be delivered. Is realised by faith. No other way.
3. “The Holy One of Israel.” This name is often applied to Him in Scripture. “There are other beings in the universe that are in a sense holy—angels and saints are holy, but He is ‘the Holy One.’ His holiness is essential and underived. It is the eternal source and the absolute standard of all holiness in the universe. Other holy beings to Him are only as the dim stars of night to the unclouded sun of day. He is the immaculate fountain of all holiness, the Father of lights whence every ray of purity in the universe proceeds.” His holiness is incomparable (Exo_15:11; 1Sa_2:2; Isa_40:25; Rev_15:4). His holiness is manifested in His words and His works, especially the work of human redemption. Is pledged for the fulfilment of His promises (Psa_89:35). Should produce reverential fear (Exo_15:11; 1Sa_6:20; Psa_5:7; Rev_15:4).
II. DIVINE WORK.
1. Teaching.
(1.) The need of a divine teacher, for we are ignorant as to spiritual knowledge (Eph_4:18). Naturally our understanding is so darkened that we see no beauty in Christ that we should desire Him (1Co_2:14).
(2.) We have a divine teacher. God, by His Spirit (Luk_12:12; Joh_14:26; 1Co_2:13; 1Jn_2:20; 1Jn_2:27). By His incarnate Son. “God’s great lesson-book is the cross of Christ. All truth is condensed there. Everything you have to learn, or to do, or enjoy, is written upon that page. It is the babe’s alphabet, and it is the philosopher’s compendium. There are the glories which are to be expanded throughout eternity. God holds the clue to that divine labyrinth of awful, blessed mystery. Only the Holy Spirit can unlock those spiritual passages.”—J. Vaughan.
2. Leading or guiding. “I am thy conductor and guide.”
(1.) We need a divine guide. “We are pilgrims to eternity. We are in the labyrinth of error and sin. Life is like a heath with paths stretching in various directions. Many appear pleasant and safe that lead astray. We are often bewildered, and often choose wrongly.”
(2.) We have a divine guide. God Himself engages to be our guide. He is the only infallible guide—infinitely wise, powerful, good, gracious. He guides His people by His Word. Its precepts instruct; its revelations enlighten; its examples encourage and warn us. By His Spirit, acting directly upon our spirit (Isa_30:21). By His providence, pointing out the way by the indications of circumstances and current events. By the example of Christ. By the counsel of His servants (Psa_77:20). The wise and good are here to direct us.
(3.) God guides His people in the way they should go, not in the way they would go—that is man’s interpretation. There is a way in which we should walk—a divine way, clear to those who will see it. God’s way is not always our way, but it is always the right, the best, the safest, and the happiest way. This assurance should always cheer and comfort us.
Unconverted sinner! you must move forward—you must “go,” it is the law of your being. But how will you “go”? with God, or without Him? You are free to choose which you will do. Take God as your guide, the wisest, the best of all leaders. To refuse divine leadership is to grope in darkness, and ultimately to perish.—Alfred Tucker.
GOD OUR TEACHER AND LEADER
Isa_48:17. I am the Lord thy God, who teacheth thee to profit, &c.
How beautiful and impressive are the “I am’s” of God! Only from God has the declaration “I am” its full meaning. But God does not isolate Himself. What He is, He is for His people.
We must go out of ourselves to get real blessing for ourselves; and to whom shall we go? The heart must have a Person to love, to lean on, to live for. No doctrine, no idea, no creed can take the place of the Person—“I am the Lord thy God.” The apostle of love seems to have taken special heed of the self-revelations of Christ; for in his pages we meet with some of the glorious “I am’s” of Christ (Joh_8:12; Joh_6:35; Joh_14:6; Joh_10:7; Joh_15:1; Joh_8:58; Joh_11:25). In the text God is revealed as our Teacher and Leader; and “Learn of Me,” and “Follow Me,” are two most important commands of Jesus Christ.
I. There is an important relation between these two offices of our Divine Master. Not every teacher is a leader, not every leader a true teacher. Theory and practice are often divorced; words and works are not always wedded. But Christ is like a general who trains his soldiers in the barracks and leads them on the field, or like a traveller who braves the dangers and endures the toils of opening up a country, and then describes its beauties, dilates upon its capacities, and adds to the common fund of scientific knowledge. Does Jesus teach us to “pray and not to faint?” He also leads (Mar_1:35; Luk_6:12); does He teach us to glorify God by our “good works?” He “went about doing good.” Does He teach us to love our enemies, and pray for those who despitefully use us? How grandly are we led by His dying prayer, “Father, forgive them!” Are we to “seek first the kingdom of God,” according to His teaching? It was His meat and drink to do His Father’s will. He truly “teaches us to profit, and leads us by the way we should go.” These are the two great forces which aid in the formation of Christian character, and the development of Christian life (H.E.I. 894–899).
The teaching of our Master is sometimes out of the book of affliction and sorrow. We have been drawn away from Him by much resting in creature strength; He is jealous for our sakes; so He teaches us our folly, and weakness, and sin; and then leads us into His wisdom, and strength, and holiness. Perhaps His lesson comes out of the book of poverty and distress. He strips us, that we may be clothed with change of raiment. In multitudes of ways does our Lord teach His people, but ever to the end that He may lead them in the way in which they should go. All the way along He is Teacher and Leader, and we love to have it so. The thought of His instruction encourages us, while His leadership emboldens us.
II. Contemplate the words “who leadeth thee.” Read them in the light of Scripture thoughts and incidents. How they remind us of God leading His people from the thraldom of Egypt (Exo_13:21). In Moses’ song there is a beautiful figure to help us in understanding our Lord’s leading (Deu_32:11-12). Passing on, we come to the poem of the shepherd-king (Psalms 23) And then we find David’s putting into the lips of wisdom the words, “I lead in the way of righteousness.” Take another example; now from Isaiah (Isa_42:16). How soothing the words of Jeremiah! (Isa_31:9).
III. What spirit shall we manifest in view of this truth? “Suffer thyself, O Christian, to be led! Presume not at any time either to linger or to precede. Follow thy Shepherd patiently, gladly, and constantly. Keep close to His footsteps. Go unhesitatingly through this dry and thirsty land of sorrows, trials, and disappointments. Let no hurry of business delay, no burden of care prevent thee. Let not the sorrows of thy heart prove too overwhelming to deter, no joys of this life too captivating to detain thee from thy God” (Stephenson on Psalms 23)
“When we cannot see our way,
Let us trust and still obey;
He who bids us forward go
Cannot fail the way to show.”
CONCLUSION.—Let us take our place by the psalmist, and with him in a spirit of humility, resignation, trustfulness, and hope, put up these petitions (Psa_5:8; Psa_26:5; Psa_27:11; Psa_31:3; Psa_61:2; Psa_139:24; Psa_143:10). Thus shall we on earth have a true foretaste of the blessedness of that sinless place, where “the Lamb, who is in the midst of the throne, shall lead them, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.”—Walter J. Mayers: Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii. pp. 228–230.
THE BENEFIT OF AFFLICTIONS
Isa_48:17. I am the Lord thy God, which teacheth thee to profit.
God can make all the objects by which men are surrounded, and all the scenes through which they are called to pass, produce just such effects in their minds as He sees best. He can blast prosperity, and bless adversity. He can make afflictions instructive and beneficial. It was while His people were in a state of adversity, and despairing of relief, that He undertook to comfort them, by reminding them of His power over them, His relation to them, and His tender regard for their spiritual good (Isa_48:12-13; Isa_48:16-17). We find no intimation here that God would put an end to the afflictions of His people, but only that He was able to sanctify them, or cause them to have a salutary and desirable effect.
I. Afflictions may be profitable to the children of God. They are not in themselves joyous, but grievous; it is natural to dread them; even our Saviour recoiled from the prospect of His approaching sufferings; nevertheless they may eventually prove very beneficial:—
1. By turning off their attention from the world. Living in the world, and compelled in some measure to its concerns, they are prone to “mind earthly things” too exclusively; but afflictions have a direct tendency to turn away their eyes from beholding vanity, and to prepare them to attend to things of everlasting consequence.
2. By turning off their affections from the world. Many of its objects have an immense fascination for the human heart, and we are always in danger of giving them that place in our hearts which is due to God alone. But in the time of affliction men learn that in the world there is nothing to soothe and comfort them. When they find how little it can do for them, how apt it is to deceive them, and rob them of superior happiness, they learn to hate rather than to love it.
3. By raising their affections to God, the source of all good. By taking away every other ground of dependence and consolation, they may be said to drive them to the Fountain of all good. Thus they operate even upon the ungodly (Psa_107:17-19). Much more is this likely to be their effect upon the righteous.
II. GOD is able to make afflictions profitable to His children. Afflictions do not necessarily sanctify; they make some men worse, and not better (2Ch_28:22; Rev_9:20; Rev_16:9; Revelation 21; H. E. I. 229–233); but God is able to teach each of His children how to turn them into sources of blessing:—
1. He is able to bring Himself into their view. As when the sun rises men cannot see the stars, so when God presents Himself before the minds of His people, they cannot see anything else. Or rather, they see Him in all things—in the providences and afflictions which have befallen them. But barely bringing Himself into their view, and turning off their attention from all created objects, will not afford relief; because men may behold God and be troubled (Exo_14:24). It is therefore necessary to observe—
2. That He can draw their affections as well as their attention towards Himself. When He brings Himself into view of the afflicted, He can awaken every holy affection in their hearts, and give them a sensible enjoyment of Himself, which is far better than the enjoyment of sons, or of daughters, or of any earthly good (H. E. I. 116–142, 204–221).
III. These facts are fountains of consolation for God’s afflicted children. What a deep and exhaustless well of comfort is this, that God bears a covenant relation to them, and has engaged to treat them as children! All His dispensations towards them are the genuine expressions of His fatherly care and kindness (Heb_12:6; Job_5:17-19; Job_5:27; 2Co_4:17). It is not necessary that they should know that their afflictions shall be removed or diminished; they may exercise faith, confidence, submission, patience, and even joy, while they know that the Lord is their God, and will certainly teach them to profit by those things which would otherwise sink them in sorrow and despair.
APPLICATION:—
1. Since God makes use of afflictions to keep His children near Him, it is clear that they are extremely prone to forsake Him. He does not grieve nor afflict them willingly, but only because they will not regard His milder means of instruction. It is a certain sign that a child is very undutiful and disobedient, if nothing but repeated and severe corrections will restrain or reclaim him. We should humble ourselves before God because of our waywardness.
2. Seeing that God chastises His children for their good, and teaches them to profit under His correcting hand, those who are suffered to live on in uninterrupted prosperity have reason to inquire whether they belong to the household of faith. Prosperity is a thing to thank God for; but it is as frequently granted to the evil as to the good; and those who have been long in the enjoyment of it have good cause seriously to inquire whether their hearts are right with God, and whether He has not been granting their requests for outward prosperity and sending leanness into their souls.
3. Since God afflicts His children only for their good, they have the best of all reasons for being submissive and cheerful in seasons of sorrow.
4. Since God afflicts His children only for their good, the severer the sufferings through which they are called to pass, the greater is the profit they may expect to derive from them in the end. The oftener He puts them into the furnace of affliction, and the longer He continues them there, the brighter He means to bring them out.
5. Since God teaches His children to profit by their afflictions, afflictions afford us a means of determining whether we belong to His family or not.
6. Since God can make afflictions profitable to His children, we may justly conclude that He can make them profitable to others also. Though sinners hate instruction and despise reproof, yet they are not beyond the reach of divine power and divine grace. God has often used affliction as an instrument for the conversion of sinners (2Ch_33:12).—Dr. Emmons: Works, vol. iii. pp. 52–66.
THE PROFIT OF LIFE
(A New Year Motto).
Isa_48:17. I am the Lord thy God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.
Inscribe these words on the banner that waves over our heads as we march through the year, that they may be always in sight, ready for use in all the varying turns of our experience. They are stored with rich promise, wise direction, sustaining comfort. This is a voice from heaven to explain God’s dealings with us, to elevate our aims and to encourage our trust.
I. The end which God has in view in the guidance of our lives, “profit.” This is His aim, and He would have us make it ours. “Profit” in heaven’s vocabulary has not the meaning it bears on earth. The profit which the world pursues is material, but this is spiritual. That is often lost, and must be left behind at death; this endures unto life eternal, and is the only real profit, for it is a part of our very selves. The solemn utterance of Christ on this matter runs (Mar_8:36-37)—a statement which is reversed by those who mind earthly things. Not what you will get, but what you will become should engage your attention. Your greatest wealth lies in yourselves, in your being renewed and sanctified. All other profit is of no value in comparison. Every advantage, talent, opportunity, which is not minted into this coin is wasted. Is this, then, the lofty purpose which you are throwing into your life? How few inquire—What will tell upon my spiritual interests? how many—How can I add to my worldly gains, and make a comfortable livelihood? I do not say you should never ask such a question, but only that it should have a subordinate place. Lot had an eye to worldly gain in selecting the plain of Sodom for his residence. The religious disadvantages and dangers of the step did not enter into his calculations. He first “pitched his tent toward Sodom,” and then thought it would be a fine thing for his family to be settled in the city, where he would be held in consideration as a man of growing wealth. But spiritual profit—growing sympathy with what is pure and beneficent, closer resemblance to Christ—is the loftiest aim in life, and all our plans should be formed with a view to its acquisition. If this profit be wanting as the years roll by, life is a losing concern, leading to spiritual bankruptcy.
II. God engages to teach us how to extract profit from life. Everything may yield us profit, if we learn the happy art of taking the profit out of it. A naturalist has said that “the seeing eye is never in want of its proper aliment;” and the Christian soul never lacks the means of spiritual profit. The bee may find it delightful to roam far and wide through the long summer day, looking into the flowers and breathing their fragrance; but he is an idle drone if he bring home no profit for the hive. One man has neither the will nor the power to extract the honey from life’s experience, while another finds profit in all that meets him. Two persons take a tour through an interesting country. One sees but little, and carelessly hurries past the grandest scenes and through the finest cities. The other comes home with large additions to his information, and with scenes impressed on his mind which he can recall long after with delight. Let me specify some of the departments of our life, and show how real profit may be derived from them. Take our daily Bible-readings and our visits to God’s house. These are occasions of richest profit, but many miss it. Not to speak of those who lay aside the Bible for books that have a stronger interest for them, and rarely, if at all, frequent the sanctuary, to others these privileges come as a matter of course. No wonder there is small profit when none is expected. Believing prayer makes the Lord’s day a day of blessing, and extracts profit from the poorest sermon. By the sorrows and difficulties of the week God sometimes sends us to His house with quickened appetite.—Our joys and sorrows may be made springs of profit. This is the very purpose of the Divine chastenings (Heb_12:10).—Our intercourse with others may furnish contributions to our spiritual wealth. Our closest friends should be the friends of Jesus, and from such companions we may get much profit by the interchange of thought and the influence of example; and even those who are otherwise minded may teach us to be gentle to the erring.—Our very temptations, if met with a firm resistance, will bring us a return of strength.—Our daily work may be made to yield us a better renumeration than mere wages, if we accept it as our God-appointed task.—In all these departments, if we take God for our teacher, life, with its changing scenes, will become a school of precious instruction, and a mine of solid wealth.
III. God engages to lead us by the way in which profit may be found. By “the way that thou shouldest go” we are to understand the experiences through which God sees it needful to lead us. “God has His plan for every man.” Each requires a special discipline. Since God has taught His children the happy secret of profiting from the experiences of life, they may be sure that the experiences will be such as to yield the profit which they most need, as the bee’s faculty and instinct do not lack flowers. This assurance ought to nerve us alike for life’s trials and life’s work. It should silence every murmur. All envying of the lot of others, all impatience with our own, will vanish when we feel that we are where God placed us. Even in the severest afflictions this thought will stay the soul. It is part of God’s plan to send trials upon us; they stand in His programme of our lives. Were any of them withheld we should lose their intended profit. Our very work has been pre-arranged (Eph_2:10). We are disposed to think that if our talents were better, our opportunities more favourable, we would serve God to greater purpose; but these are precisely what God sees we can use. Be it ours to inquire at every step, What good may I get here? what profit may I acquire? Would it not bring a truly happy year to import these principles into your life? Do they not furnish a sufficient answer to the question that has recently been discussed—“Is life worth living?” If you live while you live, if you have been taught of God to extract profit from life’s experience, certainly life is well worth living. The ship constructed at great expense does not lie anchored in some quiet bay. The owners expect a return, and send her across the seas to trade in the ports of many lands. Their end is profit, and every day their vessel is laid up is a serious loss. So it is with our lives. If there is no real profit, there must be a sad, a fatal deficit.—W. Guthrie, M.A.
SPIRITUAL PROSPERITY SECURED BY OBEDIENCE ONLY
Isa_48:17-19. Thus saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, &c.
Whatever may be the reason, in the Church there are frequently mournful complaints of the want of prosperity, both general and individual. Viewing the case only under one aspect, this might appear strange. For is not God with His people? &c. Whence, then, these complaints? Their true cause is in man, not in God. The terms here employed show us, that though the complaint is in accordance with fact, the fact might and ought to have been avoided. The real cause is found in negligence and disobedience of man. God’s complaint implies censure; and teaches us that the limitation of the blessing which was promised in the most abundant fulness, is a reproving judgment, calling us to “consider our ways,” and by renewed obedience and carefulness to remedy the evils which we ourselves have occasioned. Observe the remarkable manner in which it pleases God to address His people. It is not said, generally and alone, “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” He speaks as sustaining certain characters, performing certain works. And in examining the terms employed in this divine record, we shall find that they include and suggest the reasons why the required obedience should be rendered. We have thus—
I. THE FUNDAMENTAL CHARACTER WHICH GOD SUSTAINS IN RELATION TO HIS PEOPLE, AND AS SUSTAINING WHICH HE REQUIRES THEIR OBEDIENCE.
1. “The Holy One of Israel.” Redemption chiefly implies mercy, but by no means exclusively. It is set before us in the New Testament, with the strongest emphasis, as that exhibition and proof of love which, for its vastness and grandeur, claims to be regarded as the highest of all. But men are apt to take false views of love. These false views generally tend to very dangerous issues. With men, love is often an indulgent fondness, seldom rising above the limits of natural instinct, and possessing in its character nothing distinctively moral.
2. “Thus saith the Lord.” This is the basis of the whole (Exo_3:14). He is essential being, independent, perfect, eternal. Whatever exists, exists by Him and for Him; every faculty, by Him given, should be for Him employed. No creature possesses the excellence for which we are commanded to love, worship, and serve Him. As far as possible, there must be a difference as complete and manifest between the service we render to any creature, and that which we render to God, as there is between the creature itself and God.
3. “Thy Redeemer.” Thus has He made Himself known to us. Thus will He be acknowledged, worshipped, and served by us. True, He is our Creator, our Preserver, our Sovereign; none of these truths are set aside by the evangelical revelation; still it is our duty to remember that the chief of His royal styles and titles, is that of Redeemer. It is as our Redeemer that we are to behold His glory, study His character, acknowledge, love, worship, and serve Him. In Himself, our true and highest good, He only becomes so to us when we approach Him as our Redeemer; acknowledging all the wickedness and weakness in us which that term implies.
But there is one character which the Scriptures teach us God always must sustain,—that of the most exalted moral excellence. We must never forget that He is “the Holy One of Israel” (H. E. I. 2316, 2317). This, then, is the character in which God addresses to us the commandments to which He requires us to hearken.
II. A PARTICULAR PROCEEDING IN WHICH IT PLEASES GOD, AS SUSTAINING THIS CHARACTER, TO REPRESENT HIMSELF AS ENGAGING. “I am the Lord thy God which teacheth,” &c.
1. God teaches us. Advert to the principal methods which He is pleased to employ. But in whatever way the instruction is communicated, the object of it is always the same—our benefit and advantage.
2. God is also our Guide. “Which leadeth,” &c. Distinctly asserted in the Word of God. The wisdom of ancient philosophy could never realise the doctrine of a particular providence. To the wisdom of the world it is still a stumbling-block. Observe the character of the guidance: “In the way that thou shouldest go.” That we may perceive what that way is, let us remember what man is, and for what he is destined. There is nothing merely casual. Everything is wisely appointed or wisely permitted. And thus, putting together all these representations, is a foundation, broad and stable, laid for that enlightened, that deliberately chosen obedience which He requires.
III. THE OBEDIENCE WHICH HE CONSEQUENTLY REQUIRES FROM US.
1. God teaches us for our profit; it is therefore our duty to be learners, and that from first to last.
2. God leads us, &c.; it is therefore our duty to follow His guidance. But how? No pillar of cloud and fire goes before us, marking the way to sense. We walk by faith. What are the indications which faith must follow?
(1.) His revealed will. He never leads in opposition to that.
(2.) The specific duties indicated by every particular providence must be fulfilled. Let there be unhesitating submission, unreserved devotion. The old Vulgate employs a word that may suggest an illustration. Gubernans te in viâ. A vessel sails from harbour destined to a certain port. To guide her safely is the task of the pilot, the Gubernator. In modern times, when navigation is so well understood, such a person is usually only employed where the navigation is difficult, from dangers known to himself, but unknown to the crew—perhaps close by the port where the voyage terminates.
3. God condescends to speak to us! it is therefore our duty continually and reverently to hearken. “O that thou hadst,” &c. It is not said, “O that thou hadst obeyed!” but, “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” Of course, obedience is implied, but the word actually used teaches us the real character of the obedience. The master issues his orders. The servant stands by attentively. He hearkens to them, perceives his duty, and goes to perform it. And thus must it be with us.
(1.) We must hearken to His commandments in their evangelical order;
(2.) universally;
(3.) attentively, thoughtfully, so as to make their very meaning our own;
(4.) exclusively. Other voices will sound in our ears. To none must a moment’s heed be given;
(5.) supremely and constantly.
IV. THE RESULT OF THAT OBEDIENCE.
Great shall be the prosperity you shall thus certainly secure. “Your peace,” &c. The imagery is as instructive as it is beautiful. (See other outlines on this text.)
