Translation and Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ the Redeemer Church, Manhattan, KS 13 July 2008
1. Oh that you had ripped apart the heavens and come down;
from your face mountains would quake,
2. like fire kindles brushwood – fire boils water
to cause your adversaries to know your name,
from your face nations will tremble.
3. In your doing of fearsome things we did not anticipate, you came down,
from your face mountains quaked.
4. And from way-back-when, they have not heeded, they have not given ear, eye has not seen
a god besides you who acts on behalf of the one who waits for Him.
5. You interposed the one who rejoices and does righteousness;
in your ways they will remember you.
As for you, you were angry, and we sinned;
but in them forever we will be saved.
6. Now we have become as unclean – all of us,
and all our righteousnesses are like deceitful witnesses,
and we fade like the leaf – all of us,
and our iniquity, like the wind, carries us away.
7. And there is no one calling in your name, stirring himself to get a strong grip in you,
for you have hidden your face from us,
and you have made us melt in the hand of our sin.
8. But now, Jehovah, our father is you.
We are the clay, and you are our potter, and all of us are the work of your hand.
9. Do not be angry, Jehovah, over-much,
and do not forever remember iniquity,
so please look; all of us are your people.
10. Cities of your holiness have become wilderness.
Zion has become a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation.
11. The house of our holiness and of our beauty, where our fathers praised you, has become for the burning of fire, and all our valuables have gone to ruin.
12. Over these will you restrain yourself, Jehovah, keep silent, and afflict us over-much?
Of all the people to introduce this chapter, I would never have guessed I’d choose Mike Fleetwood, but as I was searching for the phrase “God is nowhere” the lyrics for Fleetwood Mac’s song, “These strange times” showed up. Listen to the words:
These strange times I look in my heart And see the dark
not the light
And how I'm sad and wished I was in love And look to the sky and cry out
God is nowhere, God is nowhere
And this is hell Being caught between the dark and the light
Daddy, daddy, hold on God is now here, God is now here
These strange times I too have dreams
Things that make me wonder If to walk a thin line is like
dying alone
And I'm trying to find my way home To where God is now here and the dark is now
light
…And I look to the sky and cry out God is now here, God is now here
I don’t know much about this guy or the details of his lyrics, but I do see in this poetry a lament that all is not well and a longing for God to show up and make things right. Do you ever feel that way?
I think that’s how Isaiah felt as he had been given a prophetic understanding of the future destruction of Jerusalem. Isaiah cried out to God in prayer for His chosen people in Chapters 63 and 64. These two chapters really run together and would actually work well as one chapter with this common theme of praying for revival.
v.1a “rip apart the heavens and come down”
o 31:4c Jehovah of Hosts will come down to fight upon Mount Zion and upon her hill. 5 Like birds covering, so Jehovah of Hosts will surely protect over Jerusalem and He will deliver, and by lingering over He will rescue.
o As Isaiah intercedes for his people, he brings to mind God’s power to intervene and save. It’s as though God is just waiting to break through. While this may have been a figure of speech in Isaiah’s mouth, God literally did and will rend the heavens through the comings of Jesus Christ:
§ Jesus’ first coming: Mat 3:16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; (cf Mar 1:10, Luk 3:21)
§ Jesus’ second coming: Rev 19:11 Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. (cf. 2 Pet. 3:10)
§ Even in the O.T. times, God intervened in the earth:
v.1b mountains quake/shake/tremble (KJV flow down/melt based on similar word, nzl, instead of zll – nzl used in Isa 44:3 to speak of the ourpouring of God’s Spirit, 45:8 the outpouring of His righteousness, and 48:21 the outpouring of water from the rock for Israel)
o I believe this is an allusion to Jdg 5:5 – the only other place this word occurs - where it describes the earthquake when the law was given through Moses at Mt. Sinai: The mountains melted/quaked from before the LORD, Sinai itself from before Jehovah God of Israel.
o When He showed up at Mt. Sinai, it was to express His law-covenant and to show the danger of breaking His law.
