God's Servant, The Solution To Stubbornness And Rebellion (Isaiah 49:1-6) Series

If you're seeking to understand Isaiah 40-55, and make sure you get it right, today's passage is absolutely the most important in this entire part of the book. Everything builds up to Isaiah 49, and everything that follows, builds off of it. There are many approaches to these chapters as a whole, and many of those approaches seem to work okay for a while, but most of those approaches fall apart pretty badly right here. There is one single verse, Isaiah 49:3, that's like the key puzzle piece to everything else. You can take an approach, and make it work all the way up to that verse, and then you find yourself unable to finish your puzzle. You're left with this awkward piece, and you find yourself wanting to jam it in there, or cut off a corner (literally, many scholars simply remove the to-them-impossible word "Israel"), to make it fit. At this point in my study, if I want to get a feel for a particular scholar's approach to Isaiah 40-55, I can read just a few pages, and have a pretty good idea how they handle everything else. And I can tell, more importantly, how well they put together the puzzle.

Up to this point, through Isaiah 48, we've seen God's exilic prophet repeatedly call to God's people in exile, encouraging them to listen. And the basic message, up to this point, goes something like this:

God is no longer angry with you. Your sins have all been paid for. God is now in the act of freeing you from Babylon through Mystery Dude from the east, King Cyrus. Cyrus is God's anointed one, God's loved one, and God through Cyrus will bring you home to Jerusalem (Isaiah 48:15).

All of that is set in stone. That much of your future is assured. What is less certain, is how well you go out from Babylon. When God's people originally left Egypt, they left filthy rich. The bread was rushed, and had to be unleavened. But they left with silver and gold, and rich gifts (Exodus 12:34-36). They left with large numbers of sheep, goats, and cattle (Exodus 12:38). They left, richly blessed by Egypt, and by God.

But at this point in Isaiah, it's an open question of how God's people will leave Babylon. Their refusal to listen, and get rid of their idols (Isaiah 48:5), has caused them to miss out on some of God's blessings. And if that refusal continues, they will miss out on still more. God's blessings come to those who seek God, and who are committed to Him. That's who God draws near to (Psalm 101:2). That's who has God's favor (anticipating Isaiah 49:8, a verse from the following passage).

So we left Isaiah 48 with three things:

(1) an open invitation from God, through his prophet, to his people to listen, and pay attention to his commands, to choose the path of shalom.

(2) no indication that God's people would listen to any of this, because the sinews in their neck are made of iron, and their forehead is made of bronze. The people are inflexible, and too stubborn to flinch, or react, to anything.

(3) with God's pivot. Twice in Isaiah 48 we were told that God is "now" doing something new. Let's read Isaiah 48:6-8:

I cause you to hear new things now,

while hidden things, and you haven't known them.

(7) Now they are created, ["now" is focused]

and not earlier,

while before today, you haven't heard them, [v. 6a; *Shalom Paul]

lest you say (v. 5b; *Shalom Paul),

"LOOK! I knew them.

(8) What's more, you haven't heard [v. 6a; 7a; *Paul].

What's more, you haven't known.

What's more, earlier, your ear wasn't opened,

because I knew (v. 7b; *Paul) you would actually betray/act treacherously (1 Samuel 14:33; Jer. 3:20),

while a rebel from the womb, you were called (Genesis 25:26?; Psalm 58:4; Hosea 12:3/4; Jeremiah 9:3

in Hebrew; "every brother actually Jacobs/betrays").

God doesn't announce here what this new thing is. But it is something truly new, that's never been known or heard before. This is no rehashed thing. It's not a slightly revised second edition. Whatever God is doing "now," is something legitimately new.

Now let's hop down to Isaiah 48:16:

(16) Draw near to me;

Listen to this:

It wasn't from the beginning of all this, in secret, that I spoke; ["in secret" is focused]

at the time it happened, there I [was], ["there" is focused]

and now the Lord Yahweh has sent me with his Spirit. [for "me," see Isaiah 40:6; 49:1-6; 60:1]

God's exilic prophet says, "And now" the Lord Yahweh has sent me with his Spirit.

Verse 16 doesn't tell us why God has "now" sent him. But this is not an initial commissioning. This isn't the prophet's grand introduction. And so we find ourselves thinking, that this new thing God is doing "now," he is doing "now" through his prophet.