9saying to those who are bound, ‘Come out!’; to those who are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves!’ “They shall feed along the paths, and their pasture shall be on all treeless heights.
10They shall not hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun strike them: for he who has mercy on them will lead them. He will guide them by springs of water.
11I will make all my mountains a road, and my highways shall be exalted.
12Behold, these shall come from afar, and behold, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.”
9 saying to those who are bound, ‘Come out!’; to those who are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves!’ “They shall feed along the paths, and their pasture shall be on all treeless heights.
10 They shall not hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun strike them: for he who has mercy on them will lead them. He will guide them by springs of water.
11 I will make all my mountains a road, and my highways shall be exalted.
12 Behold, these shall come from afar, and behold, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.”
KJVKing James Version
9 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth; to them that are in darkness, Shew yourselves. They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in all high places.
10 They shall not hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun smite them: for he that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall he guide them.
11 And I will make all my mountains a way, and my highways shall be exalted.
12 Behold, these shall come from far: and, lo, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
Show all 3 translations
JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
9 Saying to the prisoners: 'Go forth'; to them that are in darkness: 'Show yourselves'; they shall feed in the ways, and in all high hills shall be their pasture;
10 They shall not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor sun smite them; for He that hath compassion on them will lead them, even by the springs of water will He guide them.
11 And I will make all My mountains a way, and My highways shall be raised on high.
12 Behold, these shall come from far; and, lo, these from the north and from the west, and these from the land of Sinim.
Revelation 7:16-17(v10)They will never be hungry or thirsty any more. The sun won’t beat on them, nor any heat; for the Lamb who is in the middle of the throne…
Matthew 5:6(v10)Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.
Ezekiel 34:23(vv9–10)I will set up one shepherd over them, and he will feed them, even my servant David. He will feed them, and he will be their shepherd.
Isaiah 33:16(v10)he will dwell on high. His place of defense will be the fortress of rocks. His bread will be supplied. His waters will be sure.
Psalms 121:5-6(v10)Yahweh is your keeper. Yahweh is your shade on your right hand. The sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night.
Show all 73 cross-references
Isaiah 43:5-6(v12)Don’t be afraid, for I am with you. I will bring your offspring from the east, and gather you from the west. I will tell the north, ‘Give…
Isaiah 40:11(v10)He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom. He will gently lead those who…
Isaiah 42:7(v9)to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison.
Isaiah 42:16(v9)I will bring the blind by a way that they don’t know. I will lead them in paths that they don’t know. I will make darkness light before…
Jeremiah 31:9(v10)They will come with weeping. I will lead them with petitions. I will cause them to walk by rivers of waters, in a straight way in which…
John 10:3-4(v10)The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name, and leads them out. Whenever he…
Isaiah 4:6(v10)There will be a pavilion for a shade in the daytime from the heat, and for a refuge and for a shelter from storm and from rain.
Isaiah 11:16(v11)There will be a highway for the remnant that is left of his people from Assyria, like there was for Israel in the day that he came up out…
Isaiah 25:4(v10)For you have been a stronghold to the poor, a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat, when…
Isaiah 32:2(v10)A man shall be as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the storm, as streams of water in a dry place, as the shade of a large…
Isaiah 35:7(v10)The burning sand will become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water. Grass with reeds and rushes will be in the habitation of…
Luke 4:18(v9)“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…
1 Peter 2:9(v9)But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellence of…
Psalms 23:2-4(v10)He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He guides me in the paths of righteousness…
Psalms 69:33(v9)For Yahweh hears the needy, and doesn’t despise his captive people.
Psalms 102:20(v9)to hear the groans of the prisoner; to free those who are condemned to death;
Isaiah 9:2(v9)The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. The light has shined on those who lived in the land of the shadow of death.
Isaiah 35:8-10(v11)A highway will be there, a road, and it will be called “The Holy Way”. The unclean shall not pass over it, but it will be for those who…
Isaiah 54:10(v10)For the mountains may depart, and the hills be removed; but my loving kindness will not depart from you, and my covenant of peace will not…
Isaiah 61:1(v9)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…
Isaiah 62:10(v11)Go through, go through the gates! Prepare the way of the people! Build up, build up the highway! Gather out the stones! Lift up a banner…
Zechariah 9:11-12(v9)As for you also, because of the blood of your covenant, I have set free your prisoners from the pit in which is no water. Turn to the…
Luke 3:4-5(v11)As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make ready the way of the…
Deuteronomy 32:13(v9)He made him ride on the high places of the earth. He ate the increase of the field. He caused him to suck honey out of the rock, oil out of…
Psalms 22:26(v9)The humble shall eat and be satisfied. They shall praise Yahweh who seek after him. Let your hearts live forever.
Psalms 22:27(v12)All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to Yahweh. All the relatives of the nations shall worship before you.
Psalms 23:1-2(v9)Yahweh is my shepherd: I shall lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.
Psalms 72:10-11(v12)The kings of Tarshish and of the islands will bring tribute. The kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts. Yes, all kings shall fall down…
Psalms 72:17(v12)His name endures forever. His name continues as long as the sun. Men shall be blessed by him. All nations will call him blessed.
Psalms 107:7(v11)he led them also by a straight way, that they might go to a city to live in.
Psalms 107:10-16(v9)Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, being bound in affliction and iron, because they rebelled against the words of God, and…
Psalms 146:7(v9)who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry. Yahweh frees the prisoners.
Isaiah 2:2-3(v12)It shall happen in the latter days, that the mountain of Yahweh’s house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be…
Isaiah 5:17(v9)Then the lambs will graze as in their pasture, and strangers will eat the ruins of the rich.
Isaiah 11:10-11(v12)It will happen in that day that the nations will seek the root of Jesse, who stands as a banner of the peoples; and his resting place will…
Isaiah 14:1(v10)For Yahweh will have compassion on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and set them in their own land. The foreigner will join himself with…
Isaiah 40:3-4(v11)The voice of one who calls out, “Prepare the way of Yahweh in the wilderness! Make a level highway in the desert for our God. Every valley…
Isaiah 41:18(v9)I will open rivers on the bare heights, and springs in the middle of the valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry…
Isaiah 43:19(v11)Behold, I will do a new thing. It springs out now. Don’t you know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.
Isaiah 55:1-2(v9)“Hey! Come, everyone who thirsts, to the waters! Come, he who has no money, buy, and eat! Yes, come, buy wine and milk without money and…
Isaiah 57:14(v11)He will say, “Build up, build up, prepare the way! Remove the stumbling-block out of the way of my people.”
Isaiah 60:1-2(v9)“Arise, shine; for your light has come, and Yahweh’s glory has risen on you. For, behold, darkness will cover the earth, and thick darkness…
Isaiah 60:9-14(v12)Surely the islands will wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first, to bring your sons from far, their silver and their gold with them,…
Isaiah 65:13(v9)Therefore the Lord Yahweh says, “Behold, my servants will eat, but you will be hungry; behold, my servants will drink, but you will be…
Isaiah 66:19-20(v12)“I will set a sign among them, and I will send those who escape of them to the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, who draw the bow, to…
Ezekiel 34:13-15(v9)I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land. I will feed them on…
Ezekiel 34:29(v9)I will raise up to them a plantation for renown, and they will no more be consumed with famine in the land, and not bear the shame of the…
Joel 3:18(v9)It will happen in that day, that the mountains will drop down sweet wine, the hills will flow with milk, all the brooks of Judah will flow…
Micah 4:2(v12)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…
Zechariah 2:11(v12)Many nations shall join themselves to Yahweh in that day, and shall be my people; and I will dwell among you, and you shall know that…
Zechariah 8:20-23(v12)Yahweh of Armies says: “Many peoples, and the inhabitants of many cities will yet come; and the inhabitants of one shall go to another,…
Matthew 8:11(v12)I tell you that many will come from the east and the west, and will sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven,
Luke 1:79(v9)to shine on those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death; to guide our feet into the way of peace.”
Luke 13:29(v12)They will come from the east, west, north, and south, and will sit down in God’s Kingdom.
John 6:53-58(v9)Jesus therefore said to them, “Most certainly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you don’t have…
John 8:12(v9)Again, therefore, Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in the darkness, but will have…
John 10:9(v9)I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture.
John 14:6(v11)Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.
2 Corinthians 4:4-6(v9)in whom the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the Good News of the glory of Christ, who is the…
Ephesians 5:8(v9)For you were once darkness, but are now light in the Lord. Walk as children of light,
Ephesians 5:14(v9)Therefore he says, “Awake, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
Colossians 1:13(v9)who delivered us out of the power of darkness, and translated us into the Kingdom of the Son of his love,
1 Thessalonians 5:5-6(v9)You are all children of light and children of the day. We don’t belong to the night, nor to darkness, so then let’s not sleep, as the rest…
Revelation 7:9(v12)After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude, which no man could count, out of every nation and of all tribes, peoples, and…
Revelation 11:15(v12)The seventh angel sounded, and great voices in heaven followed, saying, “The kingdom of the world has become the Kingdom of our Lord, and…
Psalms 107:4(v11)They wandered in the wilderness in a desert way. They found no city to live in.
John 6:35(v10)Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will not be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.