v.2a “as the kindling of fire upon brushwood – fire [that] boils water”
I think this is an allusion to the wrath of God against sin in Deut 32:22 For a fire is kindled in my anger, and will burn unto the lowest hell, and consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains. (cf Jer 15:14, 17:4)
v. 2b. “to cause your name to be known to your enemies/adversaries”
o These enemies Included Jews: Isa 1:24
o Also the enemy that comes in like a flood - Isa 59:18-19
o And the enemy nations that trod down God’s sanctuary - Isa 63:18
o The purpose is so that the world will know what God is like. Often our prayers are to prop up our idol of personal peace & prosperity. Biblical prayer for revival includes the salvation of the nations!
o When God shows up, it is not just to cause earthquakes, but to cause People to worship and respect Him:
v.2c “the nations tremble/quake from your face/presence”
o 5:24b they have rejected the law of Jehovah of Hosts and the word of the Holy One of Israel they have despised. 25. Therefore, the anger of Jehovah burned with His people and He stretched out His hand against it and struck it, and the mountains trembled, and it came to pass that their carcasses were as refuse in the midst of streets. In all this His anger was not turned aside, and still He is stretching out His hand.
o 13:11b I will finish off the arrogant proud, and humiliate the pompous pride of the ruthless… 13 I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will shake out of her place, at the wrath of Jehovah of hosts in the day of his fierce anger.
o 28:21 For as it was at Mount Perazim [when David slaughtered the Philistines], Jehovah will stand up, as it was at Gibeon Valley, He will get angry enough to do His work - His strange work and to perform His service – His unfamiliar service.
v. 3a. “In your doing of awesome/fearsome things we did not anticipate/expect/look for”
o Isaiah remembers a previous time when God “came down” – perhaps he’s still thinking of the ways that God intervened with plagues and with the parting of the Red Sea to deliver Israel from Egypt, as this word “awesome/fearsome” is used in other Bible passages:
o 2 Samuel 7:23 And what one nation in the earth is like your people, even like Israel, whom God went to redeem unto himself for a people, and to make for himself a name, and to do great things for you, and fearsome things for your land, before your people, whom you redeemed for yourself out of Egypt, from the nations and their gods?
o Psalms 106:21-22 They forgot God their Saviour, who had done great things in Egypt, 22 wondrous works in the land of Ham, and fearsome things by the Red Sea.
o We can also look back to key points in history since Bible times when God intervened and preserved our peoples:
o such as the Battle of Tours that stopped the Muslim advance into Europe in 732,
o the storm that allowed the British to defeat the Spanish Armada in 1588,
o and events in the American war for independence.
In 1776, the American army under George Washington was able to peacefully
take over Boston through a miraculous event. The British army held the town of
Boston and filled its harbor with warships and troops, so Washington decided to
move his position up to the Dorchester Heights above Boston. The British could
have easily stopped the Americans from taking this position on the heights
except for one thing: clouds set in, screening the whole move from the view of
the British!
David McCullough, in his book 1776,
wrote, “The night was unseasonably mild—indeed, perfectly beautiful with a
moon—ideal conditions for the work, as if the hand of the Almighty were
directing things… ‘It was hazy below [the Heights] so that our people could not
be seen, though it was a bright moonlight night above on the hills.’ On the
Heights the men toiled steadily with picks and shovels... By the first faint
light before dawn, everything was ready, with at least 20 cannon in place. It
was an utterly phenomenal achievement… At daybreak, the British commanders
looking up at the Heights could scarcely believe their eyes."
The British guns could not reach the heights, but the Americans could fire
down upon the British and hold their position. The next day, as the British
mobilized to fight anyway, but a fierce storm stopped them and they decided to
just evacuate the city of Boston without a fight.
o What breakthroughs can you remember from scripture and from your own history?
o I remember a time when I was just married and struggling to get along financially. We had a Toyota Corolla which we called “The Tomato” because it was painted bright red. But the Tomato had starter problems, and one time we were in downtown Chattanooga and the Tomato died and wouldn’t start again – not even when I tried the “whack it with a hammer” trick. I rolled it to the nearest gas station and bummed a ride home. With the last of my money I bought a refurbished starter the next day and bummed a ride back to the gas station to do the replacement job myself. That’s when I discovered that somebody had slashed the tires. I got the car running, but couldn’t drive it home because the tires were slashed. It would cost more money than I had to put new tires on, so I bummed a ride back home. I was really depressed. God, why would you let this happen? Please help! Then God broke through. An unexpected check arrived in the mail, a gift from some infrequent supporter, for the exact amount that I needed to buy the tires! It’s these kinds of God’s intervention that can spur us on to trust Him for His intervention to save in the future.