APPLICATION.—Assume the existence of religion in some degree. Seek to realise it in all its blessed fulness as here set forth. Wherever personal religion revives, zeal for the spread of religion revives also. Then efforts to do good will be better sustained, and the prospering blessing of God will be more richly given. The consequence will be numerical increase. (Note Delitzsch’s translation of Isa_48:19.) Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine, 1849, pp. 913–934.
THE LOST IDEAL
Isa_48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! &c.
Exile and home-coming, captivity and deliverance, judgment and mercy, these are the things of this chapter. In the immediate context there is an expression of the deepest regret on God’s part that it had been necessary to bring on His people heavy judgments; while the text is a tender wish and longing that they had chosen the better way. Three thoughts are suggested for our instruction—
I. THE LOST IDEAL.
What might have been, and ought to have been. There had been an unattained national, and, therefore, individual possibility, which was now unattainable, at least to the extent that things could never be exactly as if they had attained it. So, too, there is to each man an ideal life as a matter of abstract possibility, not abstractly imaginable, but real and true as the life of God. The ideal life is the life. But what is it? There is a natural outline in every man’s life. Sin depraves, but it does not obliterate the organic powers and the natural peculiarities and tendencies of the individual. There is an outline of what might have been left in each man. There are diversities; but the question is about each man’s own ideal. What is it each of us has missed all these years—getting a glimpse of it now and again? This lost self is the self that must be found, else happiness cannot be found. It is descried in some of our best states, in elevated moods, or in quietness; and also in working earnestly towards some good practical object; or when, weary with all this world’s wilfulness and folly, we can, notwithstanding, leave it all with Him who made and can rule the world: in these, and like exercises or states of mind, we can get some glimpses of the wonderful picture that stands clearly out in the Divine ideal, and from which it will never fade away.
II. THE DIVINE LAMENTATION OVER IT.
God continues to have a Divine preference concerning human life. What depths of love and compassion are in the words, “O that thou hadst hearkened,” &c. Certain images are chosen because they are known to all the world: “Peace like a river; righteousness like the waves of the sea.” According to the Divine idea, a man’s life should be deep, and wide, and clear, and voluminous, and refreshing, and fertilising, and progressive—like a river; and, like the waves of the sea, possessed of a righteousness that cannot be measured, and that can never end. God has not forgotten the ideal, which is ever-present to Him; and at sight of the actual, so unlike these grand images, Jehovah laments. Natural goodness, without the special help and grace of God, is, at best, a sorry sight to Him.
III. THE DIVINE PROPOSAL FOR RESTORATION.
Can the Divine lamentation be turned into Divine song and rejoicing? Are there any who are rising up from their fall? We know the answers to such questions, and how they touch the very core and substance of the Gospel (Eph_2:10; 2Co_5:17; Php_2:13). We are God’s husbandmen; we are God’s building (Isa_48:20). In the text God stands as with uplifted hands, pathetically lamenting over a great loss, a great disappointment, a great ruin; the might have been has not been realised. But what means the next word in the next verse, “Go ye forth of Babylon?” &c.; God will continue His work, He will restore the ruins of it, and carry it on to ultimate success. “Go ye forth of Babylon;” that means when interpreted, just begin where you are, do the nearest thing, forsake the sin that is strongest, rectify the wrong that is nearest, take the path that is open, make room in your heart for all that God will give you, and especially for the renewing Spirit. And in all this, look unto Jesus, and press towards Him as you look, and you are a new creature in Him; the ruin is restored, Eden blooms again, the dead is alive, the long-lost self is found.
“Have we not all, amid life’s petty strife,
Some ideal of a noble life,
That once seemed possible? Did we not hear
The flutter of its wings, and feel it near?
And just within our reach it was; and yet
We lost it in this daily jar and fret;
And now live idly, in a vain regret.
But still our place is kept, and it will wait
Ready for us to fill it, soon or late.
No star is ever lost we once have seen;
We always may be what we might have been.”
—Alexander Raleigh, D.D.: Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiv. pp. 269–371.
These words would be sad from the lips of man, but coming from God they are inexpressibly touching and solemn. They are the cry of a wounded heart. They tell not of the wrath of justice, but of the sorrows of love. There is, indeed, mystery, as there must be whenever we have to do with the Infinite, but that very mystery makes the lament the more affecting and impressive. In this pathetic verse there is a threefold lament:—
I. A LAMENT OVER LOST HOPES. Once there was hope and fair promise. God’s beautiful ideal might be realised. But that is all gone. God only knows what has been lost. He is, so to speak, alone with His sorrow. Think of Aaron’s grief for his sons (Lev_10:3); of David’s lament for Absalom (2Sa_18:33); of the tears of Jesus over Jerusalem (Luk_19:41). In these we may see reflected the sorrows of disappointed love. How dreadful must be the cause that produces such effects (Psa_81:13-16; Jer_44:4)—
“Of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these, It might have been.”
II. A LAMENT OVER NEGLECTED OPPORTUNITIES. God is speaking here in the character of “the Redeemer—the Holy One of Israel.” He recalls what He had done, and what might and ought to have been the happy results. But the precious opportunities had been abused.
1. Gracious instruction, “I am the Lord which teacheth thee to profit.”
2. Infallible guidance, “Which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.”
3. Holy blessedness, “Then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.” How beautiful are these emblems! Deep and tranquil as the Euphrates, the noblest of the rivers of Asia, is the peace of the believer. Noble and majestic as the waves of the great sea, ever moving in harmony with law, and ever manifesting new forms of loveliness, is the righteousness of God’s saints. All this, and more, might have been realised, if only God’s commandments had been regarded. But the time is past. The glorious vision has faded away for ever. Neglected opportunities bring sure and terrible retribution. O man, consider thou hast been God’s enemy. He has made thee gracious offers of peace. He has called thee to place thyself under the leadership of His Son, when all shall be well. And what has been the result? Reconciliation a failure. “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?” (Heb_2:3; cf. 2Ch_36:15-17.)
III. A LAMENT OVER NEEDLESS RUIN. Sometimes evil comes in spite of us. It is a calamity, and not a crime. Borne aright, it turns to good. We see in it the chastisement of a loving Father, and learn to be content. But, alas! rarely can we hold ourselves blameless. If we suffer, it is because we have sinned. If we perish, it is our own fault. Reason, conscience, and the Holy Scriptures combine in testifying that man’s ruin is not of chance or fate, far less of God, but exclusively of himself. The sinner feels, and must feel for ever, that if he had only hearkened to God’s commandments, ruin would have been impossible. God’s commandments in the law are all good. To keep them is life and blessedness. But we have sinned. Righteousness by the law is no more possible. God’s commands in the Gospel are also good (1Ti_1:15; Joh_6:29; Joh_3:16). When we consider who and what. Jesus is, and how great things He has done for us, is it not the most reasonable thing in the world that we should love and trust Him? If we have not eyes to see His beauty, we are blind. If we have not the heart to commit ourselves to Him and to choose His service, as the most free and rightful and blessed of all services, it must be because we wilfully prefer evil to good, and the pleasures of sin for a season, to the love of God for ever (cf. Isa_5:1-7; Eze_33:11; Pro_1:24-33; Mat_23:37).—W. Forsyth.
When God smites men on account of sin, it gives Him no pleasure. The voice which speaks here is not that of the seraphic prophet, but the voice of the Lord God of the prophets. The manner is not merely the majestic formula, “Thus saith Jehovah,” but it is supplemented with words intended to remind us of His graciousness and His goodwill (Isa_48:17). Nor is this the only lesson which lies on the surface of the text. Observe, the Lord addresses words of poignant regret over the prize the sinner has lost, as well as the penalty he has incurred. So did Jesus Christ look upon Jerusalem. Musing on the desolation to which she should shortly come, He reflected on the preservation in which she might have safely stood, &c. God looks upon the “peace” you might enjoy, and the “righteousness” that would enrich you, did you hearken to His commandments, and obey His great mandate, “Believe, and live.” Sinner! the infinite heart of my Divine Master yearns over you.
What loss is that which God bewails on thy account? “Peace like a river,” and “righteousness like the waves of the sea,” are not within the limits of thy comprehension. There is a privation which you unconsciously suffer.
1. You are a stranger to peace. “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.” There are two kinds of peace into the secret satisfaction of which no unconverted person can enter—peace with God, and peace in the heart. Yet both of these are the inalienable right of the believer; for the peace which our Lord Jesus Christ made by the blood of His cross has sealed his acceptance with the Father; and the peace which is produced in his conscience as the fruit of the Spirit, calms the troubled passions of his breast. This is a peace which no man can attain unto except the man who hearkens to the commandment, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.” But if you hearken to it, you shall have peace, and that peace shall be like a river. The metaphor is full of beauty, and not wanting in instructiveness either, by which peace is compared to a river. What does this mean? Several things. Peace like a river, for
(1.) continuance. For ever, throughout all generations, the river speedeth to its destined place. Such is the peace of the Christian. He is always at peace.
(2.) Freshness. The peace which a Christian has is always fresh, always receiving fresh supplies.
(3.) A river increases in breadth, and its waters augment their volume. Such is the Christian’s peace. It will go on increasing till it melts into the infinite peace of the beatific vision, where
“Not a wave of trouble rolls
Across the peaceful breast.”
(4.) Its joyful independence of man. Habakkuk’s song: “Although the fig-tree,” &c. The devil cannot rob us of the peace which comes from God, neither can the world take it away. What would some of you give to have such a peace as this? Such peace you shall have if you hearken to God’s commands.
2. Thou hast not the righteousness which is “as the waves of the sea!” Notice how this metaphor surpasses the previous one in dignity, if not in delicacy. We can all see a sort of comparison, and yet at the same time a strong contrast, between the water of an inland river and the collection of waters which make up the wide expanse of the sea. One, for the most part, is tranquil, the other always heaving and surging to and fro. So I suppose, as the words were originally addressed to the Jewish nation, and referred to their temporal welfare, the river would represent the beauty and happiness of their own land, like the garden of Eden, watered by the river of God’s pleasure; and the sea, with its waves rolling in majestically one after another in unbroken succession, would set forth that progress which is the renown of righteousness. Generation after generation would witness the rising tide of prosperity. Oh! what did that rebellious seed of Jacob lose by forsaking the Lord! Apply this metaphor of the waves of the sea, like that of the flowing of the river, to the happiness of the believer. Look at this precious doctrine of the Gospel through the glass of that Old Testament symbol. The man who believes in Jesus Christ has the righteousness of Christ imputed to him, that is to say, the obedience of Christ is considered by God as his obedience. So, if I believe in Christ, I am as much beloved and as much accepted as if I had been perfect in a rectitude of my own; for the righteousness of Christ becomes mine. But how is this righteousness like the waves of the sea? It is like the waves of the sea
(1.), for multitude.
(2.) For majesty. What an illustration of overwhelming power! Who can withstand the power of Christ’s righteousness? “Who shall lay anything to God’s elect?” &c. Then it is majestic because it is profound, and because of its ceaseless energy.
(3.) For sufficiency.
(4.) For origin. That some of you have not got this righteousness is owing to this, that you have not hearkened to God. When the Gospel has been preached, have you listened attentively? &c. I know how some of you hear; it is always with procrastination. Even now, hear ye the voice of the Lord!—C. H. Spurgeon: Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 609–610.
DISREGARD OF GOD’S COMMANDMENTS
Isa_48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments, &c.
There are moments of reflection on the past. What would have been the history of this island, if Cæsar had not invaded it? if the Stuart kings had been inspired by different ideas? if the first Napoleon had not arisen? Similarly, we reflect on our own life. What would have been our career, if we had not, at some time, made such a mistake, or committed such a fault?—Thus also we think of some one whom we have known. With his talents and opportunities, what he might have become, if he had not spoiled everything by his folly or misconduct! Many a father laments over the son who has thrown away all his chances.
Thus God lamented over Israel. He had dealt with them as with sons; had bestowed upon them counsel and culture; but they had followed their own devices. And the consequences had overtaken them in diminished resources, a weakened empire, and eventual subjection to a foreign yoke. Had they hearkened to His commandments their state would have been different (Isa_48:18-19).
There are multitudes over whom He is pouring this lamentation to-day. He has not left them without instruction and direction. He has given them His word, His commandments, His Gospel. He has surrounded them with gracious influences. But they have been regardless of Him and of His efforts to save them. They have indulged their natural disposition to sin. Confident of themselves, and heedless of warning, like children ignorant of themselves and of the world, they have fallen over the rocks into moral ruin.
There may be some here over whom He thus laments. As you look back on your “wasted lives,” your “sins indulged while conscience slept, your vows and promises unkept,” you see that He has good reasons to do so. We invite you to consider what might have been, if you had hearkened to the calls of the Gospel and formed your life according to the Word of God; what it might have been in contrast with what it is—
I. IN RELATION YOUR CHARACTER.
Disregard of God’s commandments has led to many sins which need not have stained your life. One by one they have grown beyond all power of computation, as when debts grow until the position is irretrievable. After all allowances for the weaknesses of human nature, and the sins which would have been committed in spite of your endeavours, how many of them could have been prevented if you had hearkened to God’s commandments!—Moreover, these sins and the habit of mind which led to them have exerted a deteriorating influence on your character. Every wilful sin weakens the power of conscience and lowers the moral tone, so that the more sins a man commits the more likely is it that he will commit sin. It is a gradual descent towards the lowest point of moral being (H. E. I. 1527, 1528, 4500, 4501). Multitudes have become so degraded in conscience that they are living lives, the future of which, if shown to them some years ago, would have shocked them and called forth the indignant protest of Hazael, “Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?” Contrast this with what might have been. The habit of obedience, associated with love to the commander and approbation of the command, exerts a gradually formative influence on the character. Good principles become more firmly rooted, the conscience is trained to a quicker perception of moral differences, the inclinations are more completely engaged on the side of goodness, the holy life becomes natural, the entire moral tone is elevated. Like a tree which was at first only a slip, but has grown (Psa_92:12-14).
II. IN RELATION TO YOUR HAPPINESS.
All seek for happiness. Have you really found it in disregard of God’s commands? Has not sin often involved you in trouble? Has it not left the stinging conscience? Are you not often conscious of dissatisfaction and disappointment with the world?—It might have been so different! You might have been enjoying “the peace of God.” The troubles of life might have been to you channels of superior consolation. The blessedness of a conscience at rest through the pardoning and renewing grace might have been yours. Your heart might have been at rest, fixed, settled, centred in God, instead of being storm-driven. You might have had the happiness of friendship and fellowship with God. Instead of the gloom of the future, the thought of which is unwelcome, your future might have been radiant with the glorious Christian hope.
III. IN RELATION TO INFLUENCE.
For all have influence over others. If you have not hitherto hearkened to God’s commandments, your spirit and example has fallen on some one as an evil shadow. Within the circle of your influence, you have sown the seeds of evil and prevented good to an extent you can never calculate. You will never, at least in this world, know how many sins have been committed through you, and how many persons are morally worse than they would have been had they never known you. Some may have been irretrievably ruined. They have exceeded their exemplar.
Instead of this, had you been a Christian, consistent, earnest, your influence on these persons would have been quite different. It would have been a recognised and valued, as well as unconscious influence for good. Your own children. Not they alone. Some Christian work. The Church of Christ. The young. Society around you. You might have had the satisfaction of knowing that you had plucked some brand from the burning, and that you would be welcomed on the eternal shore by some who had passed through the golden gates because of your influence upon them. All this, and more, might have been if you had hearkened to God’s commandments.
Would it not have been unspeakably better if you had? Better for God to give us His Gospel and require obedience, rather than leave us to ourselves. Better for the gardener to train the plant than leave it wild. Better that the elder brother remained at home and obeyed his father, than that he should have ruined himself, like the prodigal. Better that Manasseh, and David, and Peter had not stained their memories with sin, even though they repented. Can you recall any of your sins which would not have been better uncommitted?
But lamentation cannot undo the past. There it lies, and will lie for ever. But one thing can be done. You can repent; confess; forsake; sue for mercy through the Cross. God laments it, that He may attract your attention to this. Listen and turn. Let the young ponder His lamentation as a warning voice. Let your character, happiness, influence be what the Gospel secures.—J. Rawlinson.
It is one of the simplest and most impressive laws of the Divine government to render to every man according to his works. The operation of this law is strikingly illustrated in the history of God’s dealings with the Israelites, to which reference is made in this chapter. But He has infinitely more pleasure in dispensing mercy than in executing judgment. When, through the impenitent obstinacy of the sinner, He arises to judgment, it is with reluctance and regret—a regret which finds expression in words of profound and tenderest pathos—“O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” Consider—
I. DISOBEDIENCE IN ITS HUMAN ASPECT.
1. It involves a serious loss. A man may lose a sum of money, and, by a simple process of arithmetic, be able to tell the exact amount. But there are losses which no figures can adequately report, or words describe; they are all the more keenly felt because of the reeling, bewildering sense of indefiniteness that surrounds them. More especially is this the case when we reflect upon the spiritual loss occasioned by a course of disobedience to the Divine commandments. We are conscious of a loss of something, though in what form, or to what extent, we cannot precisely say. Not only is there the absence of what we once possessed—the soul having suffered eclipse by the dark, cold shadow of earthliness and sin resting upon it; but there is also the vague impression of what might have been! We never know what we lose by one single dereliction of duty.
2. It involves a loss of profitable instruction. This we infer from the preceding verse. There is a close connection between obedience and growth in sound and useful knowledge (H. E. I. 3153–3154). Who, then, can estimate the loss incurred by repeated disobedience? Lofty and expansive views of the character and works of God, views of Christian duty from the clearest standpoint, glimpses of the glorious possibilities of Christian enjoyment, the remodelling or the rejection of opinions that have led into grievous and fatal errors—all are for ever lost by a pertinacious refusal to hearken to the Divine commandments. Nor is this the worst. We have brought darkness into our minds, hardness and apathy into our hearts, fear and uncertainty into our prospects, and bitterness into our experience.
3. It involves a loss of wise and infallible guidance. This we also learn from the preceding verse. Who can estimate the misery occasioned by the loss of that guidance, and the consequent prostitution to base and ignoble purposes of the rarest talent, the wreck of innocence and virtue, of youth and beauty and power, the withering of fondly cherished hopes, the blighting of domestic and individual life?
4. It involves a loss of personal happiness. “Then had thy peace been as a river”—or the river—referring to the Euphrates, the largest and most important of all the rivers of Western Asia. To an Oriental mind this noble river would vividly represent the deep, clear, and abundant peace which flows in the heart of that man whose ways please the Lord. Peace with God is the only source of permanent happiness. Its possession is conditioned on the obedience of faith (Rom_5:1-2). What a loss, when peace is gone and happiness takes wing! (H. E. I. 2828).
5. It involves a loss of character. “Then had thy righteousness been as the waves of the sea.” Character is a compound, of many separate elements—the outcome of many conflicting influences; but that which gives it lustre, dignity, and worth, is righteousness. As man lives in harmony with the laws of God, his righteousness is “as the waves of the sea.” The waves of the sea are attractive, exhibiting in their ceaseless movements ten thousand forms of wondrous beauty; imposing, as they heap themselves in mountainous billows and march as with conscious majesty along the pathways of the mighty deep; irresistible in power. Most forcibly do they symbolise the beauty, majesty, and power of that character which is based in righteousness and moulded in harmony with the Divine commandments. There is something ineffably potent in the influence of a holy life (H.E.I. 1089–1095). It checks the froward, rebukes the obstinate, lures the penitent from the haunts of sin, and conducts to the way of righteousness. Every act of disobedience is a loss, not only to the individual, but to the whole community.
II. DISOBEDIENCE IN ITS DIVINE ASPECT.
1. It calls forth the expression of Divine regret. “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” What a cry is this!—the Deity lamenting the fate of those who have lost their all by disobedience to His commandments (see Luk_19:41-42).
2. The expression of Divine regret becomes profoundly suggestive when we reflect that disobedience frustrates the Divine purpose regarding the happiness of the race. The gracious purpose of God is to save man: His heart hungers for the love of redeemed humanity. Every act of disobedience insults the Divine love, spurns His mercy, and delays the work of emancipating and elevating the entire race.
3. The expression of Divine regret becomes profoundly suggestive when we reflect that God only can aright estimate the present loss which disobedience entails.
4. The expression of Divine regret becomes still more profoundly suggestive when we reflect that God only knows the terribleness of the misery to which the disobedient must be consigned. The being God created to bless and exalt, He is obliged, in justification of His own righteousness, to punish (H. E. I. 2177, 2183); and the recollection of the Divine beneficence in the past will only augment the woe to which the soul is doomed for ever.
Do not think, O sinner! that your transgressions are unnoticed, or that you are the only one affected by them; they cannot be regarded with indifference by a just and beneficent God. And if you will persist in your disobedience, breaking through all restrictions, and spurning all help—if you will court ruin and voluntarily surrender yourself to the tormentor—He who has done all He consistently can to recall you to obedience, resolves you shall not perish unlamented; and as you drop into the abysmal depths of unutterable woe the voice of Infinite Pity exclaims, in tones which, though not intended to do so, can only sharpen the stings of remorse: “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! Then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea!”—G. Barlow, in The Study and Pulpit (1877), pp. 57–60.
“Godliness is profitable unto all things.”
I. God hath given us commandments.
1. Authoritative.
2. Perspicuous in their style (Hab_2:2; Pro_8:8-9; 2Ti_3:15).
3. Universal in their application.
4. Reasonable in their claims.
II. God’s commandments deserve attention.
1. They should be read.
2. Understood.
3. Remembered.
4. Practised.
III. Attention to God’s commandments produces the happiest results.
1. The nature of that tranquillity which the people of God enjoy.
2. Its perpetuity (Isa_26:3; Isa_66:12).
3. Its increase.
4. “My righteousness,” &c., may refer to the justice of the cause in which Israel was engaged; and had they hearkened to God’s commandments, they would have borne down all opposition, like the waves of the sea, which no might nor power can withstand.
IV. The people of Israel were inattentive to God’s commandments. They had not hearkened (2Ch_36:15-16; Psa_81:11). This conduct was—
1. Ungrateful.
2. Rebellious.
3. Unnatural.
4. Ruinous.
Learn:
1. That attention to God’s commandments is a highly important duty.
2. Where they are disregarded, peace is forfeited (Isa_48:22; Isa_57:20).
3. That God most compassionately commiserates the circumstances of His creatures.
4. That man’s final ruin is wholly of himself.—Sketches of Sermons, vol. ii. pp. 299–303.
THE RIVER AN IMAGE OF PEACE
Isa_48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river.
