Isaiah 59: 1 – 21
Why Your Prayers Are Not Answered – Part III
1 Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; Nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear. 2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear. 3 For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; Your lips have spoken lies, your tongue has muttered perversity. 4 No one calls for justice, nor does any plead for truth. They trust in empty words and speak lies; They conceive evil and bring forth iniquity. 5 They hatch vipers’ eggs and weave the spider’s web; He who eats of their eggs dies, and from that which is crushed a viper breaks out. 6 Their webs will not become garments, nor will they cover themselves with their works; Their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands. 7 Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood; Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; Wasting and destruction are in their paths. 8 The way of peace they have not known, and there is no justice in their ways; They have made themselves crooked paths; Whoever takes that way shall not know peace. 9 Therefore justice is far from us, nor does righteousness overtake us; We look for light, but there is darkness! For brightness, but we walk in blackness! 10 We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes. We stumble at noonday as at twilight; We are as dead men in desolate places. 11 We all growl like bears, and moan sadly like doves; We look for justice, but there is none; For salvation, but it is far from us. 12 For our transgressions are multiplied before You, and our sins testify against us; For our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we know them: 13 In transgressing and lying against the LORD, and departing from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood. 14 Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands afar off; For truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. 15 So truth fails, and he who departs from evil makes himself a prey. Then the LORD saw it, and it displeased Him that there was no justice. 16 He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor; Therefore His own arm brought salvation for Him; And His own righteousness, it sustained Him. 17 For He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head; He put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak. 18 According to their deeds, accordingly He will repay, fury to His adversaries, recompense to His enemies; The coastlands He will fully repay. 19 So shall they fear The Name of the LORD from the west, and His glory from the rising of the sun; When the enemy comes in like a flood, The Spirit of the LORD will lift up a standard against him. 20 “The Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,” says the LORD. 21 “As for Me,” says the LORD, “this is My covenant with them: My Spirit Who Is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants’ descendants,” says the LORD, “from this time and forevermore.”
In our last studies of chapters 57 and 58 we asked this question, ‘Are you someone whose prayers are not answered?’ Our Precious Holy Spirit addresses this problem with us through His servant the prophet Isaiah. In fact our Holy God Is so interested and concerned about this issue that He will go into a good detail as to why this is happening. Chapter 57 was the first of three chapters which depicted the resulting sad state of Israel from different angles, and the resultant lack of effectiveness in prayer. Do not forget that all Scripture is for our identification and learning. If you are honest with yourselves then you will agree that the sins the people of Israel committed against El Shaddai, God Almighty, we do likewise.
Chapter 57 commenced with the way in which God’s true people, the ‘righteous ones’, are suffering and then went on to deal with the general sins of the leadership and the generality of the people.
Thus in chapter 57 Isaiah especially condemns those who throw themselves into the worship of Canaanite deities, into sexual misbehavior, and into nature worship. In chapter 58 directed by our Precious Holy Spirit, Isaiah condemns those who engage in hypocritical fasting, and in formal religion which has no real concern for people’s good; and now in chapter 59 he condemns those who perpetrate injustice, and whose ways harm their fellowmen. We must not, of course, see Judah/Israel as full of people who are all sinning in the same way. There were different degrees of attitudes towards the gods and sexual misbehavior, and of formalism towards Yahweh and of disobedience to the Law. Some were blatant in their apostasy, others were simply disobedient because they compromised with it, and did nothing about the situation, treating the worship of Yahweh as a formality or seeing it as in fact similar to paganism. But all in one way or another were involved in injustice.
Each of these chapters is also concerned about failure in prayer, which of course goes along with the above. For the emphasis is on the fact that Yahweh only gives ear to a righteous people. Thus in chapter 57 the people call on false gods and their prayer is not answered (verse 13), in chapter 58 they fast hypocritically and their prayer is not answered (verse 4), although it would be if they repented and begun to walk righteously (verse 9), and in chapter 59 their prayer is not heard because their sins are separating them from God (verses 1-2). Judah as a whole was therefore at this stage devoid of any hope that their prayers would be heard and answered. They had shut God off and they were shut off from God. They were outwardly without spiritual hope.