Acts 26:18(v9)to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive remission of sins…
73 distinct cross-references across this passage (74 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (20 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv9, 10, 12Being in Christ’s protection, they shall be safe against…
Being in Christ’s protection, they shall be safe against all dangers, and free from the fear of the enemies.
To them that are in the prison of sin and death.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv9–12Isa 49:9 That thou mayest say to the prisoners,…
Isa 49:9 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth; to them that [are] in darkness, Shew yourselves. They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures [shall be] in all high places.
Ver. 9. That thou mayest say to the prisoners,] i.e., To such as lie hampered and enthralled in the invisible chains of the kingdom of darkness. To these Christ saith, Be refreshed with the light of saving knowledge, and with the liberty of the sons of God.
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They shall feed in the ways.] As cattle do, that are removed from place to place; they shall have a subsistence till they get home to their Father’s house, where is "bread enough."
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 vv9–12That thou mayest say, to wit, with power and…
That thou mayest say, to wit, with power and effect, as when God said, Let there be light, &c. To the prisoners; to the Gentiles, who are fast bound by the cords of their sins, and taken captive by the devil at his will, as this same phrase is understood, Isa 42:7.
Go forth; come forth to the light, receive Divine illumination and consolation.
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They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in all high places; they shall have abundant provision in all places, yea, even in those which commonly are barren and unfruitful, and such are both common roads and high grounds.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv9–12That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth,....…
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth,.... God's covenant people, while unconverted, are prisoners; they are in the prison of sin, under the power and dominion of it, and under the guilt of it, and obligation to punishment for it; and they are in the prison of the law, they are transgressors of it, and are accused and convicted by it, and are condemned, and put in prison, and held there; and they are also Satan's prisoners, and are held and led captive by him at his will; and by virtue of the covenant, and the blood of it, these prisoners are set free; and Christ in the. Gospel speaks unto them, and proclaims liberty to them; and by the knowledge of the truth they are made free, and are brought into the liberty of the children of God; and are bid to go forth, and they are brought forth from their prison houses; and bid to go to the house of God, and walk at liberty, enjoying all the privileges and ordinances of the Gospel:
to them that are in darkness; in a state of nature and unregeneracy, which is a state of infidelity and ignorance; when men are in the dark, and know not themselves, nor their lost state and condition; nor the exceeding sinfulness of sin; nor Christ, and the way of salvation by him; nor the Spirit, and the operations of his grace; nor the Scriptures, and the doctrines of them:
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show yourselves; among the people of God, in his house and ordinances, when called, converted, and enlightened by Christ; or "be revealed" (c) or manifested, when they are known to be, what they were not knows before, the people and children of God. The Targum is,
"be revealed to the light;''
such are called to partake of the light of grace, and to enjoy the light of comfort and communion:
they shall feed in the ways; not in the broad road and highways of sin, but in the ways of God, in the word and ordinances: this denotes the publicness and pleasantness of them, and the plenty of provisions in them; and yet where it might not be expected, and where exposed to enemies: the allusion is to cattle, that are drove from place to place, and as they pass along feed in the ways upon such pasture as they there find; and suggests, that the saints are travellers, and as such have food provided them by the way:
and their pastures shall be in all high places; on hills and mountains, which are often barren and unfruitful. The Targum is,
"in or by rivers of water shall be the place of their habitation.''
(c) "revelamini", V. L. Munster, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.
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 vv9, 11, 12Prisoners - To the Gentiles who are fast bound…
Prisoners - To the Gentiles who are fast bound by the cords of their sins, and taken captive by the devil at his will. Go forth - Come forth to the light, receive divine illumination. In high places - They shall have abundant provision in all places, yea even in those which commonly are unfruitful, such are both common roads and high grounds.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv9, 12Verse 9. To them that are in darkness -…
Verse 9. To them that are in darkness - "And to those that are in darkness"] Fifteen MSS. (five ancient) of Dr. Kennicott's, eleven of De Rossi's, and one ancient of my own, and the two old editions of 1486 and 1488, and three others, add the conjunction ו vau at the beginning of this member. Another MS. had it so at first, and two others have a rasure at the place: and it is expressed by the Septuagint, Syriac, Chaldee, and Vulgate.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv9, 12Isa 49:9-11. That thou mayest say — Namely, with…
Isa 49:9-11. That thou mayest say — Namely, with power and effect, as when God said, Let there be light; to the prisoners — To the Gentiles, who are fast bound by the cords of their sins, and taken captive by the devil at his will. Go forth — Come forth to the light, receive divine illumination. They shall feed, &c. — They shall have abundant provision in all places, yea, even in those which commonly are unfruitful, as are both common roads and high grounds. They shall not hunger, &c. — They shall be supplied with all good and necessary things, and preserved from all evil occurrences and annoyances, as the Israelites were in the wilderness, by the manna and other provision afforded them, and the pillar of the cloud and fire, a token of the divine presence and protection. For he that hath mercy on them shall lead them — God, who hath magnified his mercy to them, will conduct them with safety and comfort. And I will make all mountains a way — I will remove all hinderances, and prepare the way for them, by levelling high grounds, and raising the low.
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 vv9–12That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth…
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth - This language occurs also in Isa 42:7. For an explanation of it, see the notes on that place.
To them that are in darkness - Synonymous with being prisoners, as prisoners are usually confined in dark cells.
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Show yourselves - Hebrew, ‘Reveal,’ or manifest yourselves; that is, as those who come out of a dark cell come into light, so do you, who have been confined in the darkness of sin, come forth into the light of the Sun of righteousness, and be manifest as the redeemed.
They shall feed in the ways - In the remainder of this verse, and in the following verses, the Messiah is represented under the image of a shepherd, who leads forth his flock to green fields, and who takes care that they shall be guarded from the heat of the sun, and shall not hunger nor thirst. The phrase ‘they shall feed in the ways,’ means, probably, that in the way in which they were going they should find abundant food. They should not be compelled to turn aside for pasturage, or to go and seek for it in distant places. It is equivalent to the language which so often occurs, that God would provide for the needs of his people, even when passing through a desert, and that he would open before them unexpected sources of supply.
And their pastures shall be in all high places - This means, that on the hills and mountains, that are naturally barren and unproductive, they should find an abundance of food. To see the force of this, we are to remember that in many parts of the East the hills and mountains are utterly destitute of vegetation. This is the case with the mountainous regions of Horeb and Sinai, and even with the mountains about Jerusalem, and with the hills and mountains in Arabia Deserta. The idea here is, that in the ways, or paths that were commonly traveled, and where all verdure would be consumed or trodden down by the caravans, and on the hills that were usually barren and desolate, they would find abundance. God would supply them as if he should make the green grass spring up in the hard-trodden way, and on the barren and rocky hills vegetation should start up suddenly in abundance, and all their needs should be supplied.
This is an image which we have frequently had in Isaiah, and perhaps the meaning may be, that to his people the Redeemer would open unexpected sources of comfort and joy; that in places and times in which they would scarcely look for a supply of their spiritual needs, he would suddenly meet and satisfy them as if green grass for flocks and herds should suddenly start up in the down-trodden way, or luxuriant vegetation burst forth on the sides and the tops of barren, rocky, and desolate hills. Harmer, however, supposes that this whole description refers rather to the custom which prevailed in the East, of making feasts or entertainments by the sides of fountains or rivers. ‘To fountains or rivers,’ Dr. Chandler tells us in his Travels, ‘the Turks and the Greeks frequently repair for refreshment; especially the latter, in their festivals, when whole families are seen sitting on the grass, and enjoying their early or evening repast, beneath the trees, by the side of a rill’ - (Travels in Asia Minor, p. 21.) Compare 1Ki 1:9. Thus Harmer supposes that the purpose of the prophet is, to contrast the state of the Jews when they were shut up in prison in Babylon, secluded from fresh air, and even the light itself, or in unwholesome dungeons, with their state when walking at liberty, enjoying the verdure, and the enlivening air of the country; passing from the tears, the groans, and the apprehensions of such a dismal confinement, to the music, the songs, and the exquisite repasts of Eastern parties of pleasure (see Harmer’s Obs., vol. ii. pp. 18-25; Ed. Lond. 1808). The interpretation, however, above suggested, seems to me most natural and beautiful.
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 vv9, 12Ways. The captives shall find every convenience. (Calmet)
Ways. The captives shall find every convenience. (Calmet)
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).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown1871 · Public DomainOn vv9–12(Isa 42:7; Zac 9:12).
(Isa 42:7; Zac 9:12).
prisoners--the Jews bound in legal bondage.
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them . . . in darkness--the Gentiles having no light as to the one true God [VITRINGA].
Show yourselves--not only see but be seen (Mat 5:16; Mar 5:19). Come forth from the darkness of your prison into the light of the Sun of righteousness.
in the ways, &c.--In a desert there are no "ways," nor "high places," with "pastures"; thus the sense is: "They shall have their pastures, not in deserts, but in cultivated and inhabited places." Laying aside the figure, the churches of Christ at the first shall be gathered, not in obscure and unknown regions, but in the most populous parts of the Roman empire, Antioch, Alexandria, Rome, &c. [VITRINGA]. Another sense probably is the right one. Israel, on its way back to the Holy Land, shall not have to turn aside to devious paths in search of necessaries, but shall find them in all places wherever their route lies; so ROSENMULLER. God will supply them as if He should make the grass grow in the trodden ways and on the barren high places.