The images of this verse are images of national life; the peace, i.e., the outward prosperity of the people, shall flow like a river; the righteousness of the united people shall be like the forceful, restless energy of the sea waves. There is a peace which is the fruit of Christian faith; and it is of peace in this regard that we are to see the image in the river. What are the characteristics of Christian peace? What answer to this question does the river afford us?
I. The image sets before us a peace which is the expression of life and power. The life of a full and flowing river is not like that of a shallow stream; we find in it neither suggestion of feebleness nor stagnation, as in the marshy pool. The latter is still—so still, it is ghastly. The Christian is called to peace, but he is called to life more absolutely than to peace; the peace he is to realise is that, not of deathly calm, but of full, healthful life. The peace is as a river—not the babbling mountain stream; but the broad, deep, majestic river, that has gathered the shallow streams. The perfect restfulness of the broad flowing river is the outcome of power. Peace is fruitage of power—we can only reach peace by power. Faith must become firm and resolute. The great commandment cannot be fulfilled by irresolute will and feeble energy (Mat_22:37-38). “The peace of God”—why is that so perfect? Because in Him there is such perfectness of power, such force and fulness of character. There is a peace which comes by pardon that is very sweet (Mat_11:28; Luk_7:50). But there is another peace, a peace which flows out of life’s conduct—and that is the rest which is like the peace of the river (Mat_11:29). The rest of pardon is given—“I will give you rest;” the rest of obedience is found, “Ye shall find rest to your souls.” Forgiveness is a word of welcome, yet is it also a call to duty. Through the Christ-like life we come to the Christ-like peace.
II. The image of the text is expressive of healthful influence. The river’s life is one of ministry. Where the deep rivers flow, there are the rich valleys; “the still waters” make the “green pastures.” The river does not live unto itself. The Christian’s peace is not an idle reverie. We have not to seek peace, but life—a life of healthful influence, and we shall surely find peace. We cannot sever our peace from a life consecrated to service, if that peace is to be as a river (Php_2:4; P. D. 2680).
III. The image of the text is expressive of progress and perpetuity. The river flows to the sea—finding no rest, nor seeking it in stagnant idleness, for it has a more perfect rest in its ceaseless progress. The Christian’s peace is to progress—grow deeper, fuller with a progressive life. We are called to movement, the forward movement of the river. The progress of the river is perpetual. It is not a progress in spasms of energy. It would not have with such a movement a prevailing peace. Such energy is impulsive passion, fretful restlessness, This image of a Christian’s peace is a far-off ideal; and yet, if Christian character has any fulness, Christian experience any depth, we should realise peace with an almost unbroken constancy; we should have beneath outward conflict inward calm (Joh_16:33, P. D. 2673).
IV. The image of the text is expressive of pleasantness. The peace of the flowing river is not dull and wearisome—it pervades a fresh, bright, and changeful movement. The Christian’s peace is to be like the flowing, radiant waters of the river, not the still waters of a shadowed well. Peace and joy, joy and peace; these must flow together in Christian experience, bound together in a sacred wedlock. Rest in the Lord and be thankful, and your peace shall flow like a river (P. D. 2669).
CONCLUSION.—The peaceful life is dependent on obedience to God’s commandments—“Hearken,” &c. The Lord is saying to you, “Give me your heart, love Me, trust Me; be at peace with Me, and My peace shall be yours.”
“Rest, and hope, and glory,
Are found at Jesus’ feet.”
Look into His face, hear His words, sit at His feet, abide in His love; do whatsoever He commands you, and your peace shall flow like a river.—W. Steadman Davis: Christian World Pulpit, vol. iv. pp. 152–154.
How touching is the appeal of the Lord to His rebellious people! What a revelation does it give us at once of the ingratitude and folly of their disobedience, and of the greatness of His love! Consider now the first of the two figures under which the results of obedience to God’s commands are set forth: “Then had thy peace been as a river.”
“The Lord will bless His people with peace.” A blessing indeed! Without it there can be no real happiness. There is a peace which the world has to offer. But it cannot be trusted, it will not last. It is like the opiate which for a short while enables the sufferer to forget his pain, but for a short while only! It is like the tempting calm over the face of the sea, so smooth that only a ripple appears; but soon the calm will disappear, and the storm imperil the unwary mariner. Do you wish for true peace? See how God instructs you. “O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! Then had thy peace been as a river.” It is in obedience to God’s commands, and especially to the great Gospel command, that peace can be found (Joh_6:28-29; Rom_15:13).
Observe the comparison made use of. Peace as a river.
1. We can imagine the broad and noble river winding its course down to the sea; but let us trace it up to its source. What shall we see there? Probably on a mountain-side a spring—the fountain—partly concealed from view. It might be passed without notice by many a traveller, and yet this is the origin of the wide river, with its deep, ever-flowing waters. Whence comes the river of the Christian’s peace? Trace it up to its source, and what find we? The fountain ever open, ever fresh, of the Saviour’s atoning blood! Here, and here alone, is peace to be found (H. E. I., 1321–1324).
2. Having found the source of the river on the mountain-side, we do not see at once what we find farther down—the deep, wide stream, with sure and ceaseless course hastening on towards the sea. No, we find the streamlet, with but little depth of water, gushing down with impetuous force and noise, ever meeting in its bed with stones and rocks which seem to try to arrest its progress, but in vain. They stay the current but for a moment, and then it bursts over and around them with strength increased by the interruption. By and by the stream runs more smoothly and steadily; the water becomes deeper; and though the obstacles in the bed of the river still exist, yet they are less noticed, and have less and less power to interrupt its course. There is less noise, but a more even, constant flow. Does not this aptly represent the experience of many a Christian?
3. The waters of the river become deeper and broader, because they are fed in many ways, and thus increase their volume. Other streams flow into it, and there is, too, the rain direct from heaven. These help to swell the river, and to give additional depth and force. So the Christian’s peace needs a continually fresh supply, that it may deepen and widen, and be less interrupted in its course. It is continually fed by the direct outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and by the many and various means of grace. You who enjoy some measure of this peace, would you have it increased? Resort more constantly to the channels which Christ makes use of, for the impartation of His grace—the Word, communion with Christ by prayer in private and in public, and by the feast of His love; and be more watchful and prayerful in hearkening to and obeying all God’s commands. The more implicitly you obey, the more entirely the rebellious will is brought under and subdued, the more strongly and quietly will the river of your peace flow.
4. Where rivers flow, we find the country fruitful; but where water is not found, there is barrenness. Those Christians with whom the river of peace is flowing the most steadily and smoothly, will be found the most fruitful in good works to the praise and glory of God. It is far otherwise with those who are continually distracted with doubts and fears.
5. The noblest rivers become deeper, wider, stronger, until they enter the vast ocean. So the Christian’s peace, received from Christ, and fed uninterruptedly by the Holy Spirit, at death expands into participation in the peace and joy which are in the presence of the Lord for ever!
Would you know for yourselves this present peace, this future joy? Remember, you must first hearken—hearken now—to the commands of God, lest when the opportunity shall have passed beyond recall, God should say of thee, and thou shouldest seem to hear it, “O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! Then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.”
“Oh for the peace that floweth like a river,
Making life’s desert places bloom and smile;
Oh for the faith to grasp Heaven’s bright ‘for ever,’
Amid the shadows of earth’s ‘little while!’ ”
—J. H. Holford, M.A.: A Memorial Volume of Sermons, pp. 1–13.
The figure conveys three ideas:—
1. Constancy. A river is, in most cases, a permanent thing. Not like an occasional torrent which rushes down from the mountain to-day and disappears to-morrow, nor like a lake which the rains have formed, but which will dry up when the rains are over. A river flows on day after day, year after year, deeper at one time than another, and more rapid and wide, yet never exhausted, rolling on the same throughout all generations. So that peace of which this text speaks is a permanent, established thing. As long as the believer hearkens to God’s commandments, it reigns over his soul, and keeps it, if not in an unbroken, yet in an abiding calm. Not that the state of his mind is always the same. Trace a river from its source to its mouth, and there is generally an almost endless variety in its course and appearance. It is now half hidden in a narrow channel among mountains and forests, and now spread over a wide bed, conspicuous in the plain; and then again, it is seen contracting and deepening itself and moving onwards with tenfold velocity and strength. The Christian’s peace seems to vary as much. It sometimes nearly disappears; the man himself perhaps thinks it quite gone. But he is never wholly without it, while walking in the path of God’s commandments, and never will be.
2. Abundance. The Christian’s peace, it says, shall not enter his soul by drops, or flow through it as a scanty and shallow rivulet. There shall be a tide of peace, a wide and deep stream of it, passing into his soul. The waters shall be deep as well as broad (Isa_26:3; Psa_119:165; Php_4:7). We cannot tell how peaceful God can make us. There is abundance of peace for us, for there is God’s own peace for us! We often wish for the peace of this Christian friend, or the quiet of that Christian neighbour. But Christ says to us, “My peace I give unto you—a calmness like My own!” (P. D. 2666).
3. Increase. A river is not formed at once. At first it is generally a mere thread of water, scarcely perceptible through the grass and rushes among which it is running. But, as it flows on, other streams fall into it; it widens and deepens; the farther it flows the more enlarged it becomes, till it loses itself at last in the depths of the ocean. There is not much peace in the sinner’s heart, when his attention is first fixed on God’s commands; no, not even when he hopes he has found pardon in Christ for his transgressions of them. There is sometimes a good deal of joy at such seasons—it would be strange if there were not; but there is not what he himself, at a later period of his course, would call peace. True, solid peace is generally at first small; it is hardly perceptible amid the fears and perplexities with which the soul has to struggle; but as the soul goes on listening to the Divine commandments, applying to the Saviour for pardon and to the Comforter for strength, and gradually becoming moulded more and more into the Divine image, peace flows into it in a more copious stream, the sources of peace are multiplied, and the soul’s capacity to receive and hold it is increased. All this, unless God’s ways are forsaken, goes on to the last. New springs of consolation burst open in every stage of our progress, old sources of comfort become richer and sweeter; our peace constantly flows deeper and deeper, till it ends in an ocean of peace, the boundless, fathomless ocean of everlasting joy.—Charles Bradley: Practical Sermons, vol. i. pp. 276–278.
It is from simple natural imagery that the mind is put into a fitting frame for catching the spirit of the text. The good and gracious God addresses this tender language of expostulation to those who have forgotten His laws.
I. Our heavenly Father is continually speaking to us by His Word, &c. Sometimes His voice is heard in thunder tones, as on the smoking top of Sinai. Sometimes its gracious accents are those of gentleness and love. It is the duty of all to “hearken,” however and whenever God speaks. To “hearken “implies—
1. A reverent and careful attention to God’s message.
2. That we consider God’s commandments as binding upon us, and as pointing out certain particulars which we are required to attend to. God is a lawgiver, and the sceptre of dominion is held firmly in His grasp (Rev_22:14).
II. The blessing promised, as the reward of such obedience, is peace—peace of mind and heart; peace with God through Christ Jesus. Peace may be compared to a river,
1. In its origin; small, joyous, sparkling, vigorous, rapid.
2. In its progress: widening and deepening; receiving new tributories on the right and left, from the various means of grace, as they are supplied with the dew of heaven and showers of blessings; sweeping away as it rolls on in its strength the obstacles of unsanctified affections and unconquered lusts.
3. In its overflowing abundance. It is not a scanty, fluctuating, failing stream, but a full tide of peace, both wide and deep, and supplying to the utmost every longing of the soul.
4. In its perpetuity. A river differs from a mountain torrent or summer brook in this: the river flows on with a comparatively steady current—sometimes broader and deeper than at others, it is true, but never exhausted, never dry—while the very existence of the brook and the torrent depends upon uncertain showers. The Christian who hearkens diligently to the laws of the Lord shall enjoy perpetual peace. It is not uniform, indeed, any more than the course of the river.
5. In its increase. Peace shall not only dwell perpetually with God’s children, but it shall grow stronger and more pervading.
If you saw a man trying all his life to satisfy his thirst by holding an empty cup to his lips, you would smile at his folly or pity his ignorance. Not more deplorable folly and ignorance, however, than when immortal spirits persist in seeking peace everywhere except from its true and only source. “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked,” and yet each one of those who will be condemned at the last day might have enjoyed “peace as a river.”—J. N. Norton: Sermons for the Christian Year.
1. Like a river in its commencement—trickling from some fissure in the heart, singing its own song as it drops from leaf to leaf, from ledge to ledge—now gathering itself up in a little pool, saying to its joyous waters, “Here we rest,”—anon rushing on again to fulfil its purpose, and gain its parent sea.
2. Like a river in its progress, ever widening and deepening, from the ankles to the knees, from the knees to the loins, from the loins to waters to swim in, a river that cannot be passed over,—receiving new tributaries on the right and left, sweeping away as it rolls on its healthful stream the dead and dying remains of past affections and former lusts, and bearing on its bosom a thousand newly launched hopes.
3. Like a river in its influence—holy, healthy, generating—causing a wide expanse of “living green” to spread out on either side—making even the desert of the soul “rejoice and blossom as the rose.”
4. Like a river in its termination—rolling into and mingling with the shoreless, blessed sea of perfect peace, where undulating waves never roll in strife, or break in death, but where the people of God are “ever with the Lord.”
Away among the Alleghanies there is a spring so small, that a single ox in a summer day could drain it dry. It steals its unobtrusive way among the hills, till it spreads out in the beautiful Ohio. Thence it stretches away a thousand miles, leaving on its banks, cities, villages, and cultivated farms, and bearing on its bosom more than half a thousand steamboats. Beautiful representation of a Christian’s peace! Peace “as a river.”
How little do we know of this peace of God! We deem ourselves happy if we have one serene hour out of the twenty-four; and if now and then there comes a Sabbath which is balm at morning, and sweetness through the still noon, and benediction at evening, we count it a rare and blessed experience.—H. W. Beecher.
I. Their peace would have been like a river.
1. It has a source. It begins at the fountain of Christ’s blood.
2. It is fed from above. Rains and showers feed the rivers. The shower of grace swells the rivers of peace.
3. It has inundations, as the Nile. An awakening providence often makes an overflow. Afflictions and the consolations under them always, if the sufferings are the sufferings of Christ. Sacramental times also; hence the desirableness of frequency in the administration of the Lord’s Supper.
4. It gets broader and broader to the sea. The Tay. (Pro_4:18.) Try yourselves by this test.
5. It is fertilising. It conveys nourishment. Egypt owes all its fertility to the Nile. The peace of Christ makes every grace grow. Holiness always grows out of a peaceful breast.
II. Their righteousness would have been as the waves of the sea. [1486] Because—
1. It covers over the highest sins.
2. It covers again and again. It is infinite righteousness. You cannot count the waves of the sea.
[1486] The ideas suggested by the figure of a river are abundance, perpetuity, and freshness, to which the waves of the sea add those of vastness, depth, and continual succession.—Alexander.
Inference. God wishes men to be saved. God sometimes pleads with men to be saved for His own pleasure: it would be pleasant to Him, it would make Him glad, as in the parable of the lost sheep. Sometimes He pleads for His own glory (Jer_13:16; Mal_2:1). But here it is for the happiness of sinners themselves (so Psa_81:13). Once more, He pleads with men, because unwilling that any should perish (2Pe_3:9).—R. M. M‘Cheyne: Memoirs and Remains, p. 467.
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.
C. I. Scofield1917 · Public DomainOn v17Heb. "goel," Redemp. (Kinsman type). (See Scofield "Isa 59:20").
redeemer
Heb. "goel," Redemp. (Kinsman type). (See Scofield "Isa 59:20").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv16–17General Information:
General Information:
Yahweh continues speaking to the people of Israel.
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I have not spoken in secret
This can be expressed positively. AT: "I have spoken plainly and clearly" (See: Double Negatives)
sent me
Here "me" refers to an unknown servant of Yahweh, maybe Isaiah or Cyrus or the promised Messiah.
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On v1648:16 I have told you plainly: God’s promises are…
48:16 I have told you plainly: God’s promises are clear, though not always specific as to manner and time. • now the Sovereign Lord and his Spirit have sent me with this message: The identity of the one who is sent is unclear. Isaiah might be referring to himself as a Spirit-inspired prophet who spoke the very words of God to Israel. The connection with the Spirit suggests that it refers to the promised servant, the Messiah. • The presence of the Spirit assures the servant’s success.
GEBible — Godless Engineer's Bible App
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv16–17 Thus the Prophet speaketh for himself, and to assure…
Thus the Prophet speaketh for himself, and to assure them of these things.
Since the time that I declared myself to your fathers.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv16–17 Isa 48:16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye…
Isa 48:16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there [am] I: and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me.
Ver. 16. Come ye near unto me and hear this.] God calleth often for audience, as knowing our dulness and crossness, our oscitance and inadvertence: a good mirror for ministers.
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I have not spoken in secret.] See Isa 41:26.
From the time that it was, there am I,] viz., At the creation. {as Pro 8:22-23} Or, I have from everlasting been the author of that counsel by which all these things have had, as it were, their first beginning; and afterwards, in their appointed time, I have brought them forth by my power. {a}
And now the Lord God and his Spirit hath sent me,] i.e., Me, Isaiah the prophet, whose writings should therefore be prized and believed by us as most authentic and authoritative, because he was commissioned by the blessed Trinity.
{a} Diod.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv16–17 Come ye near unto me, that you may the…
Come ye near unto me, that you may the better hear me, as it follows. A speech of God after the manner of men.
I have not spoken in secret; I have not smothered the counsel and word of God, but have plainly and publicly declared it. unto you; or, I have openly revealed my mind to you. See Poole "Isa 45:19", where these very words are spoken by God in his own name, as here by the prophet in God’s name; and so all comes to one.
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From the beginning; either,
1. From the first time that I began to prophesy until this time. Or,
2. From the beginning of my taking you to be my people, and of revealing my mind to you. See Poole "Isa 41:26".
From the time that it was these words also, as well as the former, are the words, either,
1. Of the prophet; and so the sense seems to be this, From the time that I was first called to be a prophet, I have been there, i.e. I have diligently pursued my prophetical function; I have hearkened from time to time, to hear what God would speak to me, that I might impart it to you. Or,
2. Of God; and then the sense may be this, From the time that I first spoke of it, or foretold it, I am or was there, to take care to effect what I had foretold; I minded it carefully from that time, as being then more especially obliged to do it, lest my truth or power should be questioned. Or the words may be thus rendered and explained, from the time that this shall be, when the time appointed for the doing of this work shall come, there I will be, to encourage and assist Cyrus in the work. There am I: this is opposed to those foregoing words, from the beginning. God and his Spirit; God by his Spirit; or, God, even the Spirit or the Holy Ghost, to whom the sending and inspiring of God’s prophets is ascribed, 2Pe 1:21. Hath sent me, to wit, the prophet Isaiah; who yet was a type of Christ, and so this may have a respect to him also.
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 v16 Here, as before, Jacob and Israel are summoned to…
Here, as before, Jacob and Israel are summoned to hearken to the prophet speaking in God's name, or rather to God speaking in and by the prophet, and that as a type of the great prophet by whom God has in these last days spoken unto us, and that is sufficient: Come near therefore, and hear this. Note, Those that would hear and understand what God says must come near, and approach to him; let them come as near as they can. Let those that have hearkened to the tempter now come near, and hear this, that they may be confirmed in their resolutions to serve God. Those that draw nigh to God may depend upon this, that his secret shall be with them. Here,
I. God refers them to what he hath both said to them and done for them formerly, which if they would reflect upon, they might thence fetch great encouragement to trust in God at this time. 1. He had always spoken plainly to them from the beginning, by Moses and all the prophets: I have not spoken in secret, but publicly, from the top of Mount Sinai, and in the chief places of concourse, the solemn assemblies of their tribes; he did not deliver his oracles obscurely and ambiguously, but so that they might be understood, Hab 2:2. 2. He had always acted wonderfully for them: "From the time that they were first formed into a people there I am, there have I been resident among them and presiding in their affairs (he sent them prophets, raised them up judges, and frequently appeared for them), and therefore there I will be still." He that has been with his people hitherto will be to the end.
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II. The prophet himself, as a type of the great prophet, asserts his own commission to deliver this message: Now the Lord God (the same that spoke from the beginning and did not speak in secret) has by his Spirit sent me, Isa 48:16. The Spirit of God is here spoken of as a person distinct from the Father and the Son, and having a divine authority to send prophets. Note, Whom God sends the Spirit sends. Those whom God commissions for any service the Spirit in some measure qualifies for it; and those may speak boldly, and must be heard obediently, whom God and his Spirit send. As that which the prophet says to the same purport with this (Isa 61:1) is applied to Christ (Luk 4:21), so may this be; the Lord God sent him, and he had the Spirit without measure.
III. God by the prophet sends them a gracious message for their support and comfort under their affliction. The preface to this message is both awful and encouraging (Isa 48:17): Thus saith Jehovah, the eternal God, thy Redeemer, that has often been so, that has engaged to be so, and will be faithful to the engagement, for he is the Holy One, that cannot deceive, the Holy One of Israel, that will not deceive them. The same words that introduce the law, and give authority to that, introduce the promise, and give validity to that: "I am the Lord thy God, whom thou mayest depend upon as in relation to thee and in covenant with thee."
1. Here is the good work which God undertakes to fulfil in them. He that is their Redeemer, in order to that, will be, (1.) Their instructor: "I am thy God that teaches thee to profit, that is, teaches thee such things as are profitable for thee, things that belong to thy peace." By this God shows himself to be a God in covenant with us, by his teaching us (Heb 8:10, Heb 8:11); and none teaches like him, for he gives an understanding. Whom God redeems he teaches; whom he designs to deliver out of their afflictions he first teaches to profit by their afflictions, makes them partakers of his holiness, for that is the profit for which he chastens us, Heb 12:10. (2.) Their guide: He leads them to the way and in the way by which they should go. He not only enlightens their eyes, but directs their steps. By his grace he leads them in the way of duty, by his providence he leads them in the way of deliverance. Happy are those that are under such a guidance!