v.4a “and from of old/ancient times/everlasting/the beginning/way-back-when they have not listened , they have not given ear, eye has not seen a God besides you”
o This can be taken two ways:
o These days of old from way-back-when have been mentioned several times in chapter 63 to describe the time of Moses leading Israel out of Egypt 63:12b cleaving the waters away from their faces to make for Himself an everlasting name, 13. causing them to walk through the depths? …16b You, Jehovah are our father; from way-back-when your name has been our Redeemer!
o I Cor. 2:9 elaborates on this passage in Isaiah: 1 Corinthians 2:7 we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, even the wisdom that hath been hidden, which God foreordained before the worlds unto our glory: 8 which none of the rulers of this world hath known: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory: 9 but as it is written, Things which eye saw not, and ear heard not, And which entered not into the heart of man, Whatsoever things God prepared for them that love him.
o Israel had other gods besides Jehovah (26:13), but the one true God has declared (45:5) “I am Jehovah, and there is not another; besides me there are no gods. I will help you, yet you will not know me… 20b The ones lifting up wood - their idol - and praying to a god that will not save, they did not know. 21. Make a declaration and make a case. Let them also take counsel together. Who caused this to be heard from before - from the past declared it? Was it not I, Jehovah? And there is not another god besides me, a God of righteousness and the One who causes to save. There is none besides me.”
v.4b “He acts for the one who waits for Him”
o Dan Allender & Tremper Longman, in their book, The Cry of the Soul, explain how waiting is acknowledgment that we are not in contol. It is a form of faith in God. “To be blocked from gaining what we want forces us to wait, and we despise the helplessness of waiting because it stops us from moving toward satisfaction. We are distressed when we are compelled to wait in a bank line or for a friend who is late. The break in momentum toward satisfaction tells us that relief is not imminent; in fact, it might not occur at all. Waiting intensifies pain because it forces us to see that we are dependent creatures. We want satisfaction—the resolution of our tension and emptiness—but we can't obtain relief because satisfaction of our deepest desire is in the hands of those we can't control.” (The Cry of the Soul p.56)
o That’s why Isaiah said earlier, 8:17 I will wait for Jehovah, who is hiding His face from the house of Jacob, and I will look eagerly for Him.
o 30:18 …happy are all who wait for Him.
v.5a “You met the one who rejoices and who does righteousness”
o We need God to come down because He provides the way of salvation
o This word “meet/help” is the same word “interpose/intercede” that is used throughout Isaiah’s book to describe the intervention of Jesus Christ in salvation.
1. 53:6 & 12 All we like the flock have strayed, each has faced toward his own way. But Jehovah interposed/met in Him the iniquity of us all… He poured out His soul to the death and was numbered with rebels. And He Himself carried the sin of many, and will interpose for the rebels.
2. Who is it that “rejoices and does righteousness”? 59:16 He saw that there was no man, and He was astonished that there was no intercessor, and His arm caused to save for Him, and His righteousness upheld Him” There was “no man” except Jesus!
3. Hebrews 12:2 looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (cf Isa 62:5, 61:10 on “rejoicing”)
4. I believe that the one who rejoices and does righteousness is Jesus, who met us/stepped into our place to save us.
o
On the basis of Jesus’ work, they (plural as opposed to the
singular “he” who “rejoices and does righteousness”) “they [who are saved]
through His ways will remember” OR
“while in God’s ways they will remember” – this is the way of remembrance
spoken of in chapter 63:7ff “I will cause to remember the lovingkindnesses of
Jehovah”
o The need for salvation is presented by means of a contrast here in the second half of v. 5:
1. “As for you, you were angry and we sinned”
a. We looked at the wrath of God against sin in depth at the beginning of Ch. 63.
b. 42:24 Who gave up Jacob to the looter, and Israel to plunderers? Was it not Jehovah, against whom we sinned, and were not willing to walk in His ways and did not give heed to His law?
c. We sin; God is angered. What can be done?