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 vv11–1211. Mountains… highways — Ordinances in the Christian Church…
11. Mountains… highways — Ordinances in the Christian Church conspicuously illustrate exalted privileges under Messiah. But there is implied by a change of figure here, that the disciples of Messiah become now, instead of quietly enjoying the luxuries of quiet and plenty, moving hosts or great caravans, over mountain passes entirely smoothed of ruggedness by their great Leader.
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 vv9–129. That thou mayest say] Rather, Saying (R.V.) or…
9. That thou mayest say] Rather, Saying (R.V.) or possibly (continuing the previous infs.) “To say.”
the prisoners … them that are in darkness] i.e. the exiles; cf. Isa_42:7. The second half of the verse introduces a new figure, that of the flock, (see ch. Isa_40:11) led by Jehovah, the Good Shepherd.
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they shall feed in the ways] Or perhaps as LXX., in all the ways, wherein they go.
high places] bare heights; ch. Isa_41:18.
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 vv9–12(9) That thou mayest say to the prisoners .…
(9) That thou mayest say to the prisoners . . .—Comp. Isa_42:6-7. Here, perhaps, the thought of the deliverance of Israel is more exclusively prominent; but the words have obviously a yet wider and higher application.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv9–12That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth,…
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth, "The prisoners" here are not the captives in Babylon, but the servants of sin throughout the world. Christ would say to them, "Go forth." He would summon them by his messengers to repent,and be converted, and quit the service of sin, and "go forths" from the kingdom of darkness, and show themselves" as lights of the world, (Mat_5:14 Php_2:15) walking as children of the light". (Eph_5:8) It is a narrow exegesis which confines the prophet"s forecast to the mere return of the exiles to Palestine, and their re-settlement on their ancestral estates. They shall feed in the ways, etc. The returning "prisoners" are now represented as a flock of sheep, (comp. Isa_40:11) whom the good Shepherd will "lead" and "guide" by ways in which they will find sufficient pasture, which shall not fail them even when they pass over bare "hill-tops". (see Joh_10:11-16 Joh_21:15-17)
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 vv9–12That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth
Isa_49:9
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth
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Out of darkness into light
When Jesus comes to the soul, He delivers us from that direst of all bondages, fetches us out from that cruellest of all slaveries, the bondage of the spirit, the slavery of the heart.
Then we are told that, if there are any who are m a worse state than that of mere captivity, namely, in darkness as well as in bondage, the Lord Jesus Christ comes to them, and says, Show yourselves; rise, and come out of the darkness; hide away no longer, come forth into the light, and enjoy it.
I. I have to try to FIND OUT THE CHARACTERS mentioned in the text: Them that are in darkness.
1. They were not always in darkness. She was a bright young spirit once, after a fashion; and he,--I know him very well, seemed to be everything that mirth could make youth to be. But, on a sudden, there came a cloud in the sky, both to her and to him. It may be that a death happened in the family, or sickness came, or if it was neither of these things, at any rate, the mind suddenly grew strangely quiet, and a stillness came down upon the spirit, and with that stillness there fell a gloom over the whole being. What were those thoughts that brought such a sobering influence into the life? I can tell you about them from my own experience. I thought, I have not lived as I ought to have lived. God made me, yet I have never truly served Him. He is my mothers God, but I have forgotten Him; my fathers God, yet I have never sought Him. What shall I do? God must punish me, &c. I seemed plastic as wax towards evil, yet hard as cast-iron or steel towards anything that was good. Then I grew sad in soul. I read my Bible a great deal, and the more I read it the more the darkness thickened about me, &c. This is the gateway into a joy that will be worth your having.
2. Besides this, a sense of sin has settled upon you.
3. The soul I am describing is in the dark, and the darkness settles down in conviction of sin. You have no hope.
4. You fear future and eternal night. It is to people in such a state that the Gospel of Christ is sent.
II. I am going to REPEAT THE EXHORTATION of the text: Show yourselves.
1. It means that you are running away from Divine justice, and that your wisest course will be to go and deliver yourself up. Do you not know that you are not really hidden? God sees you wherever you are; there is no hiding away from Him That is the very first thing for you to do; to submit yourself to God, to lie at His feet pleading for mercy.
2. The next way of showing yourselves is somewhat different: Say to them that are in darkness, Show yourselves; that is, you are very lonely, and you have been avoiding your best friends. Come out of your retirement. If you cannot speak to any mortal man, yet speak to the Immortal Man; go and tell out all your sorrow to the best of friends.
3. This passage may be applied to you who are sick, who are concealing your disease. I want every man who is troubled about the state of his heart, and every woman too, to come and show themselves to Christ, just as they are, in all their sire
4. The next thing you have to do is to show yourselves As healed ones, bound to confess Him who has cured them.
5. But I am going to carry the text a little farther yet. There are some young men, perhaps some young women also, who have been saved; they are no longer in the dark, and God has given them grace, and talents, yet still they are hiding themselves away. They are chosen ones loth to take their place of service. If the Lord has saved you, and if He is pleading for you in heaven, it is time you began to plead for Him on earth.
6. Our text applies also to persecuted ones who shall be owned and honoured of God. There will come a day when Gods people, who have long been in the dark through persecution, slander, and misrepresentation, shall hear the Lord speaking to them out of heaven, and saying, Gather My saints together unto Me; those that nave made a covenant with Me by sacrifice. Say to them that are in darkness, Show yourselves. What a change will come for Gods poor despised people in that day!
7. These words also relate to dead ones called to resurrection. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
They shall feed in the ways
The returning captives
This is part of the prophets glowing description of the return of the captives, under the figure of a flock fed by a great shepherd. We have seen a flock of sheep driven along a road; some of them hastily trying to snatch a mouthful from the dusty grass by the wayside. Little can they get there; they have to wait until they reach some green pasture in which they can be folded. This flock shall feed in the ways; as they go they will find nourishment. That is not all; the top of the mountains is not the place where grass grows. There are bare, savage cliffs, from which every particle of soil has been washed by furious torrents, or the scanty vegetation has been burnt up by the fierce sunbeams like swords. There the wild deer and the ravens live, the sheep feed down in the valleys. But their pasture shall be in all high places. The literal rendering is even more emphatic: Their pasture shall be in all bare heights where a sudden verdure springs to feed them according to their need. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Feeding in the ways
Whilst this prophecy is originally intended simply to suggest the abundant supplies that were to be provided for the band of exiles as they came back from Babylon, there lie in it great and blessed principles which belong to the Christian pilgrimage, and the flock that follows Christ.
1. They who follow Him shall find in the dusty paths of common life, and in all the smallnesses and distractions of daily duty, nourishment for their spirits. Do you remember what Jesus said? My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work. We, too, may have the same meat to eat which the world knows not of. That is a great promise, and it is a great duty.
(1) It is a promise, the fulfilment of which is plainly guaranteed by the very nature of the case. Religion is meant to direct conduct, and the smallest affairs of life are to come under its imperial control, and the only way by which a man can get any good out of his Christianity is by living it.
(2) But this is a great duty as well as a great promise. How many of us Christian people have but little experience of getting nearer to God because of our daily occupations! Therefore we need times of special prayer and remoteness from daily work; and there will be very little realisation of the nourishing power of common duties unless there is familiar to us also the entrance into the secret place of the Most High, where He feeds His children on the bread of life.
2. Further, my text suggests that for those who follow the Lamb there shall be greenness and pasture on the bare heights. Strip that part of our text of its metaphor, and it just comes to the blessed old thought, that the times of sorrow are the times when a Christian may have the most of the presence and strength of God. In the days of famine they shall be satisfied. Our prophet puts the same thought, under a kindred though somewhat different metaphor, in another place in this book where he says: I will open rivers in high places. That is clean contrary to nature. The rivers do not run on the mountain-tops, but down in the low ground.
3. May I turn these latter words of our text a somewhat different way, attaching to them a meaning which does not belong to them, but by way of accommodation? If Christian people want to have the bread of God abundantly, they must climb. (A. Maclaren, 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 vv9, 12[1510] See pp. 24–29.
THE CHURCH SHEPHERDED BY CHRIST [1510]
[1510] See pp. 24–29.
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Isa_49:9-10. They shall feed in the ways, &c.
“The comparison of God’s care to that of a shepherd was first used by Jacob (Gen_49:24); then by Moses (Deu_32:6; Deu_32:12). From these passages the prophets borrowed the same figure (Isa_40:11; Eze_34:12-13; Mic_7:14). In the New Testament Christ is compared to a shepherd (Joh_10:11; 1Pe_2:25; 1Pe_5:4; Heb_13:20). Travellers in the East and others record the peculiarly close and tender relationship of the Oriental shepherd to his flock.”
The Saviour is here represented under the image of a shepherd, who leads forth His flock in green pastures, &c.
I. The Divine Shepherd nourishes His flock. “They shall feed in the ways,” &c. A shepherd’s express engagement to feed, tend, keep. When one pasture was bare he would lead the sheep to another, and when the herbage was deficient he would cut down the tender shoots of trees for them to eat, and he would see that they had water to drink. In thus providing for them he frequently underwent long and severe labour. Jesus provides for all the wants of His people—temporal and spiritual. He opens before them unexpected sources of supply.