2. Here is the good-will which God declares he had for them by his good wishes concerning them, Isa 48:18, Isa 48:19. He had indeed brought them into captivity, but it was owing to themselves, nor did he afflict them willingly. (1.) As when he gave them his law he earnestly wished they might be obedient (O that there were such a heart in them! Deu 5:29. O that they were wise! Deu 32:29), so, when he had punished them for the breach of his law, he wished they had been obedient: O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! Isa 48:18. O that my people had hearkened unto me! Psa 81:13. This confirms what God had said and sworn, that he has no pleasure in the death of sinners. (2.) He assures them that, if they had been obedient, that would not only have prevented their captivity, but would have advanced and perpetuated their prosperity. He had abundance of good things ready to bestow upon them if their sins had not turned them away, Isa 59:1, Isa 59:2. [1.] They should have been carried on in a constant uninterrupted stream of prosperity: "Thy peace should have been as a river; thou shouldst have enjoyed a series of mercies, one continually following another, as the waters of a river, which always last." Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis aevum - It flows, and will for ever flow; not like the waters of a land-flood, which are soon gone. [2.] Their virtue and honour, and the justice of their cause, should in all cases have borne down opposition by their own strength, as the waves of the sea. Such should their righteousness have been that nothing should have stood before it; whereas, now they had been disobedient, the current of their prosperity was interrupted, and their righteousness overpowered. [3.] The rising generation should have been very numerous and very prosperous; whereas they were now very few, as appears by the small number of the returning captives (Ezr 2:64), not so many as of one tribe when they came out of Egypt. They should have been numberless as the sand, according to the promise (Gen 22:17), which they had forfeited the benefit of: "The offspring of thy bowels would have been innumerable, like the gravel of the sea, if thy righteousness had been irresistible and unconquerable as the waves of the sea." [4.] The honour of Israel should still have been unstained, untouched: His name should not have been cut off, as now it is in the land of Israel, which is either desolate or inhabited by strangers; nor should it have been destroyed from before God. We cannot reckon the name either of a family or of a kingdom destroyed till it is destroyed from before God, till it ceases to be a name in his holy place. Now God tells them thus what he would have done for them if they had persevered in their obedience, First, That they might be the more humbled for their sins, by which they had forfeited such rich mercies. Note, This should engage us (I might say, enrage us) against sin, that it has not only deprived us of the good things we have enjoyed, but prevented the good things God had in store for us. It will make the misery of the disobedient the more intolerable to think how happy they might have been. Secondly, That his mercy might appear the more illustrious in working deliverance for them, though they had forfeited it and rendered themselves unworthy of it. Nothing but a prerogative of mercy would have saved them.
3. Here is assurance given of the great work which God designed to work for them, even their salvation out of their captivity, when he had accomplished his work in them.
(1.) Here is a commission granted them to leave Babylon. God proclaimed, long before Cyrus did, that whoever would might return to his own land (Isa 48:20): "You have a full discharge sent you: Go you forth out of Babylon; the prison-doors are thrown open, and the trumpet sounds, proclaiming a release." Perhaps with this word, as a means, the Spirit of the Lord stirred up the spirits of those that did take the benefit of Cyrus's proclamation (Ezr 1:5): Flee you from the Chaldeans, not with an ignominious stolen flight, as Jacob fled from Laban, but with a holy disdain, as scorning to stay any longer among them; flee you, not silently and sorrowfully, but with a voice, with a voice of singing, as they fled of old out of Egypt, Exo 15:1.
(2.) Here is the news of this sent to all parts: "Let it be declared; let it be told; let it be uttered; make it to be heard by the most remote, by the most remiss; send the tidings of it by word of mouth; send it by writing, from city to city, from kingdom to kingdom, even to the utmost regions, to the ends of the earth." This was a figure of the publishing of the gospel to all the world; but that brings glad tidings which all the world is concerned in, this only that which it is fit all should take notice of, that they may be invited by it to forsake their idols and come into the service of the God of Israel. Let them all know then, [1.] That those whom God owns for his are such as he has dearly bought and paid for: The Lord has redeemed his servant Jacob; he has done it formerly, when he brought them out of Egypt, and now he is about to do it again. Jacob was God's servant, and therefore he redeemed him; for what had other masters to do with God's servants? Israel is God's son, therefore Pharaoh must let him go. God redeemed Jacob, and therefore it was fit that he should be his servant (Psa 116:16); the bonds God had loosed tied them the faster to him. He that redeemed us has an unquestionable right to us. [2.] That those whom God designs to bring home to himself he will take care of, that they want not for the necessary expenses of their journey. When he brought them out of Egypt, and led them through the deserts, they thirsted not (Isa 48:21), for in all their removals the water out of the rock followed them; thence he caused the waters to flow, and, since rock-water is the clearest and finest, God clave the rock, and the waters gushed out; for he can fetch in necessary supplies for his people in a way that they think the least likely. This refers to what he did for them when he brought them out of Egypt; when all this was literally true. But it should now be in effect done again, in their return out of Babylon, so well provided for should they and theirs be in their return. God does his work as effectually by marvellous providences as by miracles, though perhaps they are not so much taken notice of. This is applicable to those treasures of grace laid up for us in Jesus Christ, from which all good flows to us as the water did to Israel out of the rock, for that rock is Christ.
(3.) Here is a caveat put in against the wicked who go on still in their trespasses. Let not them think to have any benefit among God's people. Though in show and profession they herd themselves among them, let them not expect to come in sharers; no (Isa 48:22), though God's thoughts concerning the body of that people were thoughts of peace, yet to those among them that were wicked and hated to be reformed there is no peace, no peace with God or their own consciences, no real good, whatever is pretended to. What have those to do with peace who are enemies to God? Their false prophets cried Peace to those to whom it did not belong; but God tells them that there shall be no peace, nor any think like it, to the wicked. The quarrel sinners have commenced with God, if not taken up in time by repentance, will be an everlasting quarrel.
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 vv16–17 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this,.... An…
Come ye near unto me, hear ye this,.... An address to the Jews, to attend the ministry of Christ, and hear the doctrine he had delivered to them:
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the beginning of his ministry; which be exercised not in private houses, but in the synagogues of the Jews, and in the temple, whither a large concourse of people resorted, Joh 18:20,
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from the time that it was, there am I; from the time that his ministry began there, he was in the same places, in Judea and Galilee, always publicly preaching the Gospel, and doing good: or rather, "before the time that it was, there was I" (n); Christ existed before his incarnation, before he appeared as the great Prophet in Israel; he existed as the Word and Son of God from all eternity, and was with God his Father from everlasting; he was by him, and brought up with him, and lay in his bosom so early:
and now the Lord God and his Spirit hath sent me; in the fulness of time, in the likeness of sinful flesh, to preach the Gospel, fulfil the law, and to redeem and save the Lord's people. Here is a glorious testimony of a trinity of Persons in the Godhead; Christ the Son of God is sent in human nature, and as Mediator Jehovah the Father and the Spirit are the senders of him; and so is a proof of the mission, commission, and authority of Christ, who came not of himself, but was sent of God, Joh 8:42, it may be rendered, "and now the Lord God hath sent me and his Spirit" (o); both were sent of God, and in this order; first, Christ, to be the Redeemer and Saviour; and then the Spirit, to be the Convincer and Comforter; see Joh 14:26.
(n) "ex tempore antequam fieret", V. L. "nondum existente tempore horum eventuum", Forerius. (o) "misit me et spiritum ejus", Lutherus, Castalio; "et spiritum suum", Cocceius, Vitringa.
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 vv16–17 In secret - l have openly revealed my mind…
In secret - l have openly revealed my mind to you. The beginning - Either from the first time that I began to prophecy until this time: or from the beginning of my taking you to be my people, and of revealing my mind unto you. From the time - From the time that I first spoke of it, I am or was there, to effect what I had foretold. The Lord - God by his Spirit. Me - The prophet Isaiah; who was a type of Christ, and so this may have a respect to him also.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On v16 Verse 16. Come ye near unto me] After the…
Verse 16. Come ye near unto me] After the word קרבו kirbu, "draw near," a MS. adds גוים goyim, "O ye nations;" which, as this and the two preceding verses are plainly addressed to the idolatrous nations, reproaching their gods as unable to predict future events, is probably genuine.
Hear ye this - "And hear ye this"] A MS. adds the conjunction, ושמעו vashimu; and so the Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate.
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I have not spoken in secret] The Alexandrine copy of the Septuagint adds here, ουδε εν τοπῳ γης σκοτεινω, "nor in a dark place of the earth," as in Isa 45:19. That it stands rightly, or at least stood very early, in this place of the Version of the Septuagint, is highly probable, because it is acknowledged by the Arabic Version, and by the Coptic MS. St. Germain de Prez, Paris, translated likewise from the Septuagint. But whether it should be inserted, as of right belonging to the Hebrew text, may be doubted; for a transcriber of the Greek Version might easily add it by memory from the parallel place; and it is not necessary to the sense.
From the time that it was - "Before the time when it began to exist"] An ancient MS. has היותם heyotham, "they began to exist;" and so another had it at first. From the time that the expedition of Cyrus was planned, there was God managing the whole by the economy of his providence.
There am I - "I had decreed it"] I take שם sham for a verb, not an adverb.
And now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me - "And now the Lord JEHOVAH hath sent me, and his Spirit"]
Τις εστιν ὁ εν τῳ Ησαιῳ λεγων, Και νυν Κυριος απεστειλε με και το Πνευμα αυτου; εν ᾡ, αμφιβολου οντος του ῥητου, ποτερον ὁ Πατηρ και το Ἁγιον Πνευμα απεστειλαν του Ιησουν, η ὁ Πατηρ απεστειλε τον τε Χριστον και το Ἁγιον Πνευμα το δευτερον εστιν αληθες.
"Who is it that saith in Isaiah, And now the Lord hath sent me and his Spirit? in which, as the expression is ambiguous, is it the Father and the Holy Spirit who have sent Jesus; or the Father, who hath sent both Christ and the Holy Spirit. The latter is the true interpretation." - Origen cont. Cels. lib. i. I have kept to the order of the words of the original, on purpose that the ambiguity, which Origen remarks in the Version of the Septuagint, and which is the same in the Hebrew might still remain; and the sense which he gives to it, be offered to the reader's judgment, which is wholly excluded in our translation.
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 vv16–17 Isa 48:16. Come ye near unto me, &c. —…
Isa 48:16. Come ye near unto me, &c. — That you may the better hear me. Here, as in Isa 48:14, Jacob and Israel are summoned to hearken to the prophet speaking in God’s name, and as a type of the great prophet, by whom God has in these last days spoken unto us. I have not spoken in secret — I have not suppressed, concealed, or kept back the counsel and word of God, or any part thereof, but have declared it openly and publicly. See note on Isa 45:19, where these very words are spoken by God in his own name, as they are here by the prophet in God’s name. From the beginning — From the first time that I began to prophesy until now: or, if the prophet be considered as uttering God’s words, the meaning is, From the beginning of my taking you to be my people, and revealing my mind to you. From the time that it was, there am, or rather, was, I — These words also, as well as the former, are the words either, 1st, Of the prophet; and so the sense is, From the time that I was first called to be a prophet, I have been there, that is, I have diligently pursued my prophetical function; I have hearkened, from time to time, to hear what God would speak to me, that I might impart it to you: or, 2d, Of God; and then the sense may be this: From the time that I first foretold it, I was there to take care to effect what I predicted. And now — This is opposed to the foregoing words, from the beginning; the Lord God and his Spirit — God, by his Spirit, or God, even the Spirit, namely, the Holy Ghost, to whom the sending and inspiring of God’s prophets is ascribed, 2Pe 1:21; hath sent me — Namely, the prophet, who yet was a type of Christ, and so this may have a respect to him 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 vv16–17 Come ye near unto me - (see Isa 48:14).
Come ye near unto me - (see Isa 48:14).
I have not spoken in secret - (See the notes at Isa 45:19). The idea here is, that he had foretold the raising up of Cyrus, and his agency in delivering his people, in terms so plain that it could not be pretended that it was conjectured, and so clear that there was no ambiguity.
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From the time that it was, there am I - From the moment when the purpose was formed, and when it began to be accomplished, I was present. The meaning is, that everything in regard to raising up Cyrus, and to the delivery of his people from Babylon, had been entirely under his direction.
And now the Lord God and his Spirit hath sent me - There is evidently a change in the speaker here. In the former part of the verse, it is God who is the speaker. But here it is he who is sent to bear the message. Or, if this should be regarded, as Lowth and many others suppose, as the Messiah who is speaking to the exiled Jews, then it is an assertion that he had been sent by the Lord God and his Spirit. There is an ambiguity in the original, which is not retained in our common translation. The Hebrew is, ‘And now the Lord Yahweh hath sent me, and his Spirit;’ and the meaning may be either, as in our version, that Yahweh and his Spirit were united in sending the person referred to; or that Yahweh had sent him, and at the same time had also sent his Spirit to accompany what he said. Grotius renders it, ‘The Lord by his Spirit bas given me these commands.’ Jerome understands the word ‘Spirit’ as in the nominative case, and as meaning that the Spirit united with Yahweh in sending the person referred to - Dominus Deus misit me, et spiritus ejus.
The Septuagint, like the Hebrew, is ambiguous - Νῦν κύριος κύριος ἀπέστειλέ με, καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα αὐτοῦ Nun kurios kurios apesteile me, kai to pneuma autou. The Syriac has the same ambiguity. The Targum of Jonathan renders it, ‘And now Jehovah (יי yeyâ) God hath sent me and his word.’ It is perhaps not possible to determine, where there is such ambiguity in the form of the sentence, what is the exact meaning. As it is not common, however, in the Scriptures, to speak of the Spirit of God as sending, or commissioning his servants; and as the object of the speaker here is evidently to conciliate respect for his message as being inspired, it is probably to be regarded as meaning that he had been sent by Yahweh and was accompanied wish the influences of his Spirit. Many of the reformers, and others since their time have supposed that this refers to the Messiah, and have endeavored to derive a demonstration from this verse of the doctrine of the Trinity. The argument which it has been supposed these words furnish on that subject is, that three persons are here spoken of, the person who sends, that is, God the Father; the person who is sent, that is, the Messiah; and the Spirit, who concurs in sending him, or by whom he is endowed.
But the evidence that this refers to the Messiah is too slight to lay the foundation for such an argument; and nothing is gained to the cause of truth by such forced interpretations. “It would require more time, and toil, and ingenuity to demonstrate that this passage had reference to the Messiah, than it would to demontstrate the doctrine of the Trinity, and the divinity of the Redeemer, from the unequivocal declarations of the New Testament.” The remark of Calvin on this verse, and on this mode of interpretation, is full of good sense: ‘This verse interpreters explain in different ways. Many refer it to Christ, but the prophet designs no such thing. Cavendoe autem sunt nobis violentoe et coactoe interpretations - (such forced and violent interpretations are to be avoided).’ The scope of the passage demands, as it seems to me, that it should be referred to the prophet himself. His object is, to state that he had not come at his own instance, or without being commissioned. He had been sent by God, and was attended by the Spirit of inspiration. He foretold events which the Spirit of God alone could make known to mankind. It is, therefore, a strong asseveration that his words demanded their attention, and that they had every ground of consolation, and every possible evidence that they would be rescued from their bondage. It is a full claim to divine inspiration, and is one of the many assertions which are found in the Scriptures where the sacred writers claim to have been sent by God, and taught by his Spirit.
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 v16 Spirit. The Fathers here find the three Persons of…
Spirit. The Fathers here find the three Persons of the blessed Trinity specified. Isaias was not from the beginning, though the text may also speak of him (Calmet) as the spoke long before the event, by divine inspiration. (Chaldean) (St. Jerome)
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 vv16–17 Isa_48:20-21 connect naturally with Isa_48:14-15. For Isa_48:14 foretells the…
4. TWO INSERTIONS
Isa_48:16-19
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Isa_48:20-21 connect naturally with Isa_48:14-15. For Isa_48:14 foretells the victory of Cyrus over Babylon; Isa_48:20 summons Israel to flee out of vanquished Babylon as a prison opened by Cyrus. Isa_48:16, however, contains a personal remark of the Prophet; and though Isa_48:17-19 are a revealed word of God (com. כֹּה אָמַר י׳ Isa_48:17), they are yet of so general a nature, that they would be perfectly in place, indeed, after Isa_48:21, as expressive of a regret that Israel did not follow the direct way to salvation, but had made necessary the detour through the Exile; but coming between Isa_48:15; Isa_48:20, they can only be regarded as a break of the connection. How Isa_48:16-19 came where they are will hardly be made out by any one. Their proper place would be between Isa_48:21-22. Perhaps they first stood in the margin (occasioned by the personal nature of Isa_48:16 and the retrospective nature of Isa_48:17-19 in the midst of the current of prospective prophecy), and then they were, through misunderstanding, inserted before instead of after Isa_48:21. [The Author’s difficulty as to the order of the verses will not be felt by many, any more than they are, e.g., by Lowth, Maurer, Barnes, J. A. Alex., who comment right on without being aware of anything to stumble at. Yet J. A. A. pauses to say, that the objection as presented by others is entirely unfounded; vide. his comm. on Isa_48:18. Those that fail to see the difficulty with the Author, will equally discard the caption he adopts, by which he stamps these verses 16–19 as interpolations.—Tr.).
a) FIRST INSERTION
Isa_48:16
A personal remark of the Prophet
16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this;
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning;
From the time that it was, there am I:
And now the Lord God, 9and his Spirit, hath sent me.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
These words are enigmatical, and I despair of explaining them in a convincing way. I do not believe that “come ye near unto me, hear ye this” are in parallelism with “all ye assemble yourselves and hear” Isa_48:14, and that therefore they are to be construed also as words of Jehovah. [“As certainly now as הִקָבְצוּ Isa_48:14 is the word of Jehovah, so certain is it that קִרְבוּ אֵלַי is the same. He summons to Himself the members of His nation, that they may hear still further His own testimony concerning Himself.” Delitzsch]. For, as has been shown, the initial words of Isa_48:14 are references to something said before. But Isa_48:16 begins a thought of another sort. It makes on me the impression of a separate remark, which the Prophet had directed to a narrower circle of immediate hearers, such as, say, the narrower circle of his disciples may have been (comp. on Isa_8:16 sqq.). Some might be surprised regarding the prophecies beginning with chap. 40, that the Prophet foretells so positively a Babylonian Exile, and the deliverance by a prince by the name of Cyrus. The Prophet explains this Isa_48:16. By “come ye near unto me” he intimates that he would make a particularly confidential communication. It consists in the statement that he must not be supposed to have known of these things already, say from the beginning of (מֵרֹאשׁ) his prophetic activity, and to have announced or may-be made a written record of them, as esoteric secrets, only in the narrowest circle. Rather he did not himself know of these things from the beginning. Only מעת היותה, “from the time that it was,” was he there. That is, only since these things “were created” (נִבְרְאוּ Isa_48:7) in the sense that we have explained Isa_48:7, did he become familiar with them and they stand visible before his prophetic eye. היותה seems to me to remind one of אָמַר וַיְהִי and of הַדָּבָר הָיָה. The Prophet regards as created, as come to pass, what has been announced to him. Hence he says here, he for his person was present, as an inward, spiritual witness and spectator, when these things, in a prophetic sense, came to pass. But now the LORD Jehovah (see List) has sent him, i.e., has sent him with the commission of announcing, and His Spirit. Therefore he distinguishes between the moment of prophetic seeing and that of prophetic announcement. I cannot construe רוּחוֹ as accusative. For then he would make himself like the Spirit, or put himself on a level with the Spirit. He can only make the Spirit equal with the Lord. But he distinguishes the Lord and His Spirit, by recognizing the first as the one from whom the Spirit proceeds (1Ki_22:22) or is sent.
This is an attempt at exposition, which however I by no means set forth as an assured assertion. As I cannot hold it to be satisfying, I cannot pretend to have solved the enigma by it. For a Prophet to interrupt his official prophecy by a private remark is, of course, against the rule. Still it is not unexampled. I regard Jer_31:26 as such, where see my comment. In Jeremiah, the occasion of that personal remark was the circumstance, that that moment of awaking out of sleep was for him the brightest point in all his trying prophetic career. For Isaiah the occasion was, that he regarded it as necessary to give his immediate hearers an explanation why he now announced things the like of which no one had ever before heard from him. It might seem as if hitherto he had preserved silence about what he had long known. But he says: The new thing that ye have heard, I myself did not know earlier. It has only now come to pass (in a prophetic sense), and only after it came to pass did I receive commission to reveal it. Of course, this exposition is only possible if the Prophet that speaks is Isaiah himself, and if Isaiah here for once speaks out of the historical moment in which he prophesied. But does not the whole weight of his discoures rest on this, that he is even prophesying, i.e., announcing future things, not present or past? If so, then he must be conscious of the interval between prophecy and fulfilment. He must know that what is prophesied lies far, far before him, too far for any human eye to recognize what lies beyond that interval. Hence I cannot agree with Delitsch in considering that the Prophet lives only in the Exile with his spirit. This were only possible did he forget that he prophesied.