Yet in each chapter the way of hope is presented to them and to us. We saw in chapter 57 how our Great God will bring back to Himself those whom He has chosen by the action of His sovereign will. This is the God ward side of salvation. In chapter 58.6-14 the way is open to those who repent of their formality and begin to live righteously. This is the man ward side of salvation And in chapter 59 Yahweh comes as a mighty warrior both in judgment and in deliverance, and as Redeemer of those who repent (verses 16-21) - He will establish His covenant with them forever.
In view of what has been said Isaiah now stresses that the delay in deliverance is not due to any deficiency in our Holy Father Yahweh. Rather it is due to the behavior of the people. This chapter thus continues to deal with the sad state of God’s supposed people. They want, and claim, the blessings but they do not want to have to fulfill God’s demands. Indeed their sinfulness is so bad that the future of blessing is being delayed. Deliverance is becoming far off. Our Holy God therefore will come as a mighty warrior who will remedy the situation through judgment and sovereign mercy, by means of His Servant – The Lord Jesus Christ. He will be endued with the Spirit of Yahweh and bring in His mouth the words of Yahweh which Yahweh has placed there. It is only God’s sovereign action that can remedy the situation.
1 Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear.
This verse is one of my favorites. I use it when I pray and when I try to encourage others who are struggling with the various issues of life.
However here it is used by the prophet Isaiah as a negative response to sinful rebellious people. ‘Why does God not fulfill His promises by making sure to them their inheritance?’ they ask. ‘Why does He not act with a mighty hand?’ It is not because He cannot save. It is not that the strength and ability of His hand is in any way diminished. It is not because He is not willing, under the right conditions, to hear. For there is no want of power in Him. He has not become incapable or deaf. He is still the same powerful Deliverer that He was in ancient times. He still has the same willingness to respond as He has always had.
2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.
It is rather their behavior which is the problem. It is their iniquities, the outward expression of their deep inward sinfulness, that have brought this great gulf of separation between them and God. It is their sins, the things that they do and fail to do, contrary to His demands that have made Him turn away His face and not listen to them. And these will shortly be described in full. That is why He is alienated from them, why He Is angry with them, why the relationship between them has been destroyed. Let these be put right and then things will change.
The purpose of studying God’s Word is for us to personally apply them in our lives. Seek Him to reveal what you need to do or do without.
3 For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; Your lips have spoken lies, your tongue has muttered perversity. 4 No one calls for justice, nor does any plead for truth. They trust in empty words and speak lies; They conceive evil and bring forth iniquity.
In the last chapter the people had claimed that they sought justice along God-given paths. Here is Isaiah’s verdict on their claims. It was true that they appeared to use the outward means that suggested that they wanted to be righteous, but it was all based on deceit.
The truth was that the hands of the people were morally dirty, they were defiled. They were bloodstained with the blood of the innocent. How many had died or been scourged under false accusation? How many deaths and injuries had resulted from their careless attitudes, behavior, indifference, and neglect? How many had died of hunger and poverty while they feasted? How many had been beaten and left bleeding, or even bleeding in heart, beyond what was reasonable?
Their fingers were stained with the sins which resulted from a wicked heart, and the consequences of the failures too numerous to mention. For every act of selfishness had its consequences; every sin of neglect; every failure to do what was right; and every lack in consideration for others.
‘Your lips have spoken lies, your tongue utters wickedness.’ For the majority deceit is one of the foundation stones of life. It avoids responsibility, it turns suspicion on others, it blackens other’s reputations, it gets one’s own way by false methods. It is the epitome of a selfishness which has no thought for others.
‘None calls in righteousness, and none pleads in truth.’ Here the plea for judicial enquiry is in mind. All suffer from the same trouble. Righteousness is ignored, truth is outlawed. What matters for the appellants is to get what they want by any means without regard for the facts.