The Divine life must be fed, nourished, sustained. Our Good Shepherd’s provisions are plentiful, adapted, exhaustless—Himself His Word, His ordinances, &c. With Jehovah-Jesus for our shepherd, whose hand rests on all sources of supply, we can lack no temporal or spiritual good.
II. The Divine Shepherd protects His flock. “Neither shall the heat nor sun smite them.” They shall be sheltered from suffering like that of the intense heat of the burning sun reflected from the sandy wastes. The idea is, the Divine Shepherd will protect—shelter—His flock. This is the doctrine of the Bible, of the Old Testament as well as the New. “Whatever charge He gives His angels, He has not thereby discharged Himself, so that whether every saint has an angel for his guardian or no, we are sure he has God Himself for his guardian, and what higher consolation can we desire?” Those are well protected who have the Lord for their protector. He has manifested Himself as the protector of His people in all ages. Did He not deliver the stripling David out of the paw of the lion and the bear? (1Sa_17:34-36; &c.) Our good Shepherd’s protection is ever watchful, ever present, all-sufficient, never-failing (Psa_121:3-8, &c.) Have not you experienced this protection? What He has been, and what He has done in the past, He will be, and do in the future. Let us trust in the protection of our Divine Shepherd, and rejoice.
III. The Divine Shepherd leads His flock. “He that hath mercy on them shall lead them.” With infallible knowledge and tender care, He goes before His people in all their journeyings. No longer by the mystic and majestic pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night does He lead them, but by the indications of His providence, by His Word, and by His Spirit, &c. He shall lead them, not drive them. “He”—what a leader! It is a long and perilous way, but He knows every step. Let us cheerfully follow His gracious guidance, and be assured “He leadeth us in right paths” (Psa_23:3). “The ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall walk in them.”
IV. The Divine Shepherd refreshes His flock. “Even by the springs of water shall He guide them.” The faithful shepherd leads his flock beside cooling streams. When panting and breathless, he leads them to the “little green glen, with a quiet brooklet, and a moist lush herbage all along its course, while the ‘sunbeams, like swords’ are piercing everything beyond that hidden covert.” So Jesus leads His flock beside many a cooling spring. The spiritual life is liable to exhaustion. But our Divine Shepherd refreshes, vivifies, quickens the spirit when wearied and exhausted and troubled—worn down with toil, and conflict, and care. The blessings of the gospel are often compared to water; they are the rivers of soul-life.”
CONCLUSION.—
1. Is Jesus your Shepherd? Have you been convinced of your far and perilous wanderings? Have you heard and obeyed the Shepherd’s voice?
2. If you acknowledge Jesus as your Shepherd, then follow, love, obey, and trust Him.—Alfred Tucker.
THE IMPERFCTION OF EARTHLY BLESSINGS
Isa_49:10. Neither shall the heat nor sun smite them, &c.
One of the blessings promised to Christ’s people in the latter days. The promise is fulfilled now to those who depart hence believing in Him. This promise reminds us—
I. That the best things when bestowed in excess become great evils. What a glorious gift to man is the sun! How essential is its heat to human life and happiness! Yet how oppressive are the heats of summer! With what terrible blows the sun sometimes smites men! Let us remember that the measure of a thing is as important as its kind. “Moderation in all things,” is the wise man’s motto. How necessary to remember it in regard to food, sleep, work, recreation; in the household, in regard to kindness and to severity, &c.
II. That all earthly blessings have their drawbacks. The heats of summer are great blessings; without them how poor would the harvest be in the autumn! Yet what a strain they often are on human strength! How fatal they often are to human life! Noteworthy that it can be said as a promise, “Neither shall the heat nor the sun smite them.” So with other things; “every rose has its thorn.” Wealth, its moral dangers (H. E. I. 4358–3364, 4389–4399, and social inconveniences (H. E. I. 4381, 4387, 4388). Learning; how dearly it is often purchased (H. E. I. 3089). Domestic happiness; what possibilities of profound sorrow are bound up with it. “Every possession renders us capable of loss.” Long life; how much there is in connection with old age that is undesirable.
III. That in heaven we shall have all the blessings without any of the drawbacks (H. E. I. 2721–2727).
Some practical lessons:—
1. Let us not grumble at the natural and providential drawbacks of our earthly lot. Let us remember that, so to speak, they are the prices of the blessings, and that if we are called to endure the drawbacks the blessings will not be withheld. Many men grumble that they have to pay an income-tax, and forget to thank God that they have an income. If they had not that, the tax-gatherer would never knock at their doors. So with the drawbacks of other blessings. Murmuring is unwise and wicked.
2. When the conditions of our earthly life press on us most heavily, let us comfort ourselves by the remembrance of the perfect life towards which we are hastening. The prisoner is sustained by the knowledge that the hour of his liberation is drawing nigh; the mariner, by the fact that every gale blows him nearer to the “desired haven.” It is a good thing to walk now by faith and hope in that land where neither the heat nor the sun shall smite us (H. E. I. 216–218, 2766–2770).
3. If the future life for God’s people will be all perfection without abatement, how little should they dread that event which will introduce them to it! Are we prepared for that wonderful transition which we call death? If so, why should we fear it? If we are not prepared for it, how shall we excuse ourselves for the insane unpreparedness in which we are living? Prepare for it, and the: all the great and precious promises concerning the future life will be promises made to you, and that event of which the very name has been disagreeable to you will be the beginning of inconceivable joy (H. E. I. 1623–1635; P. D. 667, 694, 745).
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.
Alexander MacLaren1905 · Public DomainOn vv9, 11
Isaiah
FEEDING IN THE WAYS
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Isa 49:9.
This is part of the prophet’s glowing description of the return of the Captives, under the figure of a flock fed by a strong shepherd. We have often seen, I suppose, a flock of sheep driven along a road, some of them hastily trying to snatch a mouthful from the dusty grass by the wayside. Little can they get there; they have to wait until they reach some green pasture in which they can be folded. This flock shall ‘feed in the ways’; as they go they will find nourishment. That is not all; the top of the mountains is not the place where grass grows. There are bare, savage cliffs, from which every particle of soil has been washed by furious torrents, or the scanty vegetation has been burnt up by the fierce ‘sunbeams like swords.’ There the wild deer and the ravens live, the sheep feed down in the valleys. But ‘their pasture shall be in all high places.’ The literal rendering is even more emphatic: ‘Their pasture shall be in all bare heights,’ where a sudden verdure springs to feed them according to their need. Whilst, then, this prophecy is originally intended simply to suggest the abundant supplies that were to be provided for the band of exiles as they came back from Babylon, there lie in it great and blessed principles which belong to the Christian pilgrimage, and the flock that follows Christ.
They who follow Him, says my text, to begin with, shall find in the dusty paths of common life, and in all the smallnesses and distractions of daily duty, nourishment for their spirits. Do you remember what Jesus said? ‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.’ We, too, may have the same meat to eat which the world knows not of, and He will give that hidden manna to the combatant as well as ‘to him that overcometh.’ In the measure in which ‘we follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth,’ in that measure do we find-like the stores of provisions that Arctic explorers come upon, cached for them-food in the wilderness, and nourishment for our highest life in our common work. That is a great promise, and it is a great duty.
It is a promise the fulfilment of which is plainly guaranteed by the very nature of the case. Religion is meant to direct conduct, and the smallest affairs of life are to come under its imperial control, and the only way by which a man can get any good out of his Christianity is by living it. It is when he sets to work on the principles of the Gospel that the Gospel proves itself to be a reality in his blessed experience. It is when he does the smallest duties from the great motives that these great motives are strengthened by exercise, as every motive is. If you wish to weaken the influence of any principle upon you, do not work it out, and it will wither and die. If a man would grasp the fulness of spiritual sustenance which lies in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, let him go to work on the basis of the Gospel, and he ‘shall feed in the ways,’ and common duties will minister strength to him instead of taking strength from him. We can make the smallest daily incidents subserve our growth and our spiritual strength, because, if we thus do them, they will bring to us attestations of the reality of the faith by which we act on them. For convincing a man that a lifebuoy is reliable there is nothing like having had experience of its power to hold his head above the waves when he has been cast into them. Live your Christianity, and it will attest itself. There will come, besides that, the blessed memory of past times in which we trusted in the Lord and were lightened, we obeyed God and found His promises true, we risked all for God and found that we had all more abundantly. It is only an active Christian life that is a nourished and growing Christian life.
The food which God gives us is not only to be taken by faith, but it has to be made ours more abundantly by work. Saint Augustine said in another connection, ‘Believe, and thou hast eaten.’ Yes, that is blessedly true, but it needs to be supplemented by ‘they shall feed in the ways,’ and their work will bring them nourishment.
But this is a great duty as well as a great promise. How many of us Christian people have but little experience of getting nearer to God because of our daily occupations? To by far the larger number of us, in by far the greater space of time in our lives, our daily work is a distraction, and tends to obscure the face of God to us and to shut us out from many of the storehouses of sustenance by which a quiet, contemplative faith is refreshed. Therefore we need times of special prayer and remoteness from daily work; and there will be very little realisation of the nourishing power of common duties unless there is familiar to us also the entrance into the ‘secret place of the Most High,’ where He feeds His children on the bread of life.