[The comment of Delitzsch directly following his words quoted above is: “From the beginning He has not spoken in secret (see Isa_45:19); but from the time that all which now lies before their eyes—namely, the victorious career of Cyrus—has unfolded itself, He has been there, or has been by (שָׁם, ‘there,’ as in Pro_8:27), to regulate, what was coming to pass, and to cause it to result in the redemption of Israel. ‘I was there’ affirms, that, at the time when the revolution caused by Cyrus was preparing in the distance, He caused it to be publicly foretold, and thereby proclaimed Himself the present Author and Lord of what was then occurring. Up to this point Jehovah is speaking; but who is it that now proceeds to say, ‘And now’—namely, now that the redemption of Israel is about to appear (ועֲתָּה being here, as in many other instances, e.g., Isa_33:10, the turning-point of salvation)—‘now hath the Lord Jehovah seat me and His Spirit.’ The majority of the commentators assume that the Prophet comes forward here in his own person, behind Him whom he has introduced, and interrupts Him. But since the Prophet has not spoken in his own person before, whereas, on the other hand, these words are followed in Isa_49:1 sqq. by an address concerning himself from that Servant of Jehovah who announces Himself as the restorer of Israel and light of the Gentiles, and who cannot therefore be Israel as a nation or the Author of these prophecies, nothing is more natural than to suppose that the words, ‘And now hath the Lord,’ etc., form a prelude to the words of the One unequalled Servant of Jehovah concerning Himself which occur in 49. The surprisingly mysterious way in which the words of Jehovah suddenly pass into those of His messenger, which is only comparable to Zec_2:12 sqq.; Zec_4:9 (where the speaker is also not the prophet, but a divine messenger exalted above him), can only be explained in this manner. And in no other way can we explain the ועתה, which means, that after Jehovah has prepared the way for the redemption of Israel by the raising up of Cyrus, in accordance with prophecy, and by his success in arms, He has sent him, the speaker in this case, to carry out, in a mediatorial capacity, the redemption thus proposed, and that not by force of arms, but in the power of the Spirit of God (Isa_42:1; comp. Zec_4:6). Consequently the Spirit is not spoken of here as joining in the sending (as Umbreit and Stier suppose, after Jerome and the Targum; the LXX is indefinite, καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα αὐτοῦ); nor do we ever find the Spirit mentioned in such co-ordination as this (see, on the other hand, Zec_7:12, per spiritum suum). The meaning is, that it is also sent, i.e., sent in and with the Servant of Jehovah, who is speaking here.” Del. on Isa., vol. II. p. 252 sq. Clark’sFor. Theol. Lib.
We may anticipate here the comment on Isa_48:17-19 for the purpose of saying, in support of the above exposition of Delitzsch, that our Isa_48:16-19 seem to be the scripture (ἡ γραφή) referred to in Joh_7:37-39. In our text, the messenger and the Spirit sent with or after him (Isa_48:16) are presented as the source of the blessings conditionally guaranteed in Isa_48:17-19. The emphatic way in which the mention of the Spirit is introduced (Isa_48:16), and the mention of “teaching,” “hearkening to commandments,” “peace” and “righteousness” (Isa_48:17-18), make it plain that the agent of the blessings described (Isa_48:18-19) must be the Spirit; not, however, excluding the priority of the Redeemer who is the speaker. The blessing described is the blessing of Abraham, as our Author shows below; and (against Del. who translates “grains of sand”) we may, with our Author, translate מֵעוֹת = “viscera, bowels” (Barnes and J. A. Alex. do the same). Of course we must understand the blessing of numerous offspring in a spiritual sense, such as the Spirit will generate, i.e., a spiritual Israel. Our Author has shown this in cognate passages, e.g., see under Isa_44:3-5. Moreover the very parallelisms of Isa_48:18, “peace as the river,” “righteousness as the waves,” show this. In Joh_7:38 the Lord Jesus says: “He that believes on Me, as the Scripture said: rivers of living water shall flow from his bowels (ἐκ τῆς κοιλίας αὐτοῦ).” This is an allusion and interpretation, rather than a quotation. It combines the spiritual figures of Isa_48:18 with the figure of offspring in Isa_48:19, where the LXX. has: καὶ τὰ ἔκγονα τῆς κοιλίας σου. By saying this, our Lord claims that He is the source of the Abrahamic blessing, and reproduces in Himself the speaker of our text. To relieve the obscurity of the allusion the Evangelist adds his comment (Joh_7:39): “But this He spake of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.” By this John completes the allusion to our text, referring to the Spirit which our Isa_48:16 represents as sent with the messenger—but after; “and His Spirit (וְרוּחוֹ),” curiously subjoined grammatically, seeming to express an after-thought, but really expressing an after-act. The day of Pentecost witnessed this sending, and the promised effect of it in the multiplication of off-spring to those that believed on Christ, in the vast increase of the spiritual Israel, rivers of living waters, righteousness like waves, and seed like the offspring of the sea.
The view here given of the correlation of our text and Joh_7:37-39, if correct, is invaluable as aid in understanding the former, confirming the exposition of Delitzsch. At the same time it identifies the reference of ἡ γραφή in Joh_7:38, which, so far as we know, has never been satisfactorily done by any commentator, and at the same time must imperatively control the interpretation put upon “rivers of living water.” Tr.]
Footnotes:
[9]hath sent me and his Spirit.
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 vv16–17 not . . . in secret-- (Isa 45:19). Jehovah…
not . . . in secret-- (Isa 45:19). Jehovah foretold Cyrus' advent, not with the studied ambiguity of heathen oracles, but plainly.
from the time, &c.--From the moment that the purpose began to be accomplished in the raising up of Cyrus I was present.
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sent me--The prophet here speaks, claiming attention to his announcement as to Cyrus, on the ground of his mission from God and His Spirit. But he speaks not in his own person so much as in that of Messiah, to whom alone in the fullest sense the words apply (Isa 61:1; Joh 10:36). Plainly, Isa 49:1, which is the continuation of the forty-eighth chapter, from Isa 48:16, where the change of speaker from God (Isa 48:1, Isa 48:12-15) begins, is the language of Messiah. Luk 4:1, Luk 4:14, Luk 4:18, shows that the Spirit combined with the Father in sending the Son: therefore "His Spirit" is nominative to "sent," not accusative, following it.
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Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv16–17 16. This verse is hard to understand from ambiguity.
16. This verse is hard to understand from ambiguity.
Come ye near unto me, hear ye this — It is scarcely to be doubted that the party summoned is Israel, and that the subject to be communicated is, what follows to the latter member of the verse. But who is the speaker? Some hold it to be the prophet in behalf of Jehovah; but most of the commentators think it is Jehovah himself, summoning his nation to hear still further concerning himself. Moreover, from the interactions of personality in the Godhead of Jehovah in trinity, and from the well-settled facts as deduced from the two Testaments, that the transacting divinity, or the Jehovah of the Old Testament, is the Son of God of the New Testament, not a small number of expositors find a satisfying explanation of the verse in supposing the Second Person of the Trinity to be here the speaker. Among these may be named Basil, Augustine, Vitringa, Alexander, Henderson, Stier, Delitzsch, Birks, Nagelsbach, etc.
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I have not spoken in secret — The coincidence of resembling verbiage in texts known to bespoken by or applying to Christ, is taken as evidence of the truth of this theory, as in Christ’s words. Joh_18:20.
From the time that it was, there am I — See Pro_8:27, and Christ’s words, “Before Abraham was, I am:” — “I am hath sent me,” etc: language quite coincident in expression with passages appertaining to facts and features of Christ.
And now — Antithetic to the previous “from the beginning.” From the foundation of the earth (Proverbs viii) I was present through human history, as the Wisdom of God, aiding the plan looking to man’s redemption.
And (or but) now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me — The prophet is the mouthpiece in these antithetic sentences, but for whom does he speak in this? For himself, as not a few hold, or for Christ, or Messiah, yet unincarnated, as the majority of expositors hold? Evidently, from lack of the conditions required, not for the prophet. The conditions are something more than being the recorder of these statements. The prophet elsewhere (Isa_6:8) speaks of and for the three Persons, and most probably here for the Second Person. See, for the same reference, Exo_23:20; Isa_61:1; Mal_3:1; Joh_3:34; Joh_7:16; Joh_17:18; Joh_20:21. From these citations the clause is by most settled as meaning Christ here, and should read, for this meaning: “The Lord God hath sent me, with his Spirit.” Sent me to Israel, with the Spirit’s aid, to enlarge in Israel’s mind (now about to close his exile) the great consolation, and (as Logos, or Word) also the revelation. Christ’s mission here, then, is not the incarnation, but the signal providence of the return from Babylon. By this interpretation the predicates of the Jehovah of the Old Testament are in nowise changed, who is throughout the divine Regent, the divine Wisdom and Revealer. Co-acting with Jehovah the Father, the source of all divine counsels, and with the Spirit who inspires leadership and prophecy, He, Jehovah the Son, administers, disciplines, consoles, and instructs.
Some of the old reformed theologians have stoutly claimed, in this view of the Old Testament tenor and purport, that strong proofs of the doctrine of the Trinity can be made out. It is to be observed, however, that Calvin, the great exegete of the Reformation, was gravely conservative on this passage. He says: “This verse interpreters explain in various ways. Many refer it to Christ, but the prophet designs no such thing. Such forced and violent interpretations are to be avoided.” Barnes also says, with emphasis: “It would require more time, and toil, and ingenuity, to demonstrate that this passage had reference to Messiah, than it would to demonstrate the doctrines of the Trinity and Divinity of the Redeemer from unequivocal declarations of the New Testament.” No doubt this caution is extreme. In pursuance of a proper caution, this much may be admitted: In so far as the prophet speaks and sets in prophecy as the speaker and writer for Jehovah, who, in the New Testament, by various indications and proofs, appears in the incarnated divinity of Jesus Christ, so far only are these words to be regarded in a Messianic point of view. Further, whether the prophet himself apprehended this dogmatic view of the words is far from certain. The action of the Revealer upon the old prophetic minds in their deliverances was doubtless in proportion to their power at the time to apprehend. See Zec_2:7-9.
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The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv16–17 16. I have not spoken in secret] Cf. ch.…
16. I have not spoken in secret] Cf. ch. Isa_45:19.
from the beginning; from the time that it was] The sense is somewhat obscure. The pronoun “it” cannot refer to the world or the creation, which would require to be expressed; the implied antecedent must be the subject of which the prophet is speaking, the purpose of Jehovah against Babylon. The “beginning” will therefore be either the origin of revelation in general, or of the series of prophecies now being fulfilled. The meaning may be paraphrased thus: Jehovah has never from the beginning spoken in dark and uncertain oracles, and He does not conceal Himself now when events are already moving towards the accomplishment of His words; He is there, interpreting as well as guiding the course of history. That Jehovah is the speaker thus far cannot be questioned, in spite of the last clause of the verse. For the phrase “there am I,” comp. Pro_8:27 (in the mouth of the personified Wisdom of God).
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and now the Lord God &c.] Render: and now the Lord Jehovah hath sent me and (i.e. with) His spirit; “His spirit” being not a second subject along with Jehovah, but a second object. For the idea cf. ch. Isa_61:1 and Zec_7:12. The Spirit is never spoken of in the O.T. as the sender of the prophets, or as an independent agent distinct from Jehovah. The isolation of this sentence from its context raises doubts as to its genuineness. The sudden change of speaker disconnects it from what precedes, and it is equally unsuitable as an introduction to Isa_48:17-19, where Jehovah Himself is again introduced by the ordinary prophetic formula. A prelude to ch. 49. (Delitzsch) it cannot possibly be; and it is utterly arbitrary and unnatural to suppose that the words are spoken by the “Servant of Jehovah.” If they are genuine they are undoubtedly words of the prophet, who here calls attention to himself and his mission, in a way which has no parallel in ch. 40–55. Duhm and Cheyne hold that the words are interpolated; the motive for their insertion being a misunderstanding of the first part of the verse. Taking “from the beginning” and “from the time that it was” to refer to the Creation, the editor supplied the contrast (“and now”), which he believed the author to have in his mind.
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Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv16–17 (16) Come ye near unto me.—Here the address would…
(16) Come ye near unto me.—Here the address would seem to be made to Israel. At first Jehovah appears as the speaker, and as using much the same language as before. At the close the prophet appears abruptly, as speaking in his own person. Perhaps, indeed, the prophet is the speaker throughout. A paraphrase will perhaps help to explain the sequence of thought. “I have not from the beginning of my prophetic work spoken in dark, ambiguous speeches like the oracles of the heathen. From the time that the great work began to unfold itself I was present, contemplating it. Now the time of revelation has come. The Lord God hath sent me (this is the Hebrew order); and His Spirit. This gives, it is believed, an adequate explanation. By some interpreters the closing words are referred to the mysterious “Servant of the Lord,” and by others the Spirit is made the object and not the subject of the word “sent.”
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The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv16–17 Vers. 16-22. THE THIRD ADDRESS. Israel is reminded of…
Vers. 16-22. THE THIRD ADDRESS. Israel is reminded of God"s merciful teaching and leading in the past (vers. 16, 17); expostulated with on their disobedience (vers. 18, 19); exhorted to go forth boldly and joyfully from Babylon (vers. 20, 21); and finally warned that God"s blessings even such a blessing as deliverance are no blessings to any but the righteous (ver. 22).
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning. God, "from the beginning," i.e. from his first dealings with Israel, had raised up a succession of prophets, who had declared his will, not "in secret," or ambiguously, but openly and plainly, so that all who heard might understand. (comp. Isa_45:19, and see the comment ad loc.) From the time that it was, there am I; i.e. "from the time that the earth was, there (in the succession of my prophetic messengers) was I" It was I who spake by their mouth, and thus announced my will publicly. And now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me. Dr. Kay supposes that "one Divine Personage is here sent by another the Second Person of the Holy Trinity by the First and by the Third; but it is against the analogy of faith that the Third Person should send the Second. Probably Mr. Cheyne is right in suggesting that "here a fresh speaker is introduced," and also right in his supposition that the fresh speaker is "the prophet himself," who tells us that he is now carrying on the goodly succession which has been "from the beginning," and is sent to deliver his message by God (the Father) and his (Holy) Spirit. On the tendency of Isaiah to "hypostatize" the Spirit of God, see the comment on Isa_40:13; and compare Mr. Cheyne"s note on the same passage ("Prophecies of Isaiah," vol. 1. p. 243).
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The separate personality and Divine authority of the Holy Spirit.
The doctrine of the Holy Trinity, like most of the other great and mysterious doctrines of true religion, was gradually revealed to mankind. In one sense we may call it an exclusively Christian doctrine; but in another we must assign it an antiquity far higher than that of the Christian era. God, in his several revelations to mankind, gradually paved the way for its acceptance. In the revelations which he made to Noah and Abraham, (Gen_9:6, 16 17:7, 8) God announced himself as Elohim a word of plural form. In the revelation which he caused to be put forth by his servant Moses, he distinguished between" God" (Elohim) and "the Spirit of God" (ruakh Elohim) which moved, or brooded, upon the face of the primeval chaos. (Gen_1:2) By David he made it known that there was a God, whose "throne was for ever and ever," whom "God, even his God, would anoint with the oil of gladness above his fellows". (Psa_45:6, Psa_45:7; comp. Heb_1:8, Heb_1:9) To the same great saint he revealed it that his Holy Spirit could be given to man and taken from him. (Psa_51:11) Isaiah, in the present passage, proclaims that he is sent "by the Lord Jehovah" (Adonai Yehovah) and also by "his Spirit." The doctrine of the Trinity in Unity is thus faintly shadowed out, and to a certain extent implied in the books of the Old Testament, though first openly preached and emphatically set forth in those of the New (see a paper by Dr. Paul Kleinert, in the Jahrbuch fur deutsche Theologic for 1867, pp. 3-59).
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The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv16–17 And now the Lord God and His Spirit hath…
Isa_48:16
And now the Lord God and His Spirit hath sent me
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The Holy Spirit
And now the Lord God hath sent Me with His Spirit.
The Spirit does not send, hut is sent. (Prof. A. B. Davidson, D. D.)
Note the tendency in chaps. 40-66, to treat the Divine Spirit as a separate personality (Isa_40:13; Isa_63:10; Isa_36:11; Isa_36:14). (Prof. S. R. Driver, D. D.)
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The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v16 Isa_48:16. Come ye near Me, hear ye this, &c.…
THE UNITY OF THE GODHEAD
Isa_48:16. Come ye near Me, hear ye this, &c. [1483]
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[1483] Some refer this whole verse to Isaiah (Kimchi, Hitzig, Knobel), and many the second clause of it alone (Calv., Zuingl., Musculus, Gesen., Meyer, Hengst., Umbr., Hahn). Others think there is a confusion of style (Jarchi, Rosenm.) But the only consistent view makes the Son of God the Speaker here, as in the last verse (Augustine, Basil, Jerome, Œcolamp., Vitr., Alex., Herd., Stier). The same is true throughout the chapter, though the distinctness of Divine Persons comes into full relief only here at the close. “All things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made that is made” (Joh_1:3).
The voice of love is here the same as in the appeal to Jerusalem in the Gospel, “How often would I have gathered thy children together!” (Mat_23:37). The Word of God “has not spoken in secret from the be-beginning,” but from the hour of creation has been the Revealer of the Father’s will. The limit “from the time it came to be,” is the same as in Pro_8:23; Pro_8:27, “from the beginning, or ever the earth was,” when creation came into being. The construction, “the LORD hath sent me and His Spirit” (Orig., Vitr., Knobel, Gesen., Herd., Alex., Hahn), is disproved by the loss of emphasis, the last clause having thus neither the same subject nor object with the rest of the verse, by the harshness of the construction, and the want of the objective sign. The Word, who speaks, is the mental object of the whole statement, first, as the Divine Revealer, and next, as divinely sent and revealed. The mission here is not the Incarnation, but the signal providence of the Return from Baby lon. So in Zechariah, “After the glory hath He sent me to the nations that spoiled you; for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye, … and ye shall know that the Lord of Hosts hath sent me” (Zec_2:7-9.) This mission of the Word to deliver captive Israel was an earnest of that fuller and later message, when “the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.”—Birh: Coram., pp. 246, 247.
There can be little doubt as to the real character of the personage who utters these words. (Context.) Can it be questioned that the personage who claims such attributes as these claims also to be divine? Yet it is equally clear that although He is divine, there is some sort of distinction to be observed between Him and Jehovah, for He was sent by Jehovah. We have here the mystery of one Divine person sending another. And we are irresistibly reminded of the passages of the New Testament in which our Lord asserts that He cometh forth from the Father, and also that He is furnished and equipped by His Spirit for accomplishing the great work of human redemption. It is clear, then, if we appeal to such statements as those of our text, that we are justified in affirming the fundamental truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ to be imbedded in the teaching of the Old Testament Scripture. This, it may be, is what is meant by the expression, “I have not spoken in secret from the beginning.” Our Lord, during His ministry upon earth, when arguing with certain of the Sadducees, pointed to a saying of Moses, and told them that it implicitly contained the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead (Luk_20:37). It may be, then, that the Messiah meant to indicate, by the expression just quoted, that the doctrine of His true and essential Godhead, although latent in the sacred page, was yet not so much of a secret that it could not have been brought to light by the earnest and diligent search of a God-directed and God-illuminated inquirer. But whether this be so or not, we may be perfectly confident that the doctrine in some form or other is contained in the elder revelation. If it could not be found there, grave doubt would be cast upon it. But there are traces of it to be found—truth, as it were, in embryo, waiting for development—and some of these I shall make it my endeavour to point out. My contention is simply this: that simultaneously with the grand revelation of the unity of the Godhead which was given to Israel, there was revealed in shadowy outline, in hidden rather than in plain and explicit statement, a distinction of persons existing in that Godhead; there was the full stream of doctrine, and side by side with it there was the little rill, but both of them equally proceeding from the throne of God. In the background of the picture, projected before the eyes of the chosen people, stood a second majestic figure, which did not interfere with the main purpose of the scene, but still made itself felt; was seen, though dimly seen; emerged more and more into the light as the ages rolled on, and at last stood out to the view in all the full proportion of its magnificence and its beauty. Abraham was the great founder of Monotheism at a time when the world was overspread by the worship of gods many and lords many; once in all probability a sharer in the general ignorance and superstition, he was brought by God to a knowledge of the truth, and sent forth as a witness to it amongst the nations of the earth. Now, it was obviously of extreme importance to keep such a man’s conception of the Unity of the Godhead distinct and clear, and yet, on a certain occasion, an incident occurred which must have tended in no slight degree to confuse and to bewilder him if his conception of the Unity of the Godhead prohibited his believing in the distinction of persons (Genesis 18.) It is hard to believe, that unless this personage was divine, he would have addressed Him and pleaded with Him as he did. Who was the person here spoken of as “the Lord,” spoken of as “communing with Abraham,” and spoken of as finally departing from him? And no less so when he was upon Mount Moriah (Genesis 22.) “From me!” What a singular confusion there must have been if there be no distinction of persons in the unity of the Godhead, &c. Pass with me now to the story of Jacob (Genesis 32.) Compare with the narrative in Genesis the comment upon it given in Hosea 12. Now, who was this “angel” whom Jacob saw face to face? If he was not divine, I say again, what a frightful mental confusion and perplexity the Monotheist patriarch must have been involved in! Pass on to the time of Moses (Exodus 23.) Very singular language indeed if the angel be only a created angel. But yet, what do we find in chap. 33? We find Moses prostrate on his face before God in an agony of supplication pleading for the restoration of the angel in whom the name of God is. Advance to the book of Joshua (chap. 5.) Who is the speaker? A created angel do you say? Nay, no created angel that was ever created would dare to receive worship. These passages are merely specimens, a few amongst many. In the life of Jacob, of Moses, and of Abraham, especially in that part of it which refers to the Egyptian handmaid, Hagar; in the story of Manoah, at the birth of Samson; in the book of Daniel, where, not Gabriel is the angel of Jehovah, the messenger of the covenant, but the mysterious person “clothed in linen,” &c. In all these and in many similar statements, I might find the corroboration of the view which it has been my desire and endeavour to set before you. In passage after passage of the ancient Scriptures, a personage appears who claims the attributes of Jehovah, who speaks as Jehovah, and directs and commands as Jehovah, who accepts homage and sacrifice as Jehovah, who is, in fact, to use the language of my text, Jehovah sent by Jehovah. Jealously as the Scripture guards the unapproachable majesty of God, is it conceivable that such an intermingling could have been possible if the personage in question had no right or title to be considered divine? Surely not; and I venture, therefore, to consider it satisfactorily established, that together with the great revelation of the Unity of the Godhead came, not as plainly and as explicitly, but quite as truly, not indeed in the development, but in the germ, in shadow, and in outline rather than in solid substance, a revelation of a distinction of persons existing in that unity, a revelation which prepared the way for the great doctrine of the Incarnation of the Eternal Son of God. We are told that we degrade Deity by supposing God to be incarnate. On such a subject I think it is most suitable for such people as we are to keep a reverent silence, for none amongst us is competent to express an opinion as to what is suitable or unsuitable, appropriate or inappropriate, to the Divine essence. But may we not go a step farther, and say that such an objection as this has its root in our human inability to conceive adequately the love of God? (H. E. I. 851, 852, 4809–4815).—Gordon Calthorp, M.A., The Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii. 33–35.
