61:4
“They will rebuild ...” Salvation is God’s work, but we are not passive partners. We become active partners in God’s work. As Paul says in Eph 2:10, we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ to do good works. We are saved for a purpose. God renews us so that we can renew others. Things long destroyed can be restored by us.
61:5
The talk about strangers shepherding flocks, and foreigners working fields sounds bad to us as it smacks of slave labour. However, we need to remember the situation. The Israelites had been enslaved in Egypt, they were now in exile in Babylon. They were used to being at the beck and call of other nations. So the situation described in this verse is a reversal of the circumstances. It is not the whole story, as the next verse will demonstrate.
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