We must not neglect either of these two ways by which our souls are fed, and we must ever remember that the reason why so many Christian people cannot set to their seal that this promise is true, lies mainly in this, that the ways on which they go are either not the ways that the Shepherd has walked in before them, or that they are trodden in forgetfulness of Him and without looking to His guidance. The work that is to minister to the Christian life must be work conformed to the Christian ideal, and if we fling ourselves into our secular business, as it is called-if you go to your counting-houses and shops, and I go to my desk and books, and forget the Shepherd-then there is no grass by the wayside for such sheep. But if we subject our wills to Him, and if in all that we do we are trying to refer to Him and are working in dependence on Him, and for Him, then the poorest work, the meanest, the most entirely secular, will be a source of Christian nourishment and blessing. We have to settle for ourselves whether we shall be distracted, torn asunder by pressure of cares and responsibilities and activities, or whether, far below the agitated surface which is ruffled by the winds, and borne along by the tidal wave, there will be a great central depth, still but not stagnant-whether we shall be fed, or starved in our Christian life, by the pressure of our worldly tasks. The choice is before us. ‘They shall feed in the ways,’ if the ways are Christ’s ways, and He is at every step their Shepherd.
Further, my text suggests that for those who follow the Lamb there shall be greenness and pasture on the bare heights. Strip that part of our text of its metaphor, and it just comes to the blessed old thought, which I hope many of us have known to be a true one, that the times of sorrow are the times when a Christian may have the most of the presence and strength of God. ‘In the days of famine they shall be satisfied,’ and up among the most barren cliffs, where there is not a bite for any four-footed creature, they shall find springing grass and watered pastures. Our prophet puts the same thought, under a kindred though somewhat different metaphor, in another place in this book, where he says, ‘I will open rivers in high places.’ That is clean contrary to nature. The rivers do not run on the mountain-tops, but down in the low ground. But for us, as the darkness thickens, the pillar may glow the brighter; as the gloom increases, the glory may grow; the less of nutriment or refreshment earth affords, the more abundantly does God spread His stores before us, if we are wise enough to take them. It is an experience, I suppose, common to all devout men, that their times of most rapid growth were their times of trouble. In nature winter stops all vegetable life. In grace the growing time is the winter. They tell us that up in the Arctic regions the reindeer will scratch away the snow, and get at the succulent moss that lies beneath it. When that Shepherd, Who Himself has known sorrows, leads us up into those barren regions of perpetual cold and snow, He teaches us, too, how to brush it away, and find what we need buried and kept safe and warm beneath the white shroud. It is the prerogative of the Christian soul not to be without trouble, but to turn the trouble into nourishment, and to feed on the barest heights.
May I turn these latter words of our text a somewhat different way, attaching to them a meaning which does not belong to them, but by way of accommodation? If Christian people want to have the bread of God abundantly, they must climb. It is to those who live on the heights that provision comes according to their need. If you would have your Christian life starved, go down into the fertile valleys. Remember Abraham and Lot, and the choice which each made. The one said: ‘I want cattle and wealth, and I am going down to Sodom. Never mind about the vices of the inhabitants. There is money to be made there.’ Abraham said: ‘I am going to stay up here on the heights, the breezy, barren heights,’ and God stayed beside him. If we go down we starve our souls. If we desire them to be fat and flourishing, nourished with the hidden manna, then we must go up. ‘Their pasture shall be in all high places.’
Before I finish, let me remind you of the application of the words of my text, which we owe to the New Testament. The context runs, as you will remember, ‘they shall not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor the sun smite them. For He that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall He guide them.’ And you remember the beautiful variation and deepening of this promise in that great saying which the Seer in the Apocalypse gives us, when he speaks of those ‘who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth,’ and are led ‘by living fountains of water,’ where ‘God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.’ So we are entitled to believe that on the loftiest heights, far above this valley of weeping, there shall be immortal food, and that on the high places of the mountains of God there shall be pasture that never withers. The prophet Ezekiel has a similar variation of my text, and transfers it from the captives on their march homewards, to the happy pilgrims who have reached home, when he says: ‘I will bring them unto their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel’-when they have reached them at last after the weary march-’I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the mountains of Israel shall their fold be; there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield1917 · Public DomainOn v12The word is supposed to refer to a people…
Sinim
The word is supposed to refer to a people of the far East, perhaps the Chinese.
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 vv9, 10, 12General Information:
General Information:
Yahweh continues speaking to his servant.
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They will graze along the roads, and on all the bare slopes will be their pasture
Yahweh speaks of the people living freely and prosperously as if they were sheep that had plenty of pasture in which to graze. (See: Metaphor)
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv10, 1249:10-11 Like a shepherd, the Lord in his mercy…
49:10-11 Like a shepherd, the Lord in his mercy will lead the returning exiles beside cool waters; he promised to comfort them and tend to their needs (see also 40:11; Ps 23:1). • level paths . . . highways: The Lord would open up the way of salvation.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 12 Being in Christ’s protection, they shall be safe against…
Being in Christ’s protection, they shall be safe against all dangers, and free from the fear of the enemies.
To them that are in the prison of sin and death.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv9–12 Isa 49:9 That thou mayest say to the prisoners,…
Isa 49:9 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth; to them that [are] in darkness, Shew yourselves. They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures [shall be] in all high places.
Ver. 9. That thou mayest say to the prisoners,] i.e., To such as lie hampered and enthralled in the invisible chains of the kingdom of darkness. To these Christ saith, Be refreshed with the light of saving knowledge, and with the liberty of the sons of God.
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They shall feed in the ways.] As cattle do, that are removed from place to place; they shall have a subsistence till they get home to their Father’s house, where is "bread enough."
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 vv9–12 That thou mayest say, to wit, with power and…
That thou mayest say, to wit, with power and effect, as when God said, Let there be light, &c. To the prisoners; to the Gentiles, who are fast bound by the cords of their sins, and taken captive by the devil at his will, as this same phrase is understood, Isa 42:7.
Go forth; come forth to the light, receive Divine illumination and consolation.
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They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in all high places; they shall have abundant provision in all places, yea, even in those which commonly are barren and unfruitful, and such are both common roads and high grounds.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv9–12 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth,....…
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth,.... God's covenant people, while unconverted, are prisoners; they are in the prison of sin, under the power and dominion of it, and under the guilt of it, and obligation to punishment for it; and they are in the prison of the law, they are transgressors of it, and are accused and convicted by it, and are condemned, and put in prison, and held there; and they are also Satan's prisoners, and are held and led captive by him at his will; and by virtue of the covenant, and the blood of it, these prisoners are set free; and Christ in the. Gospel speaks unto them, and proclaims liberty to them; and by the knowledge of the truth they are made free, and are brought into the liberty of the children of God; and are bid to go forth, and they are brought forth from their prison houses; and bid to go to the house of God, and walk at liberty, enjoying all the privileges and ordinances of the Gospel:
to them that are in darkness; in a state of nature and unregeneracy, which is a state of infidelity and ignorance; when men are in the dark, and know not themselves, nor their lost state and condition; nor the exceeding sinfulness of sin; nor Christ, and the way of salvation by him; nor the Spirit, and the operations of his grace; nor the Scriptures, and the doctrines of them:
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show yourselves; among the people of God, in his house and ordinances, when called, converted, and enlightened by Christ; or "be revealed" (c) or manifested, when they are known to be, what they were not knows before, the people and children of God. The Targum is,
"be revealed to the light;''
such are called to partake of the light of grace, and to enjoy the light of comfort and communion:
they shall feed in the ways; not in the broad road and highways of sin, but in the ways of God, in the word and ordinances: this denotes the publicness and pleasantness of them, and the plenty of provisions in them; and yet where it might not be expected, and where exposed to enemies: the allusion is to cattle, that are drove from place to place, and as they pass along feed in the ways upon such pasture as they there find; and suggests, that the saints are travellers, and as such have food provided them by the way:
and their pastures shall be in all high places; on hills and mountains, which are often barren and unfruitful. The Targum is,
"in or by rivers of water shall be the place of their habitation.''
(c) "revelamini", V. L. Munster, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.
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 vv9, 11, 12 Prisoners - To the Gentiles who are fast bound…
Prisoners - To the Gentiles who are fast bound by the cords of their sins, and taken captive by the devil at his will. Go forth - Come forth to the light, receive divine illumination. In high places - They shall have abundant provision in all places, yea even in those which commonly are unfruitful, such are both common roads and high grounds.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv9, 12 Verse 9. To them that are in darkness -…
Verse 9. To them that are in darkness - "And to those that are in darkness"] Fifteen MSS. (five ancient) of Dr. Kennicott's, eleven of De Rossi's, and one ancient of my own, and the two old editions of 1486 and 1488, and three others, add the conjunction ו vau at the beginning of this member. Another MS. had it so at first, and two others have a rasure at the place: and it is expressed by the Septuagint, Syriac, Chaldee, and Vulgate.
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 vv9, 12 Isa 49:9-11. That thou mayest say — Namely, with…
Isa 49:9-11. That thou mayest say — Namely, with power and effect, as when God said, Let there be light; to the prisoners — To the Gentiles, who are fast bound by the cords of their sins, and taken captive by the devil at his will. Go forth — Come forth to the light, receive divine illumination. They shall feed, &c. — They shall have abundant provision in all places, yea, even in those which commonly are unfruitful, as are both common roads and high grounds. They shall not hunger, &c. — They shall be supplied with all good and necessary things, and preserved from all evil occurrences and annoyances, as the Israelites were in the wilderness, by the manna and other provision afforded them, and the pillar of the cloud and fire, a token of the divine presence and protection. For he that hath mercy on them shall lead them — God, who hath magnified his mercy to them, will conduct them with safety and comfort. And I will make all mountains a way — I will remove all hinderances, and prepare the way for them, by levelling high grounds, and raising the low.