A TREASURY OF GREAT TRUTHS
Isa_48:16-17. Come ye near unto me, &c.
It is God in Christ who here speaks to us (see preceding note by Mr. Birks). A treasury of great truths; we can look only at a few of them.
I. THE GRACIOUS INVITATION GOD GIVES US. “Come ye near unto me.”
In all the means of grace God comes very near to us, and would have us approach Him. He says to us, as Isaac said to Jacob, “Come near to me, my son, that I may bless thee.” He would not have us stand at a distance, but draw nigh; not treat Him as a stranger, but as a personal friend; not be content to be outer-court worshippers, but advance as to a footing of holy personal intimacy (1Jn_1:3; H. E. I. 3427, 3428, 3448, 3449).
God would have us close the ear to the voice of the tempter and the seductions of the world, and open the ear to the whispers of His Word and the pleadings of His Spirit within us. Those who would learn the lessons of heavenly wisdom must approach near to Him, and desire immediate communications from Him. Moses went up into the mount, while the elders stood afar off; we are permitted to imitate Moses, and we should do so. While Martha was troubled about many things, Mary sat at Jesus’ feet.
The tendency of irreligion and worldliness is to separate the soul further and further from God; the tendency of all the influences of the Spirit upon the spiritual mind is to bring us nearer to the God we worship. There should be one continual desire: “Nearer, my God, to Thee,” &c.
II. THE NEEDFUL WORK WHICH GOD ACCOMPLISHES IN HIS PEOPLE.
1. He is their Teacher. “I am the Lord thy God which teacheth thee to profit.” No one can do this effectually but God. None but He has wisdom, patience, or power enough to deal with these hearts of ours which are always prone to depart from Him. The labyrinth of human ignorance has such a maze that none but He can penetrate it.
Divine teaching consists in opening the eyes of the understanding to perceive spiritual objects, and inclining the will to choose and pursue them.
It is most needful. God never acts in vain; unless His children needed His help as their teacher, He would not undertake to help them in this form. The necessity for His teaching arises from our spiritual blindness and native distaste for divine things; through sin all the faculties of the soul are left in the same condition as the body would be without light. Hence certain important Scripture sayings (Psa_119:8; Isa_42:6-7, &c.; H. E. I. 3399, 2877–2882).
2. He is their Guide. “Which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.” He leads them as well as instructs them, and makes dark providences the means of giving them spiritual light; for His Word and His providence are mutual interpreters. How did He teach Job? By philosophical lectures and a large scientific apparatus? No; but by strange and trying providences (H.E.I 99, 100, 133, 134).
III. THE CONDESCENDING RELATIONS HE SUSTAINS TO THEM.
1. He is their Lord—the sovereign of the Church. Let past experience encourage future hope. “This God is our God for ever and ever:” a changeless friend, an endless portion.
2. He is the Redeemer of the Church. He had redeemed the Israelites from Egypt; He was about to redeem them from Babylon. He will finally redeem His people from sin, death, and hell. However much the world overlooks the mystery of redemption, God Himself places the greatest stress upon it. It is that work from which He derives the highest glory, and the Church the noblest comfort. “The Lord thy redeemer” is a title in which He rejoices, and we should too.
3. He is “the Holy One of Israel.” This expresses at once His own perfection and the influence He exerts on His people—not only holy, but also the author of holiness. To produce that in them is the purpose of all His dealings with them (Heb_12:10; Tit_2:14; H. E. I. 2842, 2843).
4. He is thy God. Let this crowning and all-comprehensive fact be kept constantly in mind, prompting us to devout worship and thankful service of Him to whom we owe life, breath, and all things that minister to our present well-being, and enable us to look forward without fear to the eternal future.—Samuel Thodey.
DIVINE NAMES AND DIVINE WORK
Isa_48:17. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer, &c.
These words were spoken in dark and troublous times. They are fraught with instruction and comfort. In them we have—
I. DIVINE NAMES. They convey ideas of overwhelming greatness and glory, mingled with awful mysteriousness, and are worthy our careful consideration.
1. “Lord.” That is, Jehovah, the proper and incommunicable name of the Most High God. Represented in our version by the word LORD, printed in capitals. In the Pentateuch it is God’s personal and covenant name. It is indicative of the attributes of self-existence, eternity, immutability, and perfect independence. How great and glorious is our God! (See outline on Isa_42:8.)
2. “Redeemer”—vindicator or deliverer. Isaiah addresses his countrymen as being actually in a state of captivity.
(1.) Man is in a state of spiritual captivity—the worst sort of captivity. He is in bondage to sin (Joh_8:34). Sin rules and reigns in him. He is a slave to his lusts (2Pe_2:19). To Satan (2Ti_2:16; Eph_2:2). To the law. Not having performed the requirements of that law, he is placed under arrest to it (Gal_4:24-25; Gal_3:10). To death (Heb_2:15; Joh_3:36).
(2.) God, in Christ, is the great deliverer. No other way (Act_4:12; Joh_8:36). The Gospel is glad tidings of salvation to poor, guilty captives ready to perish. Deliverance has been effected through Christ. By a great ransom (1Co_6:20; 1Pe_1:18-19). By conquest. He not merely paid the ransom price, but He destroyed the power of man’s enslavers. See the argument of Christ (Luk_11:21-22; cf. 1Jn_3:8). He rescues sinners from the thraldom of Satan, and gives them the liberty of the sons of God. Multitudes have been delivered, and are now in a state of perfect freedom (Rom_8:1). You may be delivered. Is realised by faith. No other way.
3. “The Holy One of Israel.” This name is often applied to Him in Scripture. “There are other beings in the universe that are in a sense holy—angels and saints are holy, but He is ‘the Holy One.’ His holiness is essential and underived. It is the eternal source and the absolute standard of all holiness in the universe. Other holy beings to Him are only as the dim stars of night to the unclouded sun of day. He is the immaculate fountain of all holiness, the Father of lights whence every ray of purity in the universe proceeds.” His holiness is incomparable (Exo_15:11; 1Sa_2:2; Isa_40:25; Rev_15:4). His holiness is manifested in His words and His works, especially the work of human redemption. Is pledged for the fulfilment of His promises (Psa_89:35). Should produce reverential fear (Exo_15:11; 1Sa_6:20; Psa_5:7; Rev_15:4).
II. DIVINE WORK.
1. Teaching.
(1.) The need of a divine teacher, for we are ignorant as to spiritual knowledge (Eph_4:18). Naturally our understanding is so darkened that we see no beauty in Christ that we should desire Him (1Co_2:14).
(2.) We have a divine teacher. God, by His Spirit (Luk_12:12; Joh_14:26; 1Co_2:13; 1Jn_2:20; 1Jn_2:27). By His incarnate Son. “God’s great lesson-book is the cross of Christ. All truth is condensed there. Everything you have to learn, or to do, or enjoy, is written upon that page. It is the babe’s alphabet, and it is the philosopher’s compendium. There are the glories which are to be expanded throughout eternity. God holds the clue to that divine labyrinth of awful, blessed mystery. Only the Holy Spirit can unlock those spiritual passages.”—J. Vaughan.
2. Leading or guiding. “I am thy conductor and guide.”
(1.) We need a divine guide. “We are pilgrims to eternity. We are in the labyrinth of error and sin. Life is like a heath with paths stretching in various directions. Many appear pleasant and safe that lead astray. We are often bewildered, and often choose wrongly.”
(2.) We have a divine guide. God Himself engages to be our guide. He is the only infallible guide—infinitely wise, powerful, good, gracious. He guides His people by His Word. Its precepts instruct; its revelations enlighten; its examples encourage and warn us. By His Spirit, acting directly upon our spirit (Isa_30:21). By His providence, pointing out the way by the indications of circumstances and current events. By the example of Christ. By the counsel of His servants (Psa_77:20). The wise and good are here to direct us.
(3.) God guides His people in the way they should go, not in the way they would go—that is man’s interpretation. There is a way in which we should walk—a divine way, clear to those who will see it. God’s way is not always our way, but it is always the right, the best, the safest, and the happiest way. This assurance should always cheer and comfort us.
Unconverted sinner! you must move forward—you must “go,” it is the law of your being. But how will you “go”? with God, or without Him? You are free to choose which you will do. Take God as your guide, the wisest, the best of all leaders. To refuse divine leadership is to grope in darkness, and ultimately to perish.—Alfred Tucker.
GOD OUR TEACHER AND LEADER
Isa_48:17. I am the Lord thy God, who teacheth thee to profit, &c.
How beautiful and impressive are the “I am’s” of God! Only from God has the declaration “I am” its full meaning. But God does not isolate Himself. What He is, He is for His people.
We must go out of ourselves to get real blessing for ourselves; and to whom shall we go? The heart must have a Person to love, to lean on, to live for. No doctrine, no idea, no creed can take the place of the Person—“I am the Lord thy God.” The apostle of love seems to have taken special heed of the self-revelations of Christ; for in his pages we meet with some of the glorious “I am’s” of Christ (Joh_8:12; Joh_6:35; Joh_14:6; Joh_10:7; Joh_15:1; Joh_8:58; Joh_11:25). In the text God is revealed as our Teacher and Leader; and “Learn of Me,” and “Follow Me,” are two most important commands of Jesus Christ.
I. There is an important relation between these two offices of our Divine Master. Not every teacher is a leader, not every leader a true teacher. Theory and practice are often divorced; words and works are not always wedded. But Christ is like a general who trains his soldiers in the barracks and leads them on the field, or like a traveller who braves the dangers and endures the toils of opening up a country, and then describes its beauties, dilates upon its capacities, and adds to the common fund of scientific knowledge. Does Jesus teach us to “pray and not to faint?” He also leads (Mar_1:35; Luk_6:12); does He teach us to glorify God by our “good works?” He “went about doing good.” Does He teach us to love our enemies, and pray for those who despitefully use us? How grandly are we led by His dying prayer, “Father, forgive them!” Are we to “seek first the kingdom of God,” according to His teaching? It was His meat and drink to do His Father’s will. He truly “teaches us to profit, and leads us by the way we should go.” These are the two great forces which aid in the formation of Christian character, and the development of Christian life (H.E.I. 894–899).
The teaching of our Master is sometimes out of the book of affliction and sorrow. We have been drawn away from Him by much resting in creature strength; He is jealous for our sakes; so He teaches us our folly, and weakness, and sin; and then leads us into His wisdom, and strength, and holiness. Perhaps His lesson comes out of the book of poverty and distress. He strips us, that we may be clothed with change of raiment. In multitudes of ways does our Lord teach His people, but ever to the end that He may lead them in the way in which they should go. All the way along He is Teacher and Leader, and we love to have it so. The thought of His instruction encourages us, while His leadership emboldens us.
II. Contemplate the words “who leadeth thee.” Read them in the light of Scripture thoughts and incidents. How they remind us of God leading His people from the thraldom of Egypt (Exo_13:21). In Moses’ song there is a beautiful figure to help us in understanding our Lord’s leading (Deu_32:11-12). Passing on, we come to the poem of the shepherd-king (Psalms 23) And then we find David’s putting into the lips of wisdom the words, “I lead in the way of righteousness.” Take another example; now from Isaiah (Isa_42:16). How soothing the words of Jeremiah! (Isa_31:9).
III. What spirit shall we manifest in view of this truth? “Suffer thyself, O Christian, to be led! Presume not at any time either to linger or to precede. Follow thy Shepherd patiently, gladly, and constantly. Keep close to His footsteps. Go unhesitatingly through this dry and thirsty land of sorrows, trials, and disappointments. Let no hurry of business delay, no burden of care prevent thee. Let not the sorrows of thy heart prove too overwhelming to deter, no joys of this life too captivating to detain thee from thy God” (Stephenson on Psalms 23)
“When we cannot see our way,
Let us trust and still obey;
He who bids us forward go
Cannot fail the way to show.”
CONCLUSION.—Let us take our place by the psalmist, and with him in a spirit of humility, resignation, trustfulness, and hope, put up these petitions (Psa_5:8; Psa_26:5; Psa_27:11; Psa_31:3; Psa_61:2; Psa_139:24; Psa_143:10). Thus shall we on earth have a true foretaste of the blessedness of that sinless place, where “the Lamb, who is in the midst of the throne, shall lead them, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.”—Walter J. Mayers: Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii. pp. 228–230.
THE BENEFIT OF AFFLICTIONS
Isa_48:17. I am the Lord thy God, which teacheth thee to profit.
God can make all the objects by which men are surrounded, and all the scenes through which they are called to pass, produce just such effects in their minds as He sees best. He can blast prosperity, and bless adversity. He can make afflictions instructive and beneficial. It was while His people were in a state of adversity, and despairing of relief, that He undertook to comfort them, by reminding them of His power over them, His relation to them, and His tender regard for their spiritual good (Isa_48:12-13; Isa_48:16-17). We find no intimation here that God would put an end to the afflictions of His people, but only that He was able to sanctify them, or cause them to have a salutary and desirable effect.
I. Afflictions may be profitable to the children of God. They are not in themselves joyous, but grievous; it is natural to dread them; even our Saviour recoiled from the prospect of His approaching sufferings; nevertheless they may eventually prove very beneficial:—
1. By turning off their attention from the world. Living in the world, and compelled in some measure to its concerns, they are prone to “mind earthly things” too exclusively; but afflictions have a direct tendency to turn away their eyes from beholding vanity, and to prepare them to attend to things of everlasting consequence.
2. By turning off their affections from the world. Many of its objects have an immense fascination for the human heart, and we are always in danger of giving them that place in our hearts which is due to God alone. But in the time of affliction men learn that in the world there is nothing to soothe and comfort them. When they find how little it can do for them, how apt it is to deceive them, and rob them of superior happiness, they learn to hate rather than to love it.
3. By raising their affections to God, the source of all good. By taking away every other ground of dependence and consolation, they may be said to drive them to the Fountain of all good. Thus they operate even upon the ungodly (Psa_107:17-19). Much more is this likely to be their effect upon the righteous.
II. GOD is able to make afflictions profitable to His children. Afflictions do not necessarily sanctify; they make some men worse, and not better (2Ch_28:22; Rev_9:20; Rev_16:9; Revelation 21; H. E. I. 229–233); but God is able to teach each of His children how to turn them into sources of blessing:—
1. He is able to bring Himself into their view. As when the sun rises men cannot see the stars, so when God presents Himself before the minds of His people, they cannot see anything else. Or rather, they see Him in all things—in the providences and afflictions which have befallen them. But barely bringing Himself into their view, and turning off their attention from all created objects, will not afford relief; because men may behold God and be troubled (Exo_14:24). It is therefore necessary to observe—
2. That He can draw their affections as well as their attention towards Himself. When He brings Himself into view of the afflicted, He can awaken every holy affection in their hearts, and give them a sensible enjoyment of Himself, which is far better than the enjoyment of sons, or of daughters, or of any earthly good (H. E. I. 116–142, 204–221).
III. These facts are fountains of consolation for God’s afflicted children. What a deep and exhaustless well of comfort is this, that God bears a covenant relation to them, and has engaged to treat them as children! All His dispensations towards them are the genuine expressions of His fatherly care and kindness (Heb_12:6; Job_5:17-19; Job_5:27; 2Co_4:17). It is not necessary that they should know that their afflictions shall be removed or diminished; they may exercise faith, confidence, submission, patience, and even joy, while they know that the Lord is their God, and will certainly teach them to profit by those things which would otherwise sink them in sorrow and despair.
APPLICATION:—
1. Since God makes use of afflictions to keep His children near Him, it is clear that they are extremely prone to forsake Him. He does not grieve nor afflict them willingly, but only because they will not regard His milder means of instruction. It is a certain sign that a child is very undutiful and disobedient, if nothing but repeated and severe corrections will restrain or reclaim him. We should humble ourselves before God because of our waywardness.
2. Seeing that God chastises His children for their good, and teaches them to profit under His correcting hand, those who are suffered to live on in uninterrupted prosperity have reason to inquire whether they belong to the household of faith. Prosperity is a thing to thank God for; but it is as frequently granted to the evil as to the good; and those who have been long in the enjoyment of it have good cause seriously to inquire whether their hearts are right with God, and whether He has not been granting their requests for outward prosperity and sending leanness into their souls.
3. Since God afflicts His children only for their good, they have the best of all reasons for being submissive and cheerful in seasons of sorrow.
4. Since God afflicts His children only for their good, the severer the sufferings through which they are called to pass, the greater is the profit they may expect to derive from them in the end. The oftener He puts them into the furnace of affliction, and the longer He continues them there, the brighter He means to bring them out.
5. Since God teaches His children to profit by their afflictions, afflictions afford us a means of determining whether we belong to His family or not.
6. Since God can make afflictions profitable to His children, we may justly conclude that He can make them profitable to others also. Though sinners hate instruction and despise reproof, yet they are not beyond the reach of divine power and divine grace. God has often used affliction as an instrument for the conversion of sinners (2Ch_33:12).—Dr. Emmons: Works, vol. iii. pp. 52–66.
THE PROFIT OF LIFE
(A New Year Motto).
Isa_48:17. I am the Lord thy God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.
Inscribe these words on the banner that waves over our heads as we march through the year, that they may be always in sight, ready for use in all the varying turns of our experience. They are stored with rich promise, wise direction, sustaining comfort. This is a voice from heaven to explain God’s dealings with us, to elevate our aims and to encourage our trust.
I. The end which God has in view in the guidance of our lives, “profit.” This is His aim, and He would have us make it ours. “Profit” in heaven’s vocabulary has not the meaning it bears on earth. The profit which the world pursues is material, but this is spiritual. That is often lost, and must be left behind at death; this endures unto life eternal, and is the only real profit, for it is a part of our very selves. The solemn utterance of Christ on this matter runs (Mar_8:36-37)—a statement which is reversed by those who mind earthly things. Not what you will get, but what you will become should engage your attention. Your greatest wealth lies in yourselves, in your being renewed and sanctified. All other profit is of no value in comparison. Every advantage, talent, opportunity, which is not minted into this coin is wasted. Is this, then, the lofty purpose which you are throwing into your life? How few inquire—What will tell upon my spiritual interests? how many—How can I add to my worldly gains, and make a comfortable livelihood? I do not say you should never ask such a question, but only that it should have a subordinate place. Lot had an eye to worldly gain in selecting the plain of Sodom for his residence. The religious disadvantages and dangers of the step did not enter into his calculations. He first “pitched his tent toward Sodom,” and then thought it would be a fine thing for his family to be settled in the city, where he would be held in consideration as a man of growing wealth. But spiritual profit—growing sympathy with what is pure and beneficent, closer resemblance to Christ—is the loftiest aim in life, and all our plans should be formed with a view to its acquisition. If this profit be wanting as the years roll by, life is a losing concern, leading to spiritual bankruptcy.
II. God engages to teach us how to extract profit from life. Everything may yield us profit, if we learn the happy art of taking the profit out of it. A naturalist has said that “the seeing eye is never in want of its proper aliment;” and the Christian soul never lacks the means of spiritual profit. The bee may find it delightful to roam far and wide through the long summer day, looking into the flowers and breathing their fragrance; but he is an idle drone if he bring home no profit for the hive. One man has neither the will nor the power to extract the honey from life’s experience, while another finds profit in all that meets him. Two persons take a tour through an interesting country. One sees but little, and carelessly hurries past the grandest scenes and through the finest cities. The other comes home with large additions to his information, and with scenes impressed on his mind which he can recall long after with delight. Let me specify some of the departments of our life, and show how real profit may be derived from them. Take our daily Bible-readings and our visits to God’s house. These are occasions of richest profit, but many miss it. Not to speak of those who lay aside the Bible for books that have a stronger interest for them, and rarely, if at all, frequent the sanctuary, to others these privileges come as a matter of course. No wonder there is small profit when none is expected. Believing prayer makes the Lord’s day a day of blessing, and extracts profit from the poorest sermon. By the sorrows and difficulties of the week God sometimes sends us to His house with quickened appetite.—Our joys and sorrows may be made springs of profit. This is the very purpose of the Divine chastenings (Heb_12:10).—Our intercourse with others may furnish contributions to our spiritual wealth. Our closest friends should be the friends of Jesus, and from such companions we may get much profit by the interchange of thought and the influence of example; and even those who are otherwise minded may teach us to be gentle to the erring.—Our very temptations, if met with a firm resistance, will bring us a return of strength.—Our daily work may be made to yield us a better renumeration than mere wages, if we accept it as our God-appointed task.—In all these departments, if we take God for our teacher, life, with its changing scenes, will become a school of precious instruction, and a mine of solid wealth.
III. God engages to lead us by the way in which profit may be found. By “the way that thou shouldest go” we are to understand the experiences through which God sees it needful to lead us. “God has His plan for every man.” Each requires a special discipline. Since God has taught His children the happy secret of profiting from the experiences of life, they may be sure that the experiences will be such as to yield the profit which they most need, as the bee’s faculty and instinct do not lack flowers. This assurance ought to nerve us alike for life’s trials and life’s work. It should silence every murmur. All envying of the lot of others, all impatience with our own, will vanish when we feel that we are where God placed us. Even in the severest afflictions this thought will stay the soul. It is part of God’s plan to send trials upon us; they stand in His programme of our lives. Were any of them withheld we should lose their intended profit. Our very work has been pre-arranged (Eph_2:10). We are disposed to think that if our talents were better, our opportunities more favourable, we would serve God to greater purpose; but these are precisely what God sees we can use. Be it ours to inquire at every step, What good may I get here? what profit may I acquire? Would it not bring a truly happy year to import these principles into your life? Do they not furnish a sufficient answer to the question that has recently been discussed—“Is life worth living?” If you live while you live, if you have been taught of God to extract profit from life’s experience, certainly life is well worth living. The ship constructed at great expense does not lie anchored in some quiet bay. The owners expect a return, and send her across the seas to trade in the ports of many lands. Their end is profit, and every day their vessel is laid up is a serious loss. So it is with our lives. If there is no real profit, there must be a sad, a fatal deficit.—W. Guthrie, M.A.
SPIRITUAL PROSPERITY SECURED BY OBEDIENCE ONLY
Isa_48:17-19. Thus saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, &c.
Whatever may be the reason, in the Church there are frequently mournful complaints of the want of prosperity, both general and individual. Viewing the case only under one aspect, this might appear strange. For is not God with His people? &c. Whence, then, these complaints? Their true cause is in man, not in God. The terms here employed show us, that though the complaint is in accordance with fact, the fact might and ought to have been avoided. The real cause is found in negligence and disobedience of man. God’s complaint implies censure; and teaches us that the limitation of the blessing which was promised in the most abundant fulness, is a reproving judgment, calling us to “consider our ways,” and by renewed obedience and carefulness to remedy the evils which we ourselves have occasioned. Observe the remarkable manner in which it pleases God to address His people. It is not said, generally and alone, “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” He speaks as sustaining certain characters, performing certain works. And in examining the terms employed in this divine record, we shall find that they include and suggest the reasons why the required obedience should be rendered. We have thus—
I. THE FUNDAMENTAL CHARACTER WHICH GOD SUSTAINS IN RELATION TO HIS PEOPLE, AND AS SUSTAINING WHICH HE REQUIRES THEIR OBEDIENCE.
1. “The Holy One of Israel.” Redemption chiefly implies mercy, but by no means exclusively. It is set before us in the New Testament, with the strongest emphasis, as that exhibition and proof of love which, for its vastness and grandeur, claims to be regarded as the highest of all. But men are apt to take false views of love. These false views generally tend to very dangerous issues. With men, love is often an indulgent fondness, seldom rising above the limits of natural instinct, and possessing in its character nothing distinctively moral.
2. “Thus saith the Lord.” This is the basis of the whole (Exo_3:14). He is essential being, independent, perfect, eternal. Whatever exists, exists by Him and for Him; every faculty, by Him given, should be for Him employed. No creature possesses the excellence for which we are commanded to love, worship, and serve Him. As far as possible, there must be a difference as complete and manifest between the service we render to any creature, and that which we render to God, as there is between the creature itself and God.
3. “Thy Redeemer.” Thus has He made Himself known to us. Thus will He be acknowledged, worshipped, and served by us. True, He is our Creator, our Preserver, our Sovereign; none of these truths are set aside by the evangelical revelation; still it is our duty to remember that the chief of His royal styles and titles, is that of Redeemer. It is as our Redeemer that we are to behold His glory, study His character, acknowledge, love, worship, and serve Him. In Himself, our true and highest good, He only becomes so to us when we approach Him as our Redeemer; acknowledging all the wickedness and weakness in us which that term implies.
But there is one character which the Scriptures teach us God always must sustain,—that of the most exalted moral excellence. We must never forget that He is “the Holy One of Israel” (H. E. I. 2316, 2317). This, then, is the character in which God addresses to us the commandments to which He requires us to hearken.
II. A PARTICULAR PROCEEDING IN WHICH IT PLEASES GOD, AS SUSTAINING THIS CHARACTER, TO REPRESENT HIMSELF AS ENGAGING. “I am the Lord thy God which teacheth,” &c.
1. God teaches us. Advert to the principal methods which He is pleased to employ. But in whatever way the instruction is communicated, the object of it is always the same—our benefit and advantage.
2. God is also our Guide. “Which leadeth,” &c. Distinctly asserted in the Word of God. The wisdom of ancient philosophy could never realise the doctrine of a particular providence. To the wisdom of the world it is still a stumbling-block. Observe the character of the guidance: “In the way that thou shouldest go.” That we may perceive what that way is, let us remember what man is, and for what he is destined. There is nothing merely casual. Everything is wisely appointed or wisely permitted. And thus, putting together all these representations, is a foundation, broad and stable, laid for that enlightened, that deliberately chosen obedience which He requires.
III. THE OBEDIENCE WHICH HE CONSEQUENTLY REQUIRES FROM US.
1. God teaches us for our profit; it is therefore our duty to be learners, and that from first to last.
2. God leads us, &c.; it is therefore our duty to follow His guidance. But how? No pillar of cloud and fire goes before us, marking the way to sense. We walk by faith. What are the indications which faith must follow?
(1.) His revealed will. He never leads in opposition to that.
(2.) The specific duties indicated by every particular providence must be fulfilled. Let there be unhesitating submission, unreserved devotion. The old Vulgate employs a word that may suggest an illustration. Gubernans te in viâ. A vessel sails from harbour destined to a certain port. To guide her safely is the task of the pilot, the Gubernator. In modern times, when navigation is so well understood, such a person is usually only employed where the navigation is difficult, from dangers known to himself, but unknown to the crew—perhaps close by the port where the voyage terminates.
3. God condescends to speak to us! it is therefore our duty continually and reverently to hearken. “O that thou hadst,” &c. It is not said, “O that thou hadst obeyed!” but, “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” Of course, obedience is implied, but the word actually used teaches us the real character of the obedience. The master issues his orders. The servant stands by attentively. He hearkens to them, perceives his duty, and goes to perform it. And thus must it be with us.
(1.) We must hearken to His commandments in their evangelical order;
(2.) universally;
(3.) attentively, thoughtfully, so as to make their very meaning our own;
(4.) exclusively. Other voices will sound in our ears. To none must a moment’s heed be given;
(5.) supremely and constantly.
IV. THE RESULT OF THAT OBEDIENCE.
Great shall be the prosperity you shall thus certainly secure. “Your peace,” &c. The imagery is as instructive as it is beautiful. (See other outlines on this text.)
APPLICATION.—Assume the existence of religion in some degree. Seek to realise it in all its blessed fulness as here set forth. Wherever personal religion revives, zeal for the spread of religion revives also. Then efforts to do good will be better sustained, and the prospering blessing of God will be more richly given. The consequence will be numerical increase. (Note Delitzsch’s translation of Isa_48:19.) Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine, 1849, pp. 913–934.
THE LOST IDEAL
Isa_48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! &c.
Exile and home-coming, captivity and deliverance, judgment and mercy, these are the things of this chapter. In the immediate context there is an expression of the deepest regret on God’s part that it had been necessary to bring on His people heavy judgments; while the text is a tender wish and longing that they had chosen the better way. Three thoughts are suggested for our instruction—
I. THE LOST IDEAL.
What might have been, and ought to have been. There had been an unattained national, and, therefore, individual possibility, which was now unattainable, at least to the extent that things could never be exactly as if they had attained it. So, too, there is to each man an ideal life as a matter of abstract possibility, not abstractly imaginable, but real and true as the life of God. The ideal life is the life. But what is it? There is a natural outline in every man’s life. Sin depraves, but it does not obliterate the organic powers and the natural peculiarities and tendencies of the individual. There is an outline of what might have been left in each man. There are diversities; but the question is about each man’s own ideal. What is it each of us has missed all these years—getting a glimpse of it now and again? This lost self is the self that must be found, else happiness cannot be found. It is descried in some of our best states, in elevated moods, or in quietness; and also in working earnestly towards some good practical object; or when, weary with all this world’s wilfulness and folly, we can, notwithstanding, leave it all with Him who made and can rule the world: in these, and like exercises or states of mind, we can get some glimpses of the wonderful picture that stands clearly out in the Divine ideal, and from which it will never fade away.
II. THE DIVINE LAMENTATION OVER IT.
God continues to have a Divine preference concerning human life. What depths of love and compassion are in the words, “O that thou hadst hearkened,” &c. Certain images are chosen because they are known to all the world: “Peace like a river; righteousness like the waves of the sea.” According to the Divine idea, a man’s life should be deep, and wide, and clear, and voluminous, and refreshing, and fertilising, and progressive—like a river; and, like the waves of the sea, possessed of a righteousness that cannot be measured, and that can never end. God has not forgotten the ideal, which is ever-present to Him; and at sight of the actual, so unlike these grand images, Jehovah laments. Natural goodness, without the special help and grace of God, is, at best, a sorry sight to Him.
III. THE DIVINE PROPOSAL FOR RESTORATION.
Can the Divine lamentation be turned into Divine song and rejoicing? Are there any who are rising up from their fall? We know the answers to such questions, and how they touch the very core and substance of the Gospel (Eph_2:10; 2Co_5:17; Php_2:13). We are God’s husbandmen; we are God’s building (Isa_48:20). In the text God stands as with uplifted hands, pathetically lamenting over a great loss, a great disappointment, a great ruin; the might have been has not been realised. But what means the next word in the next verse, “Go ye forth of Babylon?” &c.; God will continue His work, He will restore the ruins of it, and carry it on to ultimate success. “Go ye forth of Babylon;” that means when interpreted, just begin where you are, do the nearest thing, forsake the sin that is strongest, rectify the wrong that is nearest, take the path that is open, make room in your heart for all that God will give you, and especially for the renewing Spirit. And in all this, look unto Jesus, and press towards Him as you look, and you are a new creature in Him; the ruin is restored, Eden blooms again, the dead is alive, the long-lost self is found.
“Have we not all, amid life’s petty strife,
Some ideal of a noble life,
That once seemed possible? Did we not hear
The flutter of its wings, and feel it near?
And just within our reach it was; and yet
We lost it in this daily jar and fret;
And now live idly, in a vain regret.
But still our place is kept, and it will wait
Ready for us to fill it, soon or late.
No star is ever lost we once have seen;
We always may be what we might have been.”
—Alexander Raleigh, D.D.: Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiv. pp. 269–371.
These words would be sad from the lips of man, but coming from God they are inexpressibly touching and solemn. They are the cry of a wounded heart. They tell not of the wrath of justice, but of the sorrows of love. There is, indeed, mystery, as there must be whenever we have to do with the Infinite, but that very mystery makes the lament the more affecting and impressive. In this pathetic verse there is a threefold lament:—
I. A LAMENT OVER LOST HOPES. Once there was hope and fair promise. God’s beautiful ideal might be realised. But that is all gone. God only knows what has been lost. He is, so to speak, alone with His sorrow. Think of Aaron’s grief for his sons (Lev_10:3); of David’s lament for Absalom (2Sa_18:33); of the tears of Jesus over Jerusalem (Luk_19:41). In these we may see reflected the sorrows of disappointed love. How dreadful must be the cause that produces such effects (Psa_81:13-16; Jer_44:4)—
“Of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these, It might have been.”
II. A LAMENT OVER NEGLECTED OPPORTUNITIES. God is speaking here in the character of “the Redeemer—the Holy One of Israel.” He recalls what He had done, and what might and ought to have been the happy results. But the precious opportunities had been abused.
1. Gracious instruction, “I am the Lord which teacheth thee to profit.”
2. Infallible guidance, “Which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.”
3. Holy blessedness, “Then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.” How beautiful are these emblems! Deep and tranquil as the Euphrates, the noblest of the rivers of Asia, is the peace of the believer. Noble and majestic as the waves of the great sea, ever moving in harmony with law, and ever manifesting new forms of loveliness, is the righteousness of God’s saints. All this, and more, might have been realised, if only God’s commandments had been regarded. But the time is past. The glorious vision has faded away for ever. Neglected opportunities bring sure and terrible retribution. O man, consider thou hast been God’s enemy. He has made thee gracious offers of peace. He has called thee to place thyself under the leadership of His Son, when all shall be well. And what has been the result? Reconciliation a failure. “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?” (Heb_2:3; cf. 2Ch_36:15-17.)
III. A LAMENT OVER NEEDLESS RUIN. Sometimes evil comes in spite of us. It is a calamity, and not a crime. Borne aright, it turns to good. We see in it the chastisement of a loving Father, and learn to be content. But, alas! rarely can we hold ourselves blameless. If we suffer, it is because we have sinned. If we perish, it is our own fault. Reason, conscience, and the Holy Scriptures combine in testifying that man’s ruin is not of chance or fate, far less of God, but exclusively of himself. The sinner feels, and must feel for ever, that if he had only hearkened to God’s commandments, ruin would have been impossible. God’s commandments in the law are all good. To keep them is life and blessedness. But we have sinned. Righteousness by the law is no more possible. God’s commands in the Gospel are also good (1Ti_1:15; Joh_6:29; Joh_3:16). When we consider who and what. Jesus is, and how great things He has done for us, is it not the most reasonable thing in the world that we should love and trust Him? If we have not eyes to see His beauty, we are blind. If we have not the heart to commit ourselves to Him and to choose His service, as the most free and rightful and blessed of all services, it must be because we wilfully prefer evil to good, and the pleasures of sin for a season, to the love of God for ever (cf. Isa_5:1-7; Eze_33:11; Pro_1:24-33; Mat_23:37).—W. Forsyth.
When God smites men on account of sin, it gives Him no pleasure. The voice which speaks here is not that of the seraphic prophet, but the voice of the Lord God of the prophets. The manner is not merely the majestic formula, “Thus saith Jehovah,” but it is supplemented with words intended to remind us of His graciousness and His goodwill (Isa_48:17). Nor is this the only lesson which lies on the surface of the text. Observe, the Lord addresses words of poignant regret over the prize the sinner has lost, as well as the penalty he has incurred. So did Jesus Christ look upon Jerusalem. Musing on the desolation to which she should shortly come, He reflected on the preservation in which she might have safely stood, &c. God looks upon the “peace” you might enjoy, and the “righteousness” that would enrich you, did you hearken to His commandments, and obey His great mandate, “Believe, and live.” Sinner! the infinite heart of my Divine Master yearns over you.
What loss is that which God bewails on thy account? “Peace like a river,” and “righteousness like the waves of the sea,” are not within the limits of thy comprehension. There is a privation which you unconsciously suffer.
1. You are a stranger to peace. “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.” There are two kinds of peace into the secret satisfaction of which no unconverted person can enter—peace with God, and peace in the heart. Yet both of these are the inalienable right of the believer; for the peace which our Lord Jesus Christ made by the blood of His cross has sealed his acceptance with the Father; and the peace which is produced in his conscience as the fruit of the Spirit, calms the troubled passions of his breast. This is a peace which no man can attain unto except the man who hearkens to the commandment, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.” But if you hearken to it, you shall have peace, and that peace shall be like a river. The metaphor is full of beauty, and not wanting in instructiveness either, by which peace is compared to a river. What does this mean? Several things. Peace like a river, for
(1.) continuance. For ever, throughout all generations, the river speedeth to its destined place. Such is the peace of the Christian. He is always at peace.
(2.) Freshness. The peace which a Christian has is always fresh, always receiving fresh supplies.
(3.) A river increases in breadth, and its waters augment their volume. Such is the Christian’s peace. It will go on increasing till it melts into the infinite peace of the beatific vision, where
“Not a wave of trouble rolls
Across the peaceful breast.”
(4.) Its joyful independence of man. Habakkuk’s song: “Although the fig-tree,” &c. The devil cannot rob us of the peace which comes from God, neither can the world take it away. What would some of you give to have such a peace as this? Such peace you shall have if you hearken to God’s commands.
2. Thou hast not the righteousness which is “as the waves of the sea!” Notice how this metaphor surpasses the previous one in dignity, if not in delicacy. We can all see a sort of comparison, and yet at the same time a strong contrast, between the water of an inland river and the collection of waters which make up the wide expanse of the sea. One, for the most part, is tranquil, the other always heaving and surging to and fro. So I suppose, as the words were originally addressed to the Jewish nation, and referred to their temporal welfare, the river would represent the beauty and happiness of their own land, like the garden of Eden, watered by the river of God’s pleasure; and the sea, with its waves rolling in majestically one after another in unbroken succession, would set forth that progress which is the renown of righteousness. Generation after generation would witness the rising tide of prosperity. Oh! what did that rebellious seed of Jacob lose by forsaking the Lord! Apply this metaphor of the waves of the sea, like that of the flowing of the river, to the happiness of the believer. Look at this precious doctrine of the Gospel through the glass of that Old Testament symbol. The man who believes in Jesus Christ has the righteousness of Christ imputed to him, that is to say, the obedience of Christ is considered by God as his obedience. So, if I believe in Christ, I am as much beloved and as much accepted as if I had been perfect in a rectitude of my own; for the righteousness of Christ becomes mine. But how is this righteousness like the waves of the sea? It is like the waves of the sea
(1.), for multitude.
(2.) For majesty. What an illustration of overwhelming power! Who can withstand the power of Christ’s righteousness? “Who shall lay anything to God’s elect?” &c. Then it is majestic because it is profound, and because of its ceaseless energy.
(3.) For sufficiency.
(4.) For origin. That some of you have not got this righteousness is owing to this, that you have not hearkened to God. When the Gospel has been preached, have you listened attentively? &c. I know how some of you hear; it is always with procrastination. Even now, hear ye the voice of the Lord!—C. H. Spurgeon: Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 609–610.
DISREGARD OF GOD’S COMMANDMENTS
Isa_48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments, &c.
There are moments of reflection on the past. What would have been the history of this island, if Cæsar had not invaded it? if the Stuart kings had been inspired by different ideas? if the first Napoleon had not arisen? Similarly, we reflect on our own life. What would have been our career, if we had not, at some time, made such a mistake, or committed such a fault?—Thus also we think of some one whom we have known. With his talents and opportunities, what he might have become, if he had not spoiled everything by his folly or misconduct! Many a father laments over the son who has thrown away all his chances.
Thus God lamented over Israel. He had dealt with them as with sons; had bestowed upon them counsel and culture; but they had followed their own devices. And the consequences had overtaken them in diminished resources, a weakened empire, and eventual subjection to a foreign yoke. Had they hearkened to His commandments their state would have been different (Isa_48:18-19).
There are multitudes over whom He is pouring this lamentation to-day. He has not left them without instruction and direction. He has given them His word, His commandments, His Gospel. He has surrounded them with gracious influences. But they have been regardless of Him and of His efforts to save them. They have indulged their natural disposition to sin. Confident of themselves, and heedless of warning, like children ignorant of themselves and of the world, they have fallen over the rocks into moral ruin.
There may be some here over whom He thus laments. As you look back on your “wasted lives,” your “sins indulged while conscience slept, your vows and promises unkept,” you see that He has good reasons to do so. We invite you to consider what might have been, if you had hearkened to the calls of the Gospel and formed your life according to the Word of God; what it might have been in contrast with what it is—
I. IN RELATION YOUR CHARACTER.
Disregard of God’s commandments has led to many sins which need not have stained your life. One by one they have grown beyond all power of computation, as when debts grow until the position is irretrievable. After all allowances for the weaknesses of human nature, and the sins which would have been committed in spite of your endeavours, how many of them could have been prevented if you had hearkened to God’s commandments!—Moreover, these sins and the habit of mind which led to them have exerted a deteriorating influence on your character. Every wilful sin weakens the power of conscience and lowers the moral tone, so that the more sins a man commits the more likely is it that he will commit sin. It is a gradual descent towards the lowest point of moral being (H. E. I. 1527, 1528, 4500, 4501). Multitudes have become so degraded in conscience that they are living lives, the future of which, if shown to them some years ago, would have shocked them and called forth the indignant protest of Hazael, “Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?” Contrast this with what might have been. The habit of obedience, associated with love to the commander and approbation of the command, exerts a gradually formative influence on the character. Good principles become more firmly rooted, the conscience is trained to a quicker perception of moral differences, the inclinations are more completely engaged on the side of goodness, the holy life becomes natural, the entire moral tone is elevated. Like a tree which was at first only a slip, but has grown (Psa_92:12-14).
II. IN RELATION TO YOUR HAPPINESS.
All seek for happiness. Have you really found it in disregard of God’s commands? Has not sin often involved you in trouble? Has it not left the stinging conscience? Are you not often conscious of dissatisfaction and disappointment with the world?—It might have been so different! You might have been enjoying “the peace of God.” The troubles of life might have been to you channels of superior consolation. The blessedness of a conscience at rest through the pardoning and renewing grace might have been yours. Your heart might have been at rest, fixed, settled, centred in God, instead of being storm-driven. You might have had the happiness of friendship and fellowship with God. Instead of the gloom of the future, the thought of which is unwelcome, your future might have been radiant with the glorious Christian hope.
III. IN RELATION TO INFLUENCE.
For all have influence over others. If you have not hitherto hearkened to God’s commandments, your spirit and example has fallen on some one as an evil shadow. Within the circle of your influence, you have sown the seeds of evil and prevented good to an extent you can never calculate. You will never, at least in this world, know how many sins have been committed through you, and how many persons are morally worse than they would have been had they never known you. Some may have been irretrievably ruined. They have exceeded their exemplar.
Instead of this, had you been a Christian, consistent, earnest, your influence on these persons would have been quite different. It would have been a recognised and valued, as well as unconscious influence for good. Your own children. Not they alone. Some Christian work. The Church of Christ. The young. Society around you. You might have had the satisfaction of knowing that you had plucked some brand from the burning, and that you would be welcomed on the eternal shore by some who had passed through the golden gates because of your influence upon them. All this, and more, might have been if you had hearkened to God’s commandments.
Would it not have been unspeakably better if you had? Better for God to give us His Gospel and require obedience, rather than leave us to ourselves. Better for the gardener to train the plant than leave it wild. Better that the elder brother remained at home and obeyed his father, than that he should have ruined himself, like the prodigal. Better that Manasseh, and David, and Peter had not stained their memories with sin, even though they repented. Can you recall any of your sins which would not have been better uncommitted?
But lamentation cannot undo the past. There it lies, and will lie for ever. But one thing can be done. You can repent; confess; forsake; sue for mercy through the Cross. God laments it, that He may attract your attention to this. Listen and turn. Let the young ponder His lamentation as a warning voice. Let your character, happiness, influence be what the Gospel secures.—J. Rawlinson.
It is one of the simplest and most impressive laws of the Divine government to render to every man according to his works. The operation of this law is strikingly illustrated in the history of God’s dealings with the Israelites, to which reference is made in this chapter. But He has infinitely more pleasure in dispensing mercy than in executing judgment. When, through the impenitent obstinacy of the sinner, He arises to judgment, it is with reluctance and regret—a regret which finds expression in words of profound and tenderest pathos—“O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” Consider—
I. DISOBEDIENCE IN ITS HUMAN ASPECT.
1. It involves a serious loss. A man may lose a sum of money, and, by a simple process of arithmetic, be able to tell the exact amount. But there are losses which no figures can adequately report, or words describe; they are all the more keenly felt because of the reeling, bewildering sense of indefiniteness that surrounds them. More especially is this the case when we reflect upon the spiritual loss occasioned by a course of disobedience to the Divine commandments. We are conscious of a loss of something, though in what form, or to what extent, we cannot precisely say. Not only is there the absence of what we once possessed—the soul having suffered eclipse by the dark, cold shadow of earthliness and sin resting upon it; but there is also the vague impression of what might have been! We never know what we lose by one single dereliction of duty.