Our Government and court system trust in what is empty and speak lies, they conceive mischief and bring forth iniquity.’ They produce false evidence, empty arguments, and untrue accusations. They plan so that others will be harmed, or to obtain things by false evidence. They make the tribunal which should be producing justice, produce instead what is basically iniquitous and unfair. They ‘bring forth iniquity’.
5 They hatch vipers’ eggs and weave the spider’s web; He who eats of their eggs dies, and from that which is crushed a viper breaks out. 6 Their webs will not become garments, nor will they cover themselves with their works; Their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands. 7 Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood; Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; Wasting and destruction are in their paths. 8 The way of peace they have not known, and there is no justice in their ways; They have made themselves crooked paths; Whoever takes that way shall not know peace.
When Paul was looking for a catalogue of sinfulness in his writings to the Romans in chapter 3.15-17 by which to describe the human race he chose extracts from this passage among others, “Their feet are swift to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way of peace have they not known:” It is a full description of the heart of man.
Please take another look at the passage, ‘‘They hatch the eggs of adders, and weave spider’s webs. He who eats of their eggs dies, and what is crushed breaks out into a viper.’ In other words they encourage evil, using it for their own benefit, (as a man might collect and hatch adders’ eggs in order to do mischief), and scheme how to entrap others and catch them in their web. If anyone tries to benefit from what is theirs (equivalent to eating their adders’ eggs) the threat of death or some kind of harm is the result, and if others try to prevent what they are doing (the equivalent of crushing adders’ eggs) their efforts result in even more poisonous snakes to destroy them. Thus these men are treacherous, scheming, and hurtful to all who come in contact with them.
Look at the beauty in which our Precious Holy Spirit bring out the sinful truth of people, ‘Their webs will not become clothing, nor will they cover themselves with their works. Their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands.’ Our Lord tells us that all their efforts to achieve what they are seeking at the expense of others will in the end come to nothing. All their scheming and their weaving of webs will not become clothing.
In the book of Genesis you are familiar when God clothed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. He covered their nakedness. The opposite is true here. The scheming of these people will leave them naked and bare. All their efforts and all their workings will not protect them. They will be open to the judgment of God whether in this world or the next. They will not be able to hide themselves from His gaze. As you well know a web is totally unsuitable for clothing, with the assurance that all their schemes are similarly flimsy and will come to nothing.
‘Their feet run to do evil, and they hurry to shed innocent blood. Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; desolation and destruction are in their paths.’ Here the thought is that they are so evil that they not only sin but hurry to get to it. They run to do evil, not wanting to lose time. They are in a hurry to commit violence. They are enflamed with sin and driven along by it. Their special aim is to destroy the innocent. Their thoughts are such that they wreak havoc among men, and to destruction, the breaking up of all that is ordered and settled. They are not builders but destroyers.
‘They do not know the way of peace, and in their goings there is no judgment. They have made them crooked paths. Whoever goes in any of them does not know peace.’ The thought of their ‘ways’ continues. Whenever Isaiah speaks of ‘ways’ he mainly has in mind the way of righteousness and unrighteousness. Please take note of the emphasis on peace. This begins and ends these phrases. These are people who have never found peace with God. Thus they do not know the way of peace. They are sad specimens, for they do not have any inkling of a life of peace. They have little common sense, or sensible thought, for in all their ways they do not use sound judgment. They are both without knowledge of peace and unwise. Instead the paths they make for themselves, their very ways of life, are crooked.
9 Therefore justice is far from us, nor does righteousness overtake us; We look for light, but there is darkness! For brightness, but we walk in blackness! 10 We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes. We stumble at noonday as at twilight; We are as dead men in desolate places.
Remember in chapter 58 how the people were upset because they thought that they were obeying our Holy God. They had mouthed that they were living righteously and doing the right justice for others. Not so, here Isaiah tells them so. As a result of their sins they have looked for light but only find darkness. That while God’s light may shine out; they are blind in their sin. They look for brightness and illumination and only achieve obscurity.