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 vv9–12 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth…
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth - This language occurs also in Isa 42:7. For an explanation of it, see the notes on that place.
To them that are in darkness - Synonymous with being prisoners, as prisoners are usually confined in dark cells.
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Show yourselves - Hebrew, ‘Reveal,’ or manifest yourselves; that is, as those who come out of a dark cell come into light, so do you, who have been confined in the darkness of sin, come forth into the light of the Sun of righteousness, and be manifest as the redeemed.
They shall feed in the ways - In the remainder of this verse, and in the following verses, the Messiah is represented under the image of a shepherd, who leads forth his flock to green fields, and who takes care that they shall be guarded from the heat of the sun, and shall not hunger nor thirst. The phrase ‘they shall feed in the ways,’ means, probably, that in the way in which they were going they should find abundant food. They should not be compelled to turn aside for pasturage, or to go and seek for it in distant places. It is equivalent to the language which so often occurs, that God would provide for the needs of his people, even when passing through a desert, and that he would open before them unexpected sources of supply.
And their pastures shall be in all high places - This means, that on the hills and mountains, that are naturally barren and unproductive, they should find an abundance of food. To see the force of this, we are to remember that in many parts of the East the hills and mountains are utterly destitute of vegetation. This is the case with the mountainous regions of Horeb and Sinai, and even with the mountains about Jerusalem, and with the hills and mountains in Arabia Deserta. The idea here is, that in the ways, or paths that were commonly traveled, and where all verdure would be consumed or trodden down by the caravans, and on the hills that were usually barren and desolate, they would find abundance. God would supply them as if he should make the green grass spring up in the hard-trodden way, and on the barren and rocky hills vegetation should start up suddenly in abundance, and all their needs should be supplied.
This is an image which we have frequently had in Isaiah, and perhaps the meaning may be, that to his people the Redeemer would open unexpected sources of comfort and joy; that in places and times in which they would scarcely look for a supply of their spiritual needs, he would suddenly meet and satisfy them as if green grass for flocks and herds should suddenly start up in the down-trodden way, or luxuriant vegetation burst forth on the sides and the tops of barren, rocky, and desolate hills. Harmer, however, supposes that this whole description refers rather to the custom which prevailed in the East, of making feasts or entertainments by the sides of fountains or rivers. ‘To fountains or rivers,’ Dr. Chandler tells us in his Travels, ‘the Turks and the Greeks frequently repair for refreshment; especially the latter, in their festivals, when whole families are seen sitting on the grass, and enjoying their early or evening repast, beneath the trees, by the side of a rill’ - (Travels in Asia Minor, p. 21.) Compare 1Ki 1:9. Thus Harmer supposes that the purpose of the prophet is, to contrast the state of the Jews when they were shut up in prison in Babylon, secluded from fresh air, and even the light itself, or in unwholesome dungeons, with their state when walking at liberty, enjoying the verdure, and the enlivening air of the country; passing from the tears, the groans, and the apprehensions of such a dismal confinement, to the music, the songs, and the exquisite repasts of Eastern parties of pleasure (see Harmer’s Obs., vol. ii. pp. 18-25; Ed. Lond. 1808). The interpretation, however, above suggested, seems to me most natural and beautiful.
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 vv9, 12 Ways. The captives shall find every convenience. (Calmet)
Ways. The captives shall find every convenience. (Calmet)
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).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv9–12 (Isa 42:7; Zac 9:12).
(Isa 42:7; Zac 9:12).
prisoners--the Jews bound in legal bondage.
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them . . . in darkness--the Gentiles having no light as to the one true God [VITRINGA].
Show yourselves--not only see but be seen (Mat 5:16; Mar 5:19). Come forth from the darkness of your prison into the light of the Sun of righteousness.
in the ways, &c.--In a desert there are no "ways," nor "high places," with "pastures"; thus the sense is: "They shall have their pastures, not in deserts, but in cultivated and inhabited places." Laying aside the figure, the churches of Christ at the first shall be gathered, not in obscure and unknown regions, but in the most populous parts of the Roman empire, Antioch, Alexandria, Rome, &c. [VITRINGA]. Another sense probably is the right one. Israel, on its way back to the Holy Land, shall not have to turn aside to devious paths in search of necessaries, but shall find them in all places wherever their route lies; so ROSENMULLER. God will supply them as if He should make the grass grow in the trodden ways and on the barren high places.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv11–12 11. Mountains… highways — Ordinances in the Christian Church…
11. Mountains… highways — Ordinances in the Christian Church conspicuously illustrate exalted privileges under Messiah. But there is implied by a change of figure here, that the disciples of Messiah become now, instead of quietly enjoying the luxuries of quiet and plenty, moving hosts or great caravans, over mountain passes entirely smoothed of ruggedness by their great Leader.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–12 9. That thou mayest say] Rather, Saying (R.V.) or…
9. That thou mayest say] Rather, Saying (R.V.) or possibly (continuing the previous infs.) “To say.”
the prisoners … them that are in darkness] i.e. the exiles; cf. Isa_42:7. The second half of the verse introduces a new figure, that of the flock, (see ch. Isa_40:11) led by Jehovah, the Good Shepherd.
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they shall feed in the ways] Or perhaps as LXX., in all the ways, wherein they go.
high places] bare heights; ch. Isa_41:18.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–12 (9) That thou mayest say to the prisoners .…
(9) That thou mayest say to the prisoners . . .—Comp. Isa_42:6-7. Here, perhaps, the thought of the deliverance of Israel is more exclusively prominent; but the words have obviously a yet wider and higher application.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv9–12 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth,…
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth, "The prisoners" here are not the captives in Babylon, but the servants of sin throughout the world. Christ would say to them, "Go forth." He would summon them by his messengers to repent,and be converted, and quit the service of sin, and "go forths" from the kingdom of darkness, and show themselves" as lights of the world, (Mat_5:14 Php_2:15) walking as children of the light". (Eph_5:8) It is a narrow exegesis which confines the prophet"s forecast to the mere return of the exiles to Palestine, and their re-settlement on their ancestral estates. They shall feed in the ways, etc. The returning "prisoners" are now represented as a flock of sheep, (comp. Isa_40:11) whom the good Shepherd will "lead" and "guide" by ways in which they will find sufficient pasture, which shall not fail them even when they pass over bare "hill-tops". (see Joh_10:11-16 Joh_21:15-17)
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv9–12 That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth
Isa_49:9
That thou mayest say to the prisoners, go forth
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Out of darkness into light
When Jesus comes to the soul, He delivers us from that direst of all bondages, fetches us out from that cruellest of all slaveries, the bondage of the spirit, the slavery of the heart.
Then we are told that, if there are any who are m a worse state than that of mere captivity, namely, in darkness as well as in bondage, the Lord Jesus Christ comes to them, and says, Show yourselves; rise, and come out of the darkness; hide away no longer, come forth into the light, and enjoy it.
I. I have to try to FIND OUT THE CHARACTERS mentioned in the text: Them that are in darkness.
1. They were not always in darkness. She was a bright young spirit once, after a fashion; and he,--I know him very well, seemed to be everything that mirth could make youth to be. But, on a sudden, there came a cloud in the sky, both to her and to him. It may be that a death happened in the family, or sickness came, or if it was neither of these things, at any rate, the mind suddenly grew strangely quiet, and a stillness came down upon the spirit, and with that stillness there fell a gloom over the whole being. What were those thoughts that brought such a sobering influence into the life? I can tell you about them from my own experience. I thought, I have not lived as I ought to have lived. God made me, yet I have never truly served Him. He is my mothers God, but I have forgotten Him; my fathers God, yet I have never sought Him. What shall I do? God must punish me, &c. I seemed plastic as wax towards evil, yet hard as cast-iron or steel towards anything that was good. Then I grew sad in soul. I read my Bible a great deal, and the more I read it the more the darkness thickened about me, &c. This is the gateway into a joy that will be worth your having.
2. Besides this, a sense of sin has settled upon you.
3. The soul I am describing is in the dark, and the darkness settles down in conviction of sin. You have no hope.
4. You fear future and eternal night. It is to people in such a state that the Gospel of Christ is sent.
II. I am going to REPEAT THE EXHORTATION of the text: Show yourselves.
1. It means that you are running away from Divine justice, and that your wisest course will be to go and deliver yourself up. Do you not know that you are not really hidden? God sees you wherever you are; there is no hiding away from Him That is the very first thing for you to do; to submit yourself to God, to lie at His feet pleading for mercy.
2. The next way of showing yourselves is somewhat different: Say to them that are in darkness, Show yourselves; that is, you are very lonely, and you have been avoiding your best friends. Come out of your retirement. If you cannot speak to any mortal man, yet speak to the Immortal Man; go and tell out all your sorrow to the best of friends.