2. The last phrase of v. 5 is literally “in them forever and we will be saved”
a. Some translations attach the phrase “in them forever/for a long time” to the verb “we sinned” to make “we continued in sin a long time.”
b. The problem with this translation is that it does not provide an antecedent for the phrase “in them” – there is no plural noun for “sin” in the sentence that it “in them” can refer to.
c. The only plural noun to be found is in the first half of the sentence “your ways” and so I agree with the NIV’s choice to render “God’s ways” as the antecedent of “them,”
d. although I disagree with their choice to make the last statement into a question, “How can we be saved?” There is nothing in the Hebrew or Greek text to indicate that this is a question. I conclude therefore that it is a statement, “We will be saved.”
e. Even though we have sinned and God’s anger was roused by that sin, so surely God raised up His righteous son to meet us and stand in our place and suffer the wrath of God for us. So surely His children will remember Him and He will save us through the provision of his son Jesus.
Why do we need Jesus to come? Because we are totally depraved in sin
§ v.6a We are impure, unclean – all of us, due to our breaking of God’s rules. Even Isaiah, as good a man as he was, said in chapter 6, “Woe is me, for I am a man of unclean lips.”
a. This uncleanness means that we have lost access to God, just as ceremonially unclean people could not come into the temple in the Old Testament times and Isaiah prophesied that no unclean person will be found on the Lord’s way (52:1,11, 35:8, Rev. 21:7ff) “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23)
b. “There is a deep-seated unbelief among Christians just now, about the eternity of future punishment... I fear at the bottom of all this there is a rebellion against the dread sovereignty of God. There is a suspicion that sin is not, after all, so bad a thing as we have dreamed. There is an apology, or a lurking wish to apologize (make an excuse) for sinners, who are looked upon rather as objects of pity than as objects of indignation, and really deserving the… punishment which they have willfully brought upon themselves. I am afraid it is the old nature in us putting on the specious garb of charity, which thus leads us to discredit a fact which is as certain as the happiness of believers… Some cannot bear the thought; but to me it seems inevitable that sin must be punished… If sin becomes a trifle, virtue will be a toy.” (Charles Spurgeon, 1865)
c. “Those of us who are redeemed are saved not merely from our mistakes, from trifles, but from eternal damnation. It is because God rejected His own Son that He accepts us. The terrible divine justice meted out upon Jesus Christ for our sin paid for the mercy and grace which brings us so much joy, now and into glory. We must understand and acknowledge the dreadful sinfulness of sin if we are ever to comprehend the amazing graciousness of grace.” (Mark Travers, 2008)
§ The second phrase in v.6 is generally translated “all our righteousnesses are like a filthy/unclean garment/rag.”
a. The word “adim” translated “filthy/unclean” would actually a euphemism, because the people who translate it this way say that the word means a woman’s “periods” where at regular monthly intervals old blood is expelled from her womb to make way for fresh arrangements for a baby to be conceived.
b. God comes up with a phrase to tell us how gross our sin really is to him. God could have said that our righteousness are like muddy boots, but certain boys I know wouldn’t find that to be objectionable at all. But girl blood? That will even gross out a little boy who loves things like mud & dirt. The idea is that all our attempts to do good things are really gross in God’s eyes.
c. Instead of putting on God’s garments of beauty (52:1) and God’s garment of salvation (59:17) we make up our own ways to add goodness to ourselves, but they are inadequate (59:6) and will result in us being like those grapes (63:1-3) that are crushed in God’s wrath against our sin and that defile His garment.
d. My family just recently watched the movie, Second Chance (Which I recommend, although it has a bit of street talk in it.) and it does a good job of depicting this phenomenon of how we make up in our heads what would be a good thing to do and we do those things and feel good about ourselves never realizing how repugnant those deeds are to others. In the movie, the assistant pastor of a white, suburban mega-church condescends to “help out” a pastor in a struggling black church in inner-city Nashville. The white pastor swaggers in with his white button-down shirt and Gucci shoes to ladle mashed potatoes and gravy in the free food line and to take movie footage to raise funds for this little downtown project. He feels like he is doing the inner city a favor. The black pastor, of course, resents this kind of attitude and would rather go without the white pastor’s money than put up with the white pastor’s attitude.