People do not will to do His will. Indeed they are like blind men with no eyes, reaching blindly for the wall to act as their guide because they have nothing better. They have refused to trust Yahweh, now they must trust as blind men who grope for a wall as their only guide. They shoot from the hip when making critical decisions.
‘We stumble at noonday as at the twilight. Among those who are strongly active (lusty) we are as dead men.’ They are a pale reflection of what life should be. They cannot benefit from God’s light, pictured as the noonday sun, for they do not have the spiritual faculties enabling them to benefit from it, thus they stumble along even when the light is brightest. And in a forceful and active world they are lacking in lustiness, indeed appear so listless that they seem almost dead to such forceful people. Having deserted Yahweh even the world looks on them as lifeless.
11 We all growl like bears, and moan sadly like doves; We look for justice, but there is none; For salvation, but it is far from us. 12 For our transgressions are multiplied before You, and our sins testify against us; For our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we know them: 13 In transgressing and lying against the LORD, and departing from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.
The idea of growling like a bear and mourning like a dove suggests anger and dissatisfaction with their lot expressed in both growling and mourning. They snap at you while at the same time look for your compassion for them. They long for the promised coming of justice and deliverance, a common theme earlier, but they do not come to the Deliverer. They still seem far away - why? Because they themselves are unjust and if there is to be deliverance they themselves must be transformed. But they do not want to be transformed. They want God’s blessing while they continue on in the old way.
Isaiah gives the reason why. It is because their transgressions, their moral failures, are multiplied before Him. It is because their sins witness against them. Nor can they hide from the fact of them, for they are well aware of them. In all truth they ‘know’ the purposeful sins they are doing.
They are revealed in their transgressing as denying Yahweh by their behavior and attitudes, and in their turning away from following Him to other things that grip their hearts. They are in constant rebellion against Him. They are revealed as what they are when they discuss together, and officially decide on, oppression of their fellow countrymen, when they lie to get their own way. To revolt means to get their own way and enhance their own wealth when they revolt against God’s covenant and against His requirements, when they dig deep into themselves to bring out and utter falsehood. These people try to spin a religious reason to their evil. Amazing!
14 Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands afar off; For truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. 15 So truth fails, and he who departs from evil makes himself a prey.
Justice and righteousness will not approach because they know what will happen to them. Deceit and lying rule. There is no place for uprightness. It is refused entry. So truth is lacking, and things are so bad that those who believe in the truth, those who seek to walk in His ways, find themselves simply a prey to the sinners who take advantage of them. They become a prey to selfish sinners.
In the movie ‘The Godfather’, Al Pachino gives a good line. He says, ‘Every time I try to get out, they suck me right back in.’ If you think you can avoid or hide from these evil people you are mistaken. They will find ways to continue to hurt you.
We can see here then The Lord’s people admitting the dreadful state into which they have fallen, and that in themselves there is no hope. But, as regularly in Isaiah, it is often when things are at their darkest that God steps in to act.
Isaiah wanted them to know that God sees their desperate condition and determines to act. He looks for a man, someone to stand in the gap, but there is none. So He Himself acts. He will step in on behalf of His people. He will bring them a Deliverer, a Redeemer, One Who is clothed in righteousness and salvation, and also One Who is clothed in vengeance and zealousness for God. He is concerned with redemption in righteousness, and judgment on unrighteousness. On the one hand He will deal with their enemies and on the other He will come as a Redeemer to Zion, to those who turn from transgression in Jacob, and put His Spirit on them and put His words in their mouths, in such a way that they will never again depart.
Take special note that our Holy Adoni Yahweh’s action and His people’s repentance go together. There can be no deliverance that does not result in repentance. He will not deliver an unrepentant people.