3. This passage may be applied to you who are sick, who are concealing your disease. I want every man who is troubled about the state of his heart, and every woman too, to come and show themselves to Christ, just as they are, in all their sire
4. The next thing you have to do is to show yourselves As healed ones, bound to confess Him who has cured them.
5. But I am going to carry the text a little farther yet. There are some young men, perhaps some young women also, who have been saved; they are no longer in the dark, and God has given them grace, and talents, yet still they are hiding themselves away. They are chosen ones loth to take their place of service. If the Lord has saved you, and if He is pleading for you in heaven, it is time you began to plead for Him on earth.
6. Our text applies also to persecuted ones who shall be owned and honoured of God. There will come a day when Gods people, who have long been in the dark through persecution, slander, and misrepresentation, shall hear the Lord speaking to them out of heaven, and saying, Gather My saints together unto Me; those that nave made a covenant with Me by sacrifice. Say to them that are in darkness, Show yourselves. What a change will come for Gods poor despised people in that day!
7. These words also relate to dead ones called to resurrection. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
They shall feed in the ways
The returning captives
This is part of the prophets glowing description of the return of the captives, under the figure of a flock fed by a great shepherd. We have seen a flock of sheep driven along a road; some of them hastily trying to snatch a mouthful from the dusty grass by the wayside. Little can they get there; they have to wait until they reach some green pasture in which they can be folded. This flock shall feed in the ways; as they go they will find nourishment. That is not all; the top of the mountains is not the place where grass grows. There are bare, savage cliffs, from which every particle of soil has been washed by furious torrents, or the scanty vegetation has been burnt up by the fierce sunbeams like swords. There the wild deer and the ravens live, the sheep feed down in the valleys. But their pasture shall be in all high places. The literal rendering is even more emphatic: Their pasture shall be in all bare heights where a sudden verdure springs to feed them according to their need. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Feeding in the ways
Whilst this prophecy is originally intended simply to suggest the abundant supplies that were to be provided for the band of exiles as they came back from Babylon, there lie in it great and blessed principles which belong to the Christian pilgrimage, and the flock that follows Christ.
1. They who follow Him shall find in the dusty paths of common life, and in all the smallnesses and distractions of daily duty, nourishment for their spirits. Do you remember what Jesus said? My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work. We, too, may have the same meat to eat which the world knows not of. That is a great promise, and it is a great duty.
(1) It is a promise, the fulfilment of which is plainly guaranteed by the very nature of the case. Religion is meant to direct conduct, and the smallest affairs of life are to come under its imperial control, and the only way by which a man can get any good out of his Christianity is by living it.
(2) But this is a great duty as well as a great promise. How many of us Christian people have but little experience of getting nearer to God because of our daily occupations! Therefore we need times of special prayer and remoteness from daily work; and there will be very little realisation of the nourishing power of common duties unless there is familiar to us also the entrance into the secret place of the Most High, where He feeds His children on the bread of life.
2. Further, my text suggests that for those who follow the Lamb there shall be greenness and pasture on the bare heights. Strip that part of our text of its metaphor, and it just comes to the blessed old thought, that the times of sorrow are the times when a Christian may have the most of the presence and strength of God. In the days of famine they shall be satisfied. Our prophet puts the same thought, under a kindred though somewhat different metaphor, in another place in this book where he says: I will open rivers in high places. That is clean contrary to nature. The rivers do not run on the mountain-tops, but down in the low ground.
3. May I turn these latter words of our text a somewhat different way, attaching to them a meaning which does not belong to them, but by way of accommodation? If Christian people want to have the bread of God abundantly, they must climb. (A. Maclaren, 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 Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv9, 12 [1510] See pp. 24–29.
THE CHURCH SHEPHERDED BY CHRIST [1510]
[1510] See pp. 24–29.
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Isa_49:9-10. They shall feed in the ways, &c.
“The comparison of God’s care to that of a shepherd was first used by Jacob (Gen_49:24); then by Moses (Deu_32:6; Deu_32:12). From these passages the prophets borrowed the same figure (Isa_40:11; Eze_34:12-13; Mic_7:14). In the New Testament Christ is compared to a shepherd (Joh_10:11; 1Pe_2:25; 1Pe_5:4; Heb_13:20). Travellers in the East and others record the peculiarly close and tender relationship of the Oriental shepherd to his flock.”
The Saviour is here represented under the image of a shepherd, who leads forth His flock in green pastures, &c.
I. The Divine Shepherd nourishes His flock. “They shall feed in the ways,” &c. A shepherd’s express engagement to feed, tend, keep. When one pasture was bare he would lead the sheep to another, and when the herbage was deficient he would cut down the tender shoots of trees for them to eat, and he would see that they had water to drink. In thus providing for them he frequently underwent long and severe labour. Jesus provides for all the wants of His people—temporal and spiritual. He opens before them unexpected sources of supply.
The Divine life must be fed, nourished, sustained. Our Good Shepherd’s provisions are plentiful, adapted, exhaustless—Himself His Word, His ordinances, &c. With Jehovah-Jesus for our shepherd, whose hand rests on all sources of supply, we can lack no temporal or spiritual good.
II. The Divine Shepherd protects His flock. “Neither shall the heat nor sun smite them.” They shall be sheltered from suffering like that of the intense heat of the burning sun reflected from the sandy wastes. The idea is, the Divine Shepherd will protect—shelter—His flock. This is the doctrine of the Bible, of the Old Testament as well as the New. “Whatever charge He gives His angels, He has not thereby discharged Himself, so that whether every saint has an angel for his guardian or no, we are sure he has God Himself for his guardian, and what higher consolation can we desire?” Those are well protected who have the Lord for their protector. He has manifested Himself as the protector of His people in all ages. Did He not deliver the stripling David out of the paw of the lion and the bear? (1Sa_17:34-36; &c.) Our good Shepherd’s protection is ever watchful, ever present, all-sufficient, never-failing (Psa_121:3-8, &c.) Have not you experienced this protection? What He has been, and what He has done in the past, He will be, and do in the future. Let us trust in the protection of our Divine Shepherd, and rejoice.
III. The Divine Shepherd leads His flock. “He that hath mercy on them shall lead them.” With infallible knowledge and tender care, He goes before His people in all their journeyings. No longer by the mystic and majestic pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night does He lead them, but by the indications of His providence, by His Word, and by His Spirit, &c. He shall lead them, not drive them. “He”—what a leader! It is a long and perilous way, but He knows every step. Let us cheerfully follow His gracious guidance, and be assured “He leadeth us in right paths” (Psa_23:3). “The ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall walk in them.”
IV. The Divine Shepherd refreshes His flock. “Even by the springs of water shall He guide them.” The faithful shepherd leads his flock beside cooling streams. When panting and breathless, he leads them to the “little green glen, with a quiet brooklet, and a moist lush herbage all along its course, while the ‘sunbeams, like swords’ are piercing everything beyond that hidden covert.” So Jesus leads His flock beside many a cooling spring. The spiritual life is liable to exhaustion. But our Divine Shepherd refreshes, vivifies, quickens the spirit when wearied and exhausted and troubled—worn down with toil, and conflict, and care. The blessings of the gospel are often compared to water; they are the rivers of soul-life.”
CONCLUSION.—
1. Is Jesus your Shepherd? Have you been convinced of your far and perilous wanderings? Have you heard and obeyed the Shepherd’s voice?
2. If you acknowledge Jesus as your Shepherd, then follow, love, obey, and trust Him.—Alfred Tucker.
THE IMPERFCTION OF EARTHLY BLESSINGS
Isa_49:10. Neither shall the heat nor sun smite them, &c.
One of the blessings promised to Christ’s people in the latter days. The promise is fulfilled now to those who depart hence believing in Him. This promise reminds us—
I. That the best things when bestowed in excess become great evils. What a glorious gift to man is the sun! How essential is its heat to human life and happiness! Yet how oppressive are the heats of summer! With what terrible blows the sun sometimes smites men! Let us remember that the measure of a thing is as important as its kind. “Moderation in all things,” is the wise man’s motto. How necessary to remember it in regard to food, sleep, work, recreation; in the household, in regard to kindness and to severity, &c.
II. That all earthly blessings have their drawbacks. The heats of summer are great blessings; without them how poor would the harvest be in the autumn! Yet what a strain they often are on human strength! How fatal they often are to human life! Noteworthy that it can be said as a promise, “Neither shall the heat nor the sun smite them.” So with other things; “every rose has its thorn.” Wealth, its moral dangers (H. E. I. 4358–3364, 4389–4399, and social inconveniences (H. E. I. 4381, 4387, 4388). Learning; how dearly it is often purchased (H. E. I. 3089). Domestic happiness; what possibilities of profound sorrow are bound up with it. “Every possession renders us capable of loss.” Long life; how much there is in connection with old age that is undesirable.
III. That in heaven we shall have all the blessings without any of the drawbacks (H. E. I. 2721–2727).
Some practical lessons:—
1. Let us not grumble at the natural and providential drawbacks of our earthly lot. Let us remember that, so to speak, they are the prices of the blessings, and that if we are called to endure the drawbacks the blessings will not be withheld. Many men grumble that they have to pay an income-tax, and forget to thank God that they have an income. If they had not that, the tax-gatherer would never knock at their doors. So with the drawbacks of other blessings. Murmuring is unwise and wicked.
