08/09/2020 – Day 076 – Isaiah 56 – 61 – The Panting Deer Takes a Drink from A Firehose.
Whoa, here we go again: God be praised, I am like a deer panting for water. And to cover these six chapters in one day, then write a commentary of say a page or less is like “taking a much needed drink of water from a fire hose.” And now I am sitting in Day 077. How about if I collapse it to three words: “Soli Deo Gloria!”
I have a supply of theological books and biblical study aids in storage, but here is one I should have pulled out here at home on Day 6, when we started with Isaiah: chapters 1 through 6 on the first Saturday, with eleven successive Saturdays to follow. Now we are down to the last reading assignment next Saturday – Chapters 62 -66, before moving to Jeremiah 10 on our designated books of the Prophets day of the week.
After completing our year, we could go back and study Isaiah more in depth. Here is my recommended study aid: (isbn reference: 978-0-87784-244-6)
“Isaiah” by J. Alec Motyer, of the Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries.
Let me start us off with an outline of the day’s assignment:
Chapter 56 – Salvation for the Gentiles
- Israel’s Irresponsible Leaders
Chapter 57 – Israel’s Futile Idolatry
- Healing for the Backslider
Chapter 58 – Fasting that Pleases God
Chapter 59 – Separated from God
- Sin Confessed
- The Redeemer of Zion
Chapter 60 – The Gentiles Bless Zion
- God the Glory of His People
Chapter 61 – The Good News of Salvation
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To summarize Isaiah, we are presented with a three-in-one Messiah view:
King (chapters 1 – 37); Servant (chapters 38-55) and the Annointed one who consummates salvation and vengeance (chapters 56 – 66 with emphasis in ch 61)
Footnote on 57:15: “Almighty God, who inhabits eternity, condescends to dwell with the lowly of heart (see Psalm 34:18; 51:17; and Matt 5:3). A humble and contrite heart is the essence of repentance. Now here I add the verse commentary in my book: “Whether contrite, literally ‘crushed’, i.e. under life’s burdens, oppositions or whatever, or lowly, at the bottom of life’s heap, whether in their own estimation (1 Timothy 1:15) or that of the world. (1 Cor 4:9-10), it is not the Lord’s intention to leave his people thus but rather to revive, to give (new) being to in spirit and heart. When used together like this, spirit is the ability to enter into life with gusto, and heart is the interior capacity for true thought, pure delight, accurate reflection.
What do we observe in America today? Is it not:
“Christianity today is man-centered, not God-centered.. The image of God currently popular is that of a distracted Father, struggling in heartbroken desperation to get people to accept a Savior of whom they feel no need and in whom they have very little interest.” A.W. Tozier
We can read the first part of Chapter 59 – “Separated from God” once again, verses 1-8 before taking alook at my Isaiah book once again, pg #368:
“Truth (as in verse 14c) is nowhere to be found – the verb adar means ‘to be missing’: personal probity is the missing ingrediant – and forces at work in society set out to ruin (prey) anyone who shuns evil. Things have gone beyond merely acting against the person who seeks to stand up for what is right. Even to avoid wrong on a personal level make one a marked man. This is a very adequate summary indeed of society as seen in 56:1 – 59:9. So what is to be done?”
I am going to interject a comment here: Not that we have doubts but by the power of the Holy Spirit, Isaiah is more than playing “three dimensional chess” here. The prophecy’s extend far beyond the prophecy of return from Babylonian exile for the Jewish people but the full redemption of the whole Abrahamic family of faith! (and that includes us – one body in Christ!) Fathomable or not, all of God’s promises are fulfilled!
Are we not to live in joy amidst the worst of persecutions from the world’s evil?:
“The religion of Christ in the religion of joy. Christ came to take away our sins, to roll off our curse, to unbind our chains, to open our prisonhouse, to cancel our debt; in a word, to give us the oil of joy for the mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. Is not this joy? Where can we find a joy so real, so deep, so pure, so lasting? (Jimmy note- forever is a long time) There is every element of joy – deep, ecstatic, satisfying, sanctifying joy – in the gospel of Christ. The believer in Jesus is essentially a happy man. The child of God is, from necessity, a joyful man. His sins are forgiven, his soul is justified, his person is adopted, his trials are blessings, his conflicts are victories, his death is immortality, his future is a heaven of inconceivable, unthough-of, untold, and endless blessedness. WIth such a God, such a Savious, and such a hope, is he not, ought he not, to be a joyful man? ” Octavius Winslow – footnote to my bible : 61:3.
I probably should have ended with the footnote above, but I can’t leave out two more quotes:
First, from my aforementioned Isaiah book , pg 369:
“But in Zion too, there is a sifting. Not all who claim to be of Zion will be saved in Zion; only the penitents (1:27-28; 57: 18-19; Heb. 12:22-23; Rev. 21:27) The Lord is as holy in redemption as in vengeance.
And by way of summarization in chapter 61 (verse #s in parenthesis) :
“The transformation of Zion’s experience (2c,3) was forecast in 60:17ff, and the work of planting (3) links with 60:21. Isaiah is thus taking his messianic portraiture into its next stage: the endowed Zion of 59:21] becomes the transformed Zion of 60: 17-22 through the annointed ministry of 61: 1-3. This is the passage which Jesus chose to read in Nazareth (Luke 4: 16-22 – our day 134), establishing the messianic credentials of Isaiah’s presentation. It is to be noted that Jesus ended his reading at the day of the Lord’s favor (2a). What Isaiah saw as one messianic work, the Lord Jesus divided into two: the salvific purpose of his first coming (Jn 3:17), and the judgmental component of his second coming (Jn. 5:22-29; cf. 2 Thessalonians 1: 7-10. The testimony is in three unequal parts: His preparation (1ab), his task (the seven infinitives of 1c – 3g) and the results to follow (3h – 4).
Connected by His grace and through vigilant prayer! And , “I don’t have enough faith to be anything but a Christian!”