Then the LORD saw it, and it displeased Him that there was no justice. 16 He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor;
Here again there is no man; No one to plead; No one to intervene. No mediator. But Yahweh is displeased that justice is lacking, that man stumbles on foolishly and blindly in his sin. He is displeased that there is no one, that there is none to stand in the gap. He is depicted in human terms as wondering why this could be, but this is in order to bring out the desperateness of the situation.
We have been here before. God looks for a man, but there is no man. There was no man, not even Isaiah or Micah, who was fit for the position. There was no man suited to act as Redeemer. And it was at that point that our Great Creator Yahweh found the answer in rising up His Wonderful Servant, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, The Unique Representative of Israel.
Therefore His own arm brought salvation for Him; And His own righteousness, it sustained Him. 17 For He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head; He put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak. 18 According to their deeds, accordingly He will repay, fury to His adversaries, recompense to His enemies; The coastlands He will fully repay.
Here is brought out God’s great secret, declared in part before but now made clear. The One Who is coming to save; Who sits at the right hand of Father God; Who will be the miraculously born King and Servant. He will be the mighty God, even though He may appear in human form, and indeed as truly human. God saw that there was no man, for a greater than man was needed. Only God could step into the gap.
‘Therefore His own arm brought salvation to Him, and His righteousness it upheld Him.’ God was looking for the deliverance of His own people, His chosen ones, and because there was none to act He Himself will bring about the deliverance that He desires through His Servant, and it will be His righteousness that will uphold Him in the work that has to be done. It is His arm that will strengthen His Servant. It is His own righteousness that will uphold Him. Thus the work of the Servant - The Anointed One Is seen as His own work. And there is a merging of those activities that reveals why Isaiah could call that King, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, The One Who as the Wonderful Counselor incorporates the Servant.
‘And He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head.’ These were His armaments and His protection that ensured that He could not fail. All He did was righteous, all He purposed was righteous, all that He was, was righteous, the righteousness of Yahweh was His, and He was surrounded by righteousness and nothing in the evil of the world could mar Him. And it was necessarily so. Had there been one chink in the armor when He became man all the purposes of God would have collapsed. But there was no chink. He was clothed in righteousness, and righteousness prevailed. He knew no sin as we learn in the book of 2 Corinthians 5.21. He did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth that the apostle Peter tells us in his 1st letter chapter 2.22. These were the testimonies of one who had belonged among His severest critics, critics who had constantly scrutinized Him, and of one who had been closest to Him in His daily life.
And it has been openly revealed, so that all are without excuse. The righteous teaching of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ stands out like a beacon in the world. None other compares with it. There have been great teachers, and men of great morality, but none taught like He taught, all are but pale reflections of His words. Only He was right all the way along the line. His teaching along reveals Him for what He is, the truly Righteous One, the One like no other, the only Son of God.
‘And a helmet of salvation on His head.’ He wore also the helmet of deliverance. He was protected by His Father’s eternal purposes and intentions, and by God’s, and His own, great purpose of salvation which had existed from before the foundation of the world. For that provided Him with all the protection of the Godhead. He was ‘God the Savior’. Wearing that helmet He could not but succeed. And through the wearing of that helmet He brought salvation to His own.
Righteousness and deliverance have gone hand in hand earlier in Isaiah and now the idea has reached its climax, fully revealed in the coming of the Great Warrior. Deliverance is here, but it is deliverance in righteousness, as God’s salvation must always be.
‘And He put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak. According to their deeds, accordingly He will repay, fury to His adversaries, recompense to His enemies, to the islands He will repay recompense.’ New emphasis is now laid on the fact that the Deliverer will come as Judge. He will come to exact judgment on those who have rebelled against Him and those who are His enemies. He will be clothed with vengeance and zealous to maintain righteousness, and punish men in accordance with their behavior, and their sinful deeds. And this will apply to all His enemies including the distant coastlands. All will receive according to what they have done.
‘Vengeance.’ The idea rather is of punishment in accordance with deserts, measured vengeance for the breaking of His Laws and refusal to observe His commands. There is no thought of exacting personal revenge. His ‘fury’ is the same; it manifests an antipathy to sin that requires proper punishment for that sin.