2. When the conditions of our earthly life press on us most heavily, let us comfort ourselves by the remembrance of the perfect life towards which we are hastening. The prisoner is sustained by the knowledge that the hour of his liberation is drawing nigh; the mariner, by the fact that every gale blows him nearer to the “desired haven.” It is a good thing to walk now by faith and hope in that land where neither the heat nor the sun shall smite us (H. E. I. 216–218, 2766–2770).
3. If the future life for God’s people will be all perfection without abatement, how little should they dread that event which will introduce them to it! Are we prepared for that wonderful transition which we call death? If so, why should we fear it? If we are not prepared for it, how shall we excuse ourselves for the insane unpreparedness in which we are living? Prepare for it, and the: all the great and precious promises concerning the future life will be promises made to you, and that event of which the very name has been disagreeable to you will be the beginning of inconceivable joy (H. E. I. 1623–1635; P. D. 667, 694, 745).
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.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv9, 11
Isaiah
FEEDING IN THE WAYS
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Isa 49:9.
This is part of the prophet’s glowing description of the return of the Captives, under the figure of a flock fed by a strong shepherd. We have often seen, I suppose, a flock of sheep driven along a road, some of them hastily trying to snatch a mouthful from the dusty grass by the wayside. Little can they get there; they have to wait until they reach some green pasture in which they can be folded. This flock shall ‘feed in the ways’; as they go they will find nourishment. That is not all; the top of the mountains is not the place where grass grows. There are bare, savage cliffs, from which every particle of soil has been washed by furious torrents, or the scanty vegetation has been burnt up by the fierce ‘sunbeams like swords.’ There the wild deer and the ravens live, the sheep feed down in the valleys. But ‘their pasture shall be in all high places.’ The literal rendering is even more emphatic: ‘Their pasture shall be in all bare heights,’ where a sudden verdure springs to feed them according to their need. Whilst, then, this prophecy is originally intended simply to suggest the abundant supplies that were to be provided for the band of exiles as they came back from Babylon, there lie in it great and blessed principles which belong to the Christian pilgrimage, and the flock that follows Christ.
They who follow Him, says my text, to begin with, shall find in the dusty paths of common life, and in all the smallnesses and distractions of daily duty, nourishment for their spirits. Do you remember what Jesus said? ‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.’ We, too, may have the same meat to eat which the world knows not of, and He will give that hidden manna to the combatant as well as ‘to him that overcometh.’ In the measure in which ‘we follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth,’ in that measure do we find-like the stores of provisions that Arctic explorers come upon, cached for them-food in the wilderness, and nourishment for our highest life in our common work. That is a great promise, and it is a great duty.
It is a promise the fulfilment of which is plainly guaranteed by the very nature of the case. Religion is meant to direct conduct, and the smallest affairs of life are to come under its imperial control, and the only way by which a man can get any good out of his Christianity is by living it. It is when he sets to work on the principles of the Gospel that the Gospel proves itself to be a reality in his blessed experience. It is when he does the smallest duties from the great motives that these great motives are strengthened by exercise, as every motive is. If you wish to weaken the influence of any principle upon you, do not work it out, and it will wither and die. If a man would grasp the fulness of spiritual sustenance which lies in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, let him go to work on the basis of the Gospel, and he ‘shall feed in the ways,’ and common duties will minister strength to him instead of taking strength from him. We can make the smallest daily incidents subserve our growth and our spiritual strength, because, if we thus do them, they will bring to us attestations of the reality of the faith by which we act on them. For convincing a man that a lifebuoy is reliable there is nothing like having had experience of its power to hold his head above the waves when he has been cast into them. Live your Christianity, and it will attest itself. There will come, besides that, the blessed memory of past times in which we trusted in the Lord and were lightened, we obeyed God and found His promises true, we risked all for God and found that we had all more abundantly. It is only an active Christian life that is a nourished and growing Christian life.
The food which God gives us is not only to be taken by faith, but it has to be made ours more abundantly by work. Saint Augustine said in another connection, ‘Believe, and thou hast eaten.’ Yes, that is blessedly true, but it needs to be supplemented by ‘they shall feed in the ways,’ and their work will bring them nourishment.
But this is a great duty as well as a great promise. How many of us Christian people have but little experience of getting nearer to God because of our daily occupations? To by far the larger number of us, in by far the greater space of time in our lives, our daily work is a distraction, and tends to obscure the face of God to us and to shut us out from many of the storehouses of sustenance by which a quiet, contemplative faith is refreshed. Therefore we need times of special prayer and remoteness from daily work; and there will be very little realisation of the nourishing power of common duties unless there is familiar to us also the entrance into the ‘secret place of the Most High,’ where He feeds His children on the bread of life.
We must not neglect either of these two ways by which our souls are fed, and we must ever remember that the reason why so many Christian people cannot set to their seal that this promise is true, lies mainly in this, that the ways on which they go are either not the ways that the Shepherd has walked in before them, or that they are trodden in forgetfulness of Him and without looking to His guidance. The work that is to minister to the Christian life must be work conformed to the Christian ideal, and if we fling ourselves into our secular business, as it is called-if you go to your counting-houses and shops, and I go to my desk and books, and forget the Shepherd-then there is no grass by the wayside for such sheep. But if we subject our wills to Him, and if in all that we do we are trying to refer to Him and are working in dependence on Him, and for Him, then the poorest work, the meanest, the most entirely secular, will be a source of Christian nourishment and blessing. We have to settle for ourselves whether we shall be distracted, torn asunder by pressure of cares and responsibilities and activities, or whether, far below the agitated surface which is ruffled by the winds, and borne along by the tidal wave, there will be a great central depth, still but not stagnant-whether we shall be fed, or starved in our Christian life, by the pressure of our worldly tasks. The choice is before us. ‘They shall feed in the ways,’ if the ways are Christ’s ways, and He is at every step their Shepherd.
Further, my text suggests that for those who follow the Lamb there shall be greenness and pasture on the bare heights. Strip that part of our text of its metaphor, and it just comes to the blessed old thought, which I hope many of us have known to be a true one, that the times of sorrow are the times when a Christian may have the most of the presence and strength of God. ‘In the days of famine they shall be satisfied,’ and up among the most barren cliffs, where there is not a bite for any four-footed creature, they shall find springing grass and watered pastures. Our prophet puts the same thought, under a kindred though somewhat different metaphor, in another place in this book, where he says, ‘I will open rivers in high places.’ That is clean contrary to nature. The rivers do not run on the mountain-tops, but down in the low ground. But for us, as the darkness thickens, the pillar may glow the brighter; as the gloom increases, the glory may grow; the less of nutriment or refreshment earth affords, the more abundantly does God spread His stores before us, if we are wise enough to take them. It is an experience, I suppose, common to all devout men, that their times of most rapid growth were their times of trouble. In nature winter stops all vegetable life. In grace the growing time is the winter. They tell us that up in the Arctic regions the reindeer will scratch away the snow, and get at the succulent moss that lies beneath it. When that Shepherd, Who Himself has known sorrows, leads us up into those barren regions of perpetual cold and snow, He teaches us, too, how to brush it away, and find what we need buried and kept safe and warm beneath the white shroud. It is the prerogative of the Christian soul not to be without trouble, but to turn the trouble into nourishment, and to feed on the barest heights.
May I turn these latter words of our text a somewhat different way, attaching to them a meaning which does not belong to them, but by way of accommodation? If Christian people want to have the bread of God abundantly, they must climb. It is to those who live on the heights that provision comes according to their need. If you would have your Christian life starved, go down into the fertile valleys. Remember Abraham and Lot, and the choice which each made. The one said: ‘I want cattle and wealth, and I am going down to Sodom. Never mind about the vices of the inhabitants. There is money to be made there.’ Abraham said: ‘I am going to stay up here on the heights, the breezy, barren heights,’ and God stayed beside him. If we go down we starve our souls. If we desire them to be fat and flourishing, nourished with the hidden manna, then we must go up. ‘Their pasture shall be in all high places.’
Before I finish, let me remind you of the application of the words of my text, which we owe to the New Testament. The context runs, as you will remember, ‘they shall not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor the sun smite them. For He that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall He guide them.’ And you remember the beautiful variation and deepening of this promise in that great saying which the Seer in the Apocalypse gives us, when he speaks of those ‘who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth,’ and are led ‘by living fountains of water,’ where ‘God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.’ So we are entitled to believe that on the loftiest heights, far above this valley of weeping, there shall be immortal food, and that on the high places of the mountains of God there shall be pasture that never withers. The prophet Ezekiel has a similar variation of my text, and transfers it from the captives on their march homewards, to the happy pilgrims who have reached home, when he says: ‘I will bring them unto their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel’-when they have reached them at last after the weary march-’I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the mountains of Israel shall their fold be; there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v12 The word is supposed to refer to a people…
Sinim
The word is supposed to refer to a people of the far East, perhaps the Chinese.
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 vv9, 10, 12 General Information:
General Information:
Yahweh continues speaking to his servant.
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They will graze along the roads, and on all the bare slopes will be their pasture
Yahweh speaks of the people living freely and prosperously as if they were sheep that had plenty of pasture in which to graze. (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
prison
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 vv10, 12 49:10-11 Like a shepherd, the Lord in his mercy…
49:10-11 Like a shepherd, the Lord in his mercy will lead the returning exiles beside cool waters; he promised to comfort them and tend to their needs (see also 40:11; Ps 23:1). • level paths . . . highways: The Lord would open up the way of salvation.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.