2. It involves a loss of profitable instruction. This we infer from the preceding verse. There is a close connection between obedience and growth in sound and useful knowledge (H. E. I. 3153–3154). Who, then, can estimate the loss incurred by repeated disobedience? Lofty and expansive views of the character and works of God, views of Christian duty from the clearest standpoint, glimpses of the glorious possibilities of Christian enjoyment, the remodelling or the rejection of opinions that have led into grievous and fatal errors—all are for ever lost by a pertinacious refusal to hearken to the Divine commandments. Nor is this the worst. We have brought darkness into our minds, hardness and apathy into our hearts, fear and uncertainty into our prospects, and bitterness into our experience.
3. It involves a loss of wise and infallible guidance. This we also learn from the preceding verse. Who can estimate the misery occasioned by the loss of that guidance, and the consequent prostitution to base and ignoble purposes of the rarest talent, the wreck of innocence and virtue, of youth and beauty and power, the withering of fondly cherished hopes, the blighting of domestic and individual life?
4. It involves a loss of personal happiness. “Then had thy peace been as a river”—or the river—referring to the Euphrates, the largest and most important of all the rivers of Western Asia. To an Oriental mind this noble river would vividly represent the deep, clear, and abundant peace which flows in the heart of that man whose ways please the Lord. Peace with God is the only source of permanent happiness. Its possession is conditioned on the obedience of faith (Rom_5:1-2). What a loss, when peace is gone and happiness takes wing! (H. E. I. 2828).
5. It involves a loss of character. “Then had thy righteousness been as the waves of the sea.” Character is a compound, of many separate elements—the outcome of many conflicting influences; but that which gives it lustre, dignity, and worth, is righteousness. As man lives in harmony with the laws of God, his righteousness is “as the waves of the sea.” The waves of the sea are attractive, exhibiting in their ceaseless movements ten thousand forms of wondrous beauty; imposing, as they heap themselves in mountainous billows and march as with conscious majesty along the pathways of the mighty deep; irresistible in power. Most forcibly do they symbolise the beauty, majesty, and power of that character which is based in righteousness and moulded in harmony with the Divine commandments. There is something ineffably potent in the influence of a holy life (H.E.I. 1089–1095). It checks the froward, rebukes the obstinate, lures the penitent from the haunts of sin, and conducts to the way of righteousness. Every act of disobedience is a loss, not only to the individual, but to the whole community.
II. DISOBEDIENCE IN ITS DIVINE ASPECT.
1. It calls forth the expression of Divine regret. “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments!” What a cry is this!—the Deity lamenting the fate of those who have lost their all by disobedience to His commandments (see Luk_19:41-42).
2. The expression of Divine regret becomes profoundly suggestive when we reflect that disobedience frustrates the Divine purpose regarding the happiness of the race. The gracious purpose of God is to save man: His heart hungers for the love of redeemed humanity. Every act of disobedience insults the Divine love, spurns His mercy, and delays the work of emancipating and elevating the entire race.
3. The expression of Divine regret becomes profoundly suggestive when we reflect that God only can aright estimate the present loss which disobedience entails.
4. The expression of Divine regret becomes still more profoundly suggestive when we reflect that God only knows the terribleness of the misery to which the disobedient must be consigned. The being God created to bless and exalt, He is obliged, in justification of His own righteousness, to punish (H. E. I. 2177, 2183); and the recollection of the Divine beneficence in the past will only augment the woe to which the soul is doomed for ever.
Do not think, O sinner! that your transgressions are unnoticed, or that you are the only one affected by them; they cannot be regarded with indifference by a just and beneficent God. And if you will persist in your disobedience, breaking through all restrictions, and spurning all help—if you will court ruin and voluntarily surrender yourself to the tormentor—He who has done all He consistently can to recall you to obedience, resolves you shall not perish unlamented; and as you drop into the abysmal depths of unutterable woe the voice of Infinite Pity exclaims, in tones which, though not intended to do so, can only sharpen the stings of remorse: “O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! Then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea!”—G. Barlow, in The Study and Pulpit (1877), pp. 57–60.
“Godliness is profitable unto all things.”
I. God hath given us commandments.
1. Authoritative.
2. Perspicuous in their style (Hab_2:2; Pro_8:8-9; 2Ti_3:15).
3. Universal in their application.
4. Reasonable in their claims.
II. God’s commandments deserve attention.
1. They should be read.
2. Understood.
3. Remembered.
4. Practised.
III. Attention to God’s commandments produces the happiest results.
1. The nature of that tranquillity which the people of God enjoy.
2. Its perpetuity (Isa_26:3; Isa_66:12).
3. Its increase.
4. “My righteousness,” &c., may refer to the justice of the cause in which Israel was engaged; and had they hearkened to God’s commandments, they would have borne down all opposition, like the waves of the sea, which no might nor power can withstand.
IV. The people of Israel were inattentive to God’s commandments. They had not hearkened (2Ch_36:15-16; Psa_81:11). This conduct was—
1. Ungrateful.
2. Rebellious.
3. Unnatural.
4. Ruinous.
Learn:
1. That attention to God’s commandments is a highly important duty.
2. Where they are disregarded, peace is forfeited (Isa_48:22; Isa_57:20).
3. That God most compassionately commiserates the circumstances of His creatures.
4. That man’s final ruin is wholly of himself.—Sketches of Sermons, vol. ii. pp. 299–303.
THE RIVER AN IMAGE OF PEACE
Isa_48:18. O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river.
The images of this verse are images of national life; the peace, i.e., the outward prosperity of the people, shall flow like a river; the righteousness of the united people shall be like the forceful, restless energy of the sea waves. There is a peace which is the fruit of Christian faith; and it is of peace in this regard that we are to see the image in the river. What are the characteristics of Christian peace? What answer to this question does the river afford us?
I. The image sets before us a peace which is the expression of life and power. The life of a full and flowing river is not like that of a shallow stream; we find in it neither suggestion of feebleness nor stagnation, as in the marshy pool. The latter is still—so still, it is ghastly. The Christian is called to peace, but he is called to life more absolutely than to peace; the peace he is to realise is that, not of deathly calm, but of full, healthful life. The peace is as a river—not the babbling mountain stream; but the broad, deep, majestic river, that has gathered the shallow streams. The perfect restfulness of the broad flowing river is the outcome of power. Peace is fruitage of power—we can only reach peace by power. Faith must become firm and resolute. The great commandment cannot be fulfilled by irresolute will and feeble energy (Mat_22:37-38). “The peace of God”—why is that so perfect? Because in Him there is such perfectness of power, such force and fulness of character. There is a peace which comes by pardon that is very sweet (Mat_11:28; Luk_7:50). But there is another peace, a peace which flows out of life’s conduct—and that is the rest which is like the peace of the river (Mat_11:29). The rest of pardon is given—“I will give you rest;” the rest of obedience is found, “Ye shall find rest to your souls.” Forgiveness is a word of welcome, yet is it also a call to duty. Through the Christ-like life we come to the Christ-like peace.
II. The image of the text is expressive of healthful influence. The river’s life is one of ministry. Where the deep rivers flow, there are the rich valleys; “the still waters” make the “green pastures.” The river does not live unto itself. The Christian’s peace is not an idle reverie. We have not to seek peace, but life—a life of healthful influence, and we shall surely find peace. We cannot sever our peace from a life consecrated to service, if that peace is to be as a river (Php_2:4; P. D. 2680).
III. The image of the text is expressive of progress and perpetuity. The river flows to the sea—finding no rest, nor seeking it in stagnant idleness, for it has a more perfect rest in its ceaseless progress. The Christian’s peace is to progress—grow deeper, fuller with a progressive life. We are called to movement, the forward movement of the river. The progress of the river is perpetual. It is not a progress in spasms of energy. It would not have with such a movement a prevailing peace. Such energy is impulsive passion, fretful restlessness, This image of a Christian’s peace is a far-off ideal; and yet, if Christian character has any fulness, Christian experience any depth, we should realise peace with an almost unbroken constancy; we should have beneath outward conflict inward calm (Joh_16:33, P. D. 2673).
IV. The image of the text is expressive of pleasantness. The peace of the flowing river is not dull and wearisome—it pervades a fresh, bright, and changeful movement. The Christian’s peace is to be like the flowing, radiant waters of the river, not the still waters of a shadowed well. Peace and joy, joy and peace; these must flow together in Christian experience, bound together in a sacred wedlock. Rest in the Lord and be thankful, and your peace shall flow like a river (P. D. 2669).
CONCLUSION.—The peaceful life is dependent on obedience to God’s commandments—“Hearken,” &c. The Lord is saying to you, “Give me your heart, love Me, trust Me; be at peace with Me, and My peace shall be yours.”
“Rest, and hope, and glory,
Are found at Jesus’ feet.”
Look into His face, hear His words, sit at His feet, abide in His love; do whatsoever He commands you, and your peace shall flow like a river.—W. Steadman Davis: Christian World Pulpit, vol. iv. pp. 152–154.
How touching is the appeal of the Lord to His rebellious people! What a revelation does it give us at once of the ingratitude and folly of their disobedience, and of the greatness of His love! Consider now the first of the two figures under which the results of obedience to God’s commands are set forth: “Then had thy peace been as a river.”
“The Lord will bless His people with peace.” A blessing indeed! Without it there can be no real happiness. There is a peace which the world has to offer. But it cannot be trusted, it will not last. It is like the opiate which for a short while enables the sufferer to forget his pain, but for a short while only! It is like the tempting calm over the face of the sea, so smooth that only a ripple appears; but soon the calm will disappear, and the storm imperil the unwary mariner. Do you wish for true peace? See how God instructs you. “O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! Then had thy peace been as a river.” It is in obedience to God’s commands, and especially to the great Gospel command, that peace can be found (Joh_6:28-29; Rom_15:13).
Observe the comparison made use of. Peace as a river.
1. We can imagine the broad and noble river winding its course down to the sea; but let us trace it up to its source. What shall we see there? Probably on a mountain-side a spring—the fountain—partly concealed from view. It might be passed without notice by many a traveller, and yet this is the origin of the wide river, with its deep, ever-flowing waters. Whence comes the river of the Christian’s peace? Trace it up to its source, and what find we? The fountain ever open, ever fresh, of the Saviour’s atoning blood! Here, and here alone, is peace to be found (H. E. I., 1321–1324).
2. Having found the source of the river on the mountain-side, we do not see at once what we find farther down—the deep, wide stream, with sure and ceaseless course hastening on towards the sea. No, we find the streamlet, with but little depth of water, gushing down with impetuous force and noise, ever meeting in its bed with stones and rocks which seem to try to arrest its progress, but in vain. They stay the current but for a moment, and then it bursts over and around them with strength increased by the interruption. By and by the stream runs more smoothly and steadily; the water becomes deeper; and though the obstacles in the bed of the river still exist, yet they are less noticed, and have less and less power to interrupt its course. There is less noise, but a more even, constant flow. Does not this aptly represent the experience of many a Christian?
3. The waters of the river become deeper and broader, because they are fed in many ways, and thus increase their volume. Other streams flow into it, and there is, too, the rain direct from heaven. These help to swell the river, and to give additional depth and force. So the Christian’s peace needs a continually fresh supply, that it may deepen and widen, and be less interrupted in its course. It is continually fed by the direct outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and by the many and various means of grace. You who enjoy some measure of this peace, would you have it increased? Resort more constantly to the channels which Christ makes use of, for the impartation of His grace—the Word, communion with Christ by prayer in private and in public, and by the feast of His love; and be more watchful and prayerful in hearkening to and obeying all God’s commands. The more implicitly you obey, the more entirely the rebellious will is brought under and subdued, the more strongly and quietly will the river of your peace flow.
4. Where rivers flow, we find the country fruitful; but where water is not found, there is barrenness. Those Christians with whom the river of peace is flowing the most steadily and smoothly, will be found the most fruitful in good works to the praise and glory of God. It is far otherwise with those who are continually distracted with doubts and fears.
5. The noblest rivers become deeper, wider, stronger, until they enter the vast ocean. So the Christian’s peace, received from Christ, and fed uninterruptedly by the Holy Spirit, at death expands into participation in the peace and joy which are in the presence of the Lord for ever!
Would you know for yourselves this present peace, this future joy? Remember, you must first hearken—hearken now—to the commands of God, lest when the opportunity shall have passed beyond recall, God should say of thee, and thou shouldest seem to hear it, “O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! Then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.”
“Oh for the peace that floweth like a river,
Making life’s desert places bloom and smile;
Oh for the faith to grasp Heaven’s bright ‘for ever,’
Amid the shadows of earth’s ‘little while!’ ”
—J. H. Holford, M.A.: A Memorial Volume of Sermons, pp. 1–13.
The figure conveys three ideas:—
1. Constancy. A river is, in most cases, a permanent thing. Not like an occasional torrent which rushes down from the mountain to-day and disappears to-morrow, nor like a lake which the rains have formed, but which will dry up when the rains are over. A river flows on day after day, year after year, deeper at one time than another, and more rapid and wide, yet never exhausted, rolling on the same throughout all generations. So that peace of which this text speaks is a permanent, established thing. As long as the believer hearkens to God’s commandments, it reigns over his soul, and keeps it, if not in an unbroken, yet in an abiding calm. Not that the state of his mind is always the same. Trace a river from its source to its mouth, and there is generally an almost endless variety in its course and appearance. It is now half hidden in a narrow channel among mountains and forests, and now spread over a wide bed, conspicuous in the plain; and then again, it is seen contracting and deepening itself and moving onwards with tenfold velocity and strength. The Christian’s peace seems to vary as much. It sometimes nearly disappears; the man himself perhaps thinks it quite gone. But he is never wholly without it, while walking in the path of God’s commandments, and never will be.
2. Abundance. The Christian’s peace, it says, shall not enter his soul by drops, or flow through it as a scanty and shallow rivulet. There shall be a tide of peace, a wide and deep stream of it, passing into his soul. The waters shall be deep as well as broad (Isa_26:3; Psa_119:165; Php_4:7). We cannot tell how peaceful God can make us. There is abundance of peace for us, for there is God’s own peace for us! We often wish for the peace of this Christian friend, or the quiet of that Christian neighbour. But Christ says to us, “My peace I give unto you—a calmness like My own!” (P. D. 2666).
3. Increase. A river is not formed at once. At first it is generally a mere thread of water, scarcely perceptible through the grass and rushes among which it is running. But, as it flows on, other streams fall into it; it widens and deepens; the farther it flows the more enlarged it becomes, till it loses itself at last in the depths of the ocean. There is not much peace in the sinner’s heart, when his attention is first fixed on God’s commands; no, not even when he hopes he has found pardon in Christ for his transgressions of them. There is sometimes a good deal of joy at such seasons—it would be strange if there were not; but there is not what he himself, at a later period of his course, would call peace. True, solid peace is generally at first small; it is hardly perceptible amid the fears and perplexities with which the soul has to struggle; but as the soul goes on listening to the Divine commandments, applying to the Saviour for pardon and to the Comforter for strength, and gradually becoming moulded more and more into the Divine image, peace flows into it in a more copious stream, the sources of peace are multiplied, and the soul’s capacity to receive and hold it is increased. All this, unless God’s ways are forsaken, goes on to the last. New springs of consolation burst open in every stage of our progress, old sources of comfort become richer and sweeter; our peace constantly flows deeper and deeper, till it ends in an ocean of peace, the boundless, fathomless ocean of everlasting joy.—Charles Bradley: Practical Sermons, vol. i. pp. 276–278.
It is from simple natural imagery that the mind is put into a fitting frame for catching the spirit of the text. The good and gracious God addresses this tender language of expostulation to those who have forgotten His laws.
I. Our heavenly Father is continually speaking to us by His Word, &c. Sometimes His voice is heard in thunder tones, as on the smoking top of Sinai. Sometimes its gracious accents are those of gentleness and love. It is the duty of all to “hearken,” however and whenever God speaks. To “hearken “implies—
1. A reverent and careful attention to God’s message.
2. That we consider God’s commandments as binding upon us, and as pointing out certain particulars which we are required to attend to. God is a lawgiver, and the sceptre of dominion is held firmly in His grasp (Rev_22:14).
II. The blessing promised, as the reward of such obedience, is peace—peace of mind and heart; peace with God through Christ Jesus. Peace may be compared to a river,
1. In its origin; small, joyous, sparkling, vigorous, rapid.
2. In its progress: widening and deepening; receiving new tributories on the right and left, from the various means of grace, as they are supplied with the dew of heaven and showers of blessings; sweeping away as it rolls on in its strength the obstacles of unsanctified affections and unconquered lusts.
3. In its overflowing abundance. It is not a scanty, fluctuating, failing stream, but a full tide of peace, both wide and deep, and supplying to the utmost every longing of the soul.
4. In its perpetuity. A river differs from a mountain torrent or summer brook in this: the river flows on with a comparatively steady current—sometimes broader and deeper than at others, it is true, but never exhausted, never dry—while the very existence of the brook and the torrent depends upon uncertain showers. The Christian who hearkens diligently to the laws of the Lord shall enjoy perpetual peace. It is not uniform, indeed, any more than the course of the river.
5. In its increase. Peace shall not only dwell perpetually with God’s children, but it shall grow stronger and more pervading.
If you saw a man trying all his life to satisfy his thirst by holding an empty cup to his lips, you would smile at his folly or pity his ignorance. Not more deplorable folly and ignorance, however, than when immortal spirits persist in seeking peace everywhere except from its true and only source. “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked,” and yet each one of those who will be condemned at the last day might have enjoyed “peace as a river.”—J. N. Norton: Sermons for the Christian Year.
1. Like a river in its commencement—trickling from some fissure in the heart, singing its own song as it drops from leaf to leaf, from ledge to ledge—now gathering itself up in a little pool, saying to its joyous waters, “Here we rest,”—anon rushing on again to fulfil its purpose, and gain its parent sea.
2. Like a river in its progress, ever widening and deepening, from the ankles to the knees, from the knees to the loins, from the loins to waters to swim in, a river that cannot be passed over,—receiving new tributaries on the right and left, sweeping away as it rolls on its healthful stream the dead and dying remains of past affections and former lusts, and bearing on its bosom a thousand newly launched hopes.
3. Like a river in its influence—holy, healthy, generating—causing a wide expanse of “living green” to spread out on either side—making even the desert of the soul “rejoice and blossom as the rose.”
4. Like a river in its termination—rolling into and mingling with the shoreless, blessed sea of perfect peace, where undulating waves never roll in strife, or break in death, but where the people of God are “ever with the Lord.”
Away among the Alleghanies there is a spring so small, that a single ox in a summer day could drain it dry. It steals its unobtrusive way among the hills, till it spreads out in the beautiful Ohio. Thence it stretches away a thousand miles, leaving on its banks, cities, villages, and cultivated farms, and bearing on its bosom more than half a thousand steamboats. Beautiful representation of a Christian’s peace! Peace “as a river.”
How little do we know of this peace of God! We deem ourselves happy if we have one serene hour out of the twenty-four; and if now and then there comes a Sabbath which is balm at morning, and sweetness through the still noon, and benediction at evening, we count it a rare and blessed experience.—H. W. Beecher.
I. Their peace would have been like a river.
1. It has a source. It begins at the fountain of Christ’s blood.
2. It is fed from above. Rains and showers feed the rivers. The shower of grace swells the rivers of peace.
3. It has inundations, as the Nile. An awakening providence often makes an overflow. Afflictions and the consolations under them always, if the sufferings are the sufferings of Christ. Sacramental times also; hence the desirableness of frequency in the administration of the Lord’s Supper.
4. It gets broader and broader to the sea. The Tay. (Pro_4:18.) Try yourselves by this test.
5. It is fertilising. It conveys nourishment. Egypt owes all its fertility to the Nile. The peace of Christ makes every grace grow. Holiness always grows out of a peaceful breast.
II. Their righteousness would have been as the waves of the sea. [1486] Because—
1. It covers over the highest sins.
2. It covers again and again. It is infinite righteousness. You cannot count the waves of the sea.
[1486] The ideas suggested by the figure of a river are abundance, perpetuity, and freshness, to which the waves of the sea add those of vastness, depth, and continual succession.—Alexander.
Inference. God wishes men to be saved. God sometimes pleads with men to be saved for His own pleasure: it would be pleasant to Him, it would make Him glad, as in the parable of the lost sheep. Sometimes He pleads for His own glory (Jer_13:16; Mal_2:1). But here it is for the happiness of sinners themselves (so Psa_81:13). Once more, He pleads with men, because unwilling that any should perish (2Pe_3:9).—R. M. M‘Cheyne: Memoirs and Remains, p. 467.
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.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v17 Heb. "goel," Redemp. (Kinsman type). (See Scofield "Isa 59:20").
redeemer
Heb. "goel," Redemp. (Kinsman type). (See Scofield "Isa 59:20").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv16–17 General Information:
General Information:
Yahweh continues speaking to the people of Israel.
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I have not spoken in secret
This can be expressed positively. AT: "I have spoken plainly and clearly" (See: Double Negatives)
sent me
Here "me" refers to an unknown servant of Yahweh, maybe Isaiah or Cyrus or the promised Messiah.
translationWords
Lord Yahweh
Holy Spirit
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 v16 48:16 I have told you plainly: God’s promises are…
48:16 I have told you plainly: God’s promises are clear, though not always specific as to manner and time. • now the Sovereign Lord and his Spirit have sent me with this message: The identity of the one who is sent is unclear. Isaiah might be referring to himself as a Spirit-inspired prophet who spoke the very words of God to Israel. The connection with the Spirit suggests that it refers to the promised servant, the Messiah. • The presence of the Spirit assures the servant’s success.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.