Isaiah 40:12-20 - Consider the Lord

When we consider our circumstances we so easily forget who the Lord is, we allow our thoughts to be concerned solely with whatever is facing us. The difficulties of the situation, how we got into the mess, why it is impossible to get out of it etc. We need to remind ourselves of who our God is. 

The whole earth is as nothing to God. He can hold all the seas in the hollow of His hand, or hold the dust of the earth in a basket.  This is, of course, figurative language, but the meaning is clear. God is infinitely greater than anything we face. 

The Spirit of the Lord is wiser than all the wisdom of the world. The world has nothing to teach God, despite what it might think! The Lord has complete understanding and needs no-one to instruct Him.

The nations, which opposed Israel, are as nothing to God. When it says God regards them as nothing and worthless it does not mean that He does not care for the nations, but when they oppose Him it is no contest. 

The nations had idols, but these were mere man-made things. They had no power of their own.

We need fear nothing, but should look to God in all circumstances.

Isaiah 40:6-11 - All men are like grass

"A voice ...". This is the second of three "voices". This voice tells Isaiah to cry out. Not surprisingly, Isaiah asks what he is to cry out. 

"All men are like grass .." Babylon was the superpower, she seemed to be totally dominant, and Israel certainly could do nothing against her. Israel was tightly held in captivity. But all human power is like grass. It will wither very quickly. Human faithfulness is equally fickle. Men can sometimes be united in a cause, but unless this is a godly cause the faithfulness will not last. At the start of the second world war Germany and Russia were allies, yet two years later they were seeking to destroy each other. 

And why does the grass wither? Because the Lord blows upon it. It is the Lord who has the last word, it is His will that prevails. It is only the word of God that lasts forever.

Now we get the third voice. This was to be proclaimed to Jerusalem. When Babylon would conquer Jerusalem many would be taken off into exile, the rest would be left behind in Jerusalem. Jerusalem would be a much reduced city, and under the authority of others.

"You who bring good news" Humanly the situation would seem hopeless, yet the good news is to be proclaimed loudly and clearly. The same applies today. 

Why can this be done? Because the Lord comes with power. He comes to reign and to restore the fortunes of His people. Yet this power is mixed with tenderness. This is what we need. It needs power to set us free and heal us. Yet our hearts are fragile and we need the tenderness to restore our souls.

Isaiah 40:3-5 - Prepare the way

When a king came to visit a place representatives were sent ahead to prepare the way. In those days this may have involved physically making the road smooth. Nowadays the same thing happens when advisers etc are sent ahead to check security arrangements and other details. In the New Testament John the Baptist is seen as preparing the way for Jesus with his call for repentance. 

This way is made in the wilderness, in the desert (which, incidentally, is where John did much of his preaching). We can seem to be totally lost. People we long to see saved can be seem to be totally lost, with no possible way of God breaking in to their lives. This is never true. No matter where someone is (physically or spiritually), if they repent and call upon the Lord then they will be saved.

When people repent the glory of the Lord is revealed. If we turn to God, His glory is revealed in our lives and this can utterly transform things. When Jesus came Israel was a spiritual desert, but whenever people put faith in Him, even the most despised people, miracles happened, restoration occurred. The glory of God was revealed.

Isaiah 40:1-2 - Comfort

Now we will start to look at the prophecies themselves. "Comfort, comfort my people". This sets the theme of the rest of the book. The first part of Isaiah contained much judgement upon Israel, with hints of salvation, both for Israel and further afield, woven into this. The overwhelming theme of the second part of Isaiah is salvation. In the same way as salvation was woven into the first part, so there are elements of judgement as well. 

Indeed this is the way the gospel works. The need for repentance is an essential part of the good news. Without a recognition of our need to repent, or our sin, the good news makes no sense. Jesus preached "repent for the Kingdom of God is near", Peter preached "repent and believe". When God tells us about our sin it is so that we can turn to Him and be healed. 

Isaiah proclaims that her penalty has been paid. This is a reference to the Babylonian exile, declaring that her exile is coming to an end. Now we know that it is because of Jesus that we are saved, it is because He has paid the price that we are forgiven. So how does this work? Well, we are all paying the price of our sin. Our lives, to varying degrees, are a lot worse than they would be if we had never sinned. Without Christ we experience more and more of the consequences of sin (our own, and other peoples'). Without Christ we are on a downward spiral. These times have finished, they have come to an end. Now, we are in the restoration phase. 

We still experience the effects of sin (indeed we still sin, though hopefully less than we used to), but we need to remind ourselves that we are now on an upward spiral. We are now starting to receive the benefits of salvation.

Isaiah 40-66 - Authorship

We now move into the final section of Isaiah, chapters 40-66. No, we are not going to look at all twenty seven chapters at once, but at the question of authorship. The first thirty five chapters dealt with prophecies concerning the Assyrian threat, then we had the record of what happened when Assyria threatened Jerusalem itself. This demonstrated the authenticity of Isaiah's words. Now we are concerned with the Babylonian exile. Most of it is written as though the Babylonian exile has happened and is nearing its end, this has led many scholars to conclude that this part of the book was written by someone other than Isaiah. I do not believe this to be the case, for several reasons:

1. No convincing alternative author or authors have been found.
2. The rest of the Bible makes no distinction between the first and second Isaiah.
3. There are many linguistic similarities between first and second Isaiah, ie it looks as though it was written by the same person.
4. The argument I find most convincing is that the book makes perfect sense. As indicated above, and in earlier comments, the Assyrian part demonstrates the validity of Isaiah's prophecies. So the predictions of the future in second Isaiah can be taken seriously. Moreover, we need to remember that the release from Babylon is only a partial fulfilment of the prophecy. The main goal of the prophecy is Jesus Christ, and these events happened several hundred years later (and well over two thousand years later for the things that have not been fulfilled yet, relating to the second coming!). 

Psalm 101 - Dedicated to God

After several Psalms calling upon the nations and the earth to praise the Lord we come to a more personal one, and one that is designated as a Psalm of David.

David sings of the Lord's love and justice. He also dedicates himself to lead a blameless life. Love of the Lord makes moral demands upon us. Then he asks "when will you come to me?" Clearly David was in trouble of some sort (nothing unusual about that). 

Yet in the midst of this trouble David remains dedicated to the Lord. He lives his life in a way that is pleasing to the Lord and refuses to look upon anything vile. In an age when the internet makes vile images of various sorts so readily available we need to follow David's lead.

We are to hate what faithless people do. People who are "perverse of heart" are not to be any sort of example to us, they are to have no influence on the way we live.

David had authority, so he used this authority to advance righteousness. Authority is there to promote justice and righteousness.

Psalm 100 - The Lord is God, the Lord is good.

Yet another Psalm calling on all creation to praise the Lord. Note that again it is a shout for joy that is called for. The world continues to peddle the lie that God's aim is to make men miserable, and too often the church has colluded in this lie. Indeed this is the lie that the Devil told to Eve in the Garden of Eden (Gen 3:1-4). Nothing could be further from the truth. Joy is the fruit of the Holy Spirit. 

The fundamental truth is that we were created by God and belong to Him. We are the sheep of His pasture. Ie it is He who looks after us and watches over us. See how vehemently atheism seeks to deny this truth. 

Instead we are far wiser to accept the truth and enter His gates with thanksgiving and praise. 

He is good, His love endures, and His faithfulness continues forever. What ever our situation we should seek the Lord and go to Him with praise. We will then be pleasantly surprised at what we find!