§ While it is true that our sin is really gross in God’s eyes, the problem with this generally-accepted translation is that the word is not used this way anywhere else in the Bible. Everywhere else, the word means “witnesses.”
a. Another thing to consider is that the primary meaning of the word translated “clothing/rags” is “deceit/treachery” (related to the concept of “clothing” in that deceit is a “cover-up,” just as clothes hide your skin).
b. I believe that it might be more consistent to translate this phrase “deceit of witnesses” rather than “filthy rags.” This is the way I have chosen to translate it, giving the sense that all of us have become unclean and all of our self-righteous behaviors are like deceitful witnesses that tell us everything is o.k. when things really aren’t o.k. This would follow the sense of:
c. 57:11. And whom did you dread and fear that you became deceptive and did not remember me? You did not lay it upon your heart. Was it not I myself who held peace – and that for an eternity, yet you do not fear me! 12. I myself will relate your “righteousness,” and your deeds – even they will not profit you. 13. ... But the one who takes refuge in me will possess the land, and he will take over my holy mountain!
d. The Apostle Paul recognized that all the things that make us look good are a slippery place to stand, and the only safe place to stand is on Jesus Christ: Philippians 3:4b …if anyone else has another mind to have confidence in flesh I have more: 5 Circumcised the eighth day of the offspring of Israel, a tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, according to (the) law, a Pharisee 6. According to zeal, a persecutor of the church according to the righteousness in the law, to become blameless. 7 But whatever things were gain to me, these things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ… and reckoned (them as) dung, in order that I may gain Christ, 9. and that I may be found (standing) in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is in the law, but (having) the (righteousness) through faith of Christ, the (righteousness) of God based on faith.
§ The end of the verse says that we’re like a dry leaf in the Fall and that our iniquity, like the wind will carry us away. [ILLUSTRATE BY DROPPING REAL LEAF ON FLOOR]
a. Come winter, that leaf has no control over where it will fall, the Kansas wind is going to blow it wherever the wind is going.
b. And without the power of Christ, we will be controlled by our sin, flapping in the breeze whichever way our lust is blowing.
c. Jesus said, “I am the vine, you are the branches… abide in me and you will bear much fruit (John 15).”
d. Only when we are connected to the power of God through faith in Jesus can we be saved from withering up into ourselves and being carried off by our sin.
e. If Jesus is not in control of your life, sin is in control and you are not in control.
f. The only way to get off the train headed for the cliff is for Jesus to rip open the heavens and take over control, and that’s what Isaiah is praying for.
v.7a “There is no one calling in your name, stirring himself to get a strong-grip in you”
§ We cannot save ourselves. When Jesus is not in control of our lives and sin is blowing us around, we are like that dead leaf. We can’t get up and grab back hold of the tree that gives life to the leaf.
§ People can walk by all day long and tell that leaf that it needs to wake up and grab back onto that tree (52: 1. Awake, stir yourself up! Put on your strength, Zion! Put on your garments of splendor, Jerusalem, City of the Holy One! 2. Shake yourself, arise from the dust... Let the bonds of your neck be unlocked, captive daughter of Zion!) But we are helpless to do anything about it in our own strength.
§
That is why God must break through in His power if any salvation
is going to happen.
41:13 I am Jehovah your God, taking a strong grip on your right hand; saying to
you, ‘Fear not, I myself will help you."
v.7b “For you have hidden your face from us, and made us melt in the hand of our sins”
§ Isaiah puts all the blame on God! It’s like he said in 63:17 “Why do you cause us to stray, Jehovah, from your ways - you cause to harden our heart from the fear of you? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your inheritance.”
§ Isaiah recognizes that God is sovereign even over our sin. If someone’s heart it hard, it’s because He hardened it; if we don’t call upon the name of the Lord it’s because He has hidden his face from us.
§ Romans 1:24 “God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves: 25 because they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator… 26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile passions: for their women changed the natural use into that which is against nature: 27 and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another, men with men working unseemliness, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was due.” There’s the New Testament picture of melting in the hand of our sins.
§ That’s why God must break through. That’s why Isaiah begs God in this prayer to change His stance toward us rather than merely starting a campaign to change people’s attitude toward God.
§ That’s why Isaiah said in 8:17 “I will wait for Jehovah, who is hiding His face from the house of Jacob, and I will look eagerly for Him.”
§ Isaiah (and we) can pray and wait with confidence because we know that the nature of God is to save and because we have promises like 54:8 “With flood of wrath I caused my face to be hidden from you for a moment, but with everlasting lovingkindness I will have compassion on you,” says Jehovah your Redeemer. (cf. 57:17)
§ That’s why Isaiah can pray like he does in the following verses:
v.8a “But now, Jehovah, you are our father”
§
Isaiah is the first and only OT writer
to call God “our father”:
Isaiah: 63:15 Look down from the heavens and see from the mansion of
your holiness and your beauty. Where is your zeal and your exploits? The
moaning of your inner parts and your compassion toward me has been restrained.
16. For it is You who are our father, for Abraham did not know us and
Israel will not recognize us. You, Jehovah are our father; from way-back-when
your name has been our Redeemer!
§ This break from a human forefather being one’s defining identity to a union with God through faith being one’s defining identity is a New Testament concept that Isaiah introduces here! The “now” (which the NIV unfortunately omits) indicates a change to the New Testament where:
· Jesus taught His disciples to pray to God as “our Father” (Mt. 6:9)
· and Paul consistently called God “our Father” and identified Him with the Savior Jesus Christ in the introductions to his letters (Romans 1:7; 1 Corinthians 1:3; 2 Corinthians 1:2; Ephesians 1:2; Philippians 1:2; Colossians 1:2; 2 Thessalonians 1:1; 2:16; Philemon 1:3)
v.8b “we are the clay, and you are the potter, and we are the working of your hand – all of us”
§ This seems to be a rather different situation than was described before:
§ 29:16 Your perverseness! Is the potter to be considered like clay? For a making says to its maker, “He did not make me,” and a pot said about its potter, “He doesn’t understand.”
§ 45:9 Woe to the one who strives with his Potter – ceramic of earthen ceramics. Does clay say to its potter, “What will you make?” or “Your work – there are no hands for it!” 10. Woe to one who says to a father, “What will you beget?” or to a woman, “What will you deliver?” 11. Thus says Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, and its Potter, “Ask me of the things to come, y’all! Concerning my children and concerning the work of my hand, commit them unto me.
§ This new lump of clay is submitting to its potter. (Ps. 138:8)
v.9a The Request: “Do not be angry over much, Jehovah, and do not forever remember iniquity.”
§ Jeremiah illustrates this change in the covenant relationship through the course of his book: 14:10b “…they loved to wander; they have not refrained their feet: therefore Jehovah will not accept them; now he will remember their iniquity, and visit their sins…” 31:33-34 “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” says Jehovah: “I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people: 34 … I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin will I remember no more.”
v.9b “So please look; all of us are your people”
§ This is a prayer for more than self or family. When we pray, we should pray for all God’s people!
§ 63:15 Look down from the heavens and see from the mansion of your holiness and your beauty. Where is your zeal and your exploits?
§ 18:4 Jehovah said to me: "In My establishment, I will be calm and look on like clear heat in sunshine, like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest." God is not distracted and distant from what is going on; rather He is “looking” watching the situation waiting for the right time to halt evil and spread His kingdom.
§ How can Isaiah be so bold as to command God the Father Almighty not to be angry, not to remember iniquity and even tell God where to be looking? This is based upon God’s covenant relationship with His people. “all of us are your people”
§ It is God’s nature to love His people, and He has promised to keep His eye on them (Deuteronomy 32:10; Psalms 17:8; Proverbs 7:2; Lamentations 2:18; Zechariah 2:8) and not punish them as their sins deserve (Psalm 103:5ff; Dan. 9:19ff). We can’t pray and expect these things for just anybody, but we can pray them for those who have entered into a covenant relationship with God and have been baptized. We can pray with confidence for the revival of the church and its members – and that includes the children in the church! (cf. James 5:13-20)
vs. 10-11 Isaiah looks into the future destruction of Jerusalem and lists the losses for God and man:
1. v.10 looks at the loss in terms of what God has lost.
a. He has lost His representation of holiness upon the earth by exercising His anger against His people: “Your holy cities (or the cities of your holiness) and Zion have become a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation”
b. There are no more cities standing which represent your holiness, God. You won’t let that continue to be, will you? It is your nature to set apart people upon the earth for yourself and make them holy.
c. This was the prayer of Daniel in chapter 9 and of Nehemiah in the first chapter of his book.
d. When we look at the world around us and realize that they are not seeing a good representation of God’s holiness, let this move you to pray for God to come down and bring revival!
e. God indeed would not leave that situation unremedied. He sent Nehemiah to rebuild Jerusalem, then He sent His son to make a holy people called the church (I Peter 2:5)
2. v.11 looks at the situation in terms of what Israel had lost:
a. “The house of our holiness and of our beauty were our fathers praised you has been for the burning of fire”
b.
The loss of God’s special presence and the curse of being burnt
was prophesied by Moses:
Deuteronomy 29:22-27 And the generation
to come… and the foreigner that shall come from a far land, shall say, when
they see the plagues of the land, and the sicknesses with which Jehovah made it
sick; 23 and that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and a burning..
24 even all the nations shall say, “Why did Jehovah do this unto this land?
what is the meaning of the heat of this great anger?” 25 Then men shall say,
“Because they forsook the covenant of Jehovah, the God of their fathers, which
he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, 26 and
went and served other gods… 27 therefore the anger of Jehovah was kindled
against this land, to bring upon it all the curse that is written in this book”
c. This indeed came to pass as 2 Chron 36 records it: 16 they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until the wrath of Jehovah arose against his people, till there was no remedy. 17 Therefore he brought upon them the king of the Chaldeans, who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary… 19 And they burnt the house of God, and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces thereof with fire, and destroyed all its pleasant things.
d. The precious/treasured/pleasant things mentioned at the end of v.11 are a synonym for the temple and its goods (cf. Joel 3:5, Ezek 24:16-25, Lam 1:10, 2:4)
e. Isaiah saw that Israel stood to lose the beauty and holiness and value provided by God. This moved him to pray as he did.
f. Do you ever look around at the Christians around you and cry out to God to preserve His beauty and holiness among such a dim bunch? Pray for God’s people! We need it!
And so in “these strange times[when you] look in [your] heart [and in the world – and the church - around you] And see the dark not the light” recognize that God is near, waiting for your prayer, waiting to act for those who wait on Him, just waiting to rip apart the heavens again and come down as he has before. We desperately need Him because we are dead in sin - like the dead leaf - unable to help ourselves, we need Him because no one else can save us, He is our Father and our potter who brought us into being and shapes us into what we will be. Cry out to Him to come down and transform the ruins and desolation we see from sin.
v.12 Over these things, will you restrain yourself, Jehovah, keep silent, and afflict us over-much?
§ We already know God’s answer: 42:14 “I have held my peace from way-back-when; I will keep still; I will restrain myself; like a birthing woman I will cry out… 15. I will lay waste mountains and hills … 16. And I will cause the blind to walk in a way they do not know... I will arrange the darkness before their faces into the light, and the crooked into straight. These are the things I have done, and I do not forsake them.”
§ No, I will not afflict you over-much, I will instead afflict my Son Jesus in your place 53:5 He was being pierced from our rebellion - beaten from our iniquity. Chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes there is healing for us. 6. All we like the flock have strayed, each has faced toward his own way. But Jehovah interposed in Him the iniquity of us all. 7. He was oppressed and He Himself was afflicted …
§ 62:1 For the sake of Zion [the church] I will not sit still, and for the sake of Jerusalem I will not rest, until her righteousness goes abroad like brightness and her salvation as a flame burns, 2. and nations will see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory , and you will be called a new name, as the mouth of Jehovah will brand it. 3. You will be a crown of beauty in the hand of Jehovah and the diadem of the kingdom in the palm of your God. 4. It will never again be said of you, “She is forsaken,” and your land will never again be said to be desolate, for you will be called “My delight is in her,” and your land, “Married…”
Nate Wilson’s website – Isaiah Sermon Expositions