19 So shall they fear The Name of the LORD from the west, and His glory from the rising of the sun; When the enemy comes in like a flood, The Spirit of the LORD will lift up a standard against him.
The whole known world will thus learn to fear His name, and be aware of His glory. They will recognize Him for what He is and acknowledge Him. In terms of earlier teaching in chapter 45, ‘to Him every knee will bow and every tongue declare allegiance’. For His coming will be with the force of a mighty river, forced along in the narrows between high banks, both by the force of the flow and by a powerful wind, the breath of Yahweh. He will be irresistible.
The Redeemer continues His mighty work through the power of the Spirit. He strides forth in the world through His own. But it is always in righteousness, and must result in righteousness. For that in the end is what salvation involves. Deliverance in righteousness is His perfect work.
20 “The Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,” says the LORD.
Previously Yahweh has constantly been declared to be ‘your Redeemer’. But the suggestion here would seem to be of another Redeemer, One sent to deliver, sent from Yahweh, Who can only be the Servant. For He is certainly revealed as a Redeemer, One Who saves by the payment of a price. We read in chapter 53 that it is He who will be numbered with the transgressors (verse 12); it is He Who makes His soul an offering for sin (10); it is He Who makes the will of Yahweh prosper (10); it is He Who bears the sin of many (12); And it is He Who comes on behalf of those who turn from transgression. There can be no deliverance without turning to righteousness. And this is the word of Yahweh.
The object of this Redeemer is the redemption of Zion, the ‘city’ which had failed Yahweh and become a harlot city which is indicated in chapter 1 verse 21, a rebel against Yahweh, and thereby represented within itself the whole failing ‘people of God’. They had despoiled His Sanctuary as we read in chapter 43 verse 28 so that it requires replacement which chapter 44 verses 26-28 reveal. Thus ‘Zion’ needs to be redeemed by the mighty Savior, and to be transformed into a glorious city beyond man’s imagining, the very dwelling place of Yahweh, where His light will permanently be revealed, and all the world who are willing to respond will come to worship.
To Israel Zion was ‘the city of God’, the ‘holy city’. To be there was to be as near to God as it was possible to be. It was their ideal, their dream, and had been even when they were following idolatry. It was to them the place where Yahweh dwelt on earth. He speaks of what Jerusalem represents for the world in terms of God’s salvation, a Jerusalem beyond Jerusalem, a kind of stairway between heaven and earth, and includes within the idea all of God’s future blessings on the whole true people of God. Their love of Jerusalem was used to point forward to a greater Jerusalem, a New Jerusalem which had attributes of Heaven.
So as we look at this section of Isaiah with its references to Zion we must recognize that to him Zion depicts the perfect future where God and His people share together the everlasting future. But in those days there was no conception of a heaven to which people could go. Thus he depicts the future, both the future on earth in the purposes of God, and the eternal future in terms of a glorious and widely expanded everlasting ‘Zion’.
That is why as we go through chapters 60-62 we must not see an ordinary Israelite city, however majestic, but a city beyond all cities, where Yahweh reigns supreme, where He can be truly approached and worshipped in the full light of what He is, where His chosen and anointed King sits on His throne receiving the tribute of the nations, and which is large enough to envelop the world who will come to it to make their submission to Him. Babylon is now no more and Zion reigns triumphant.
As we therefore look at these chapters we must make a careful distinction between the city with all its significance, and the people, who while included in the idea of the city, are only a humble part of it, and our concentration must be on all that Zion signifies of the sovereignty and glory and presence of God. Thus while it includes all God’s people, it even more symbolises the whole divine enterprise of which they are only a part, even though an important one. When we read of the nations coming and offering worship and paying tribute, it is not His people who are important, except in their ministry of priests, the important focus is on Yahweh as present in Zion, on behalf of Whom all is received.
21 “As for Me,” says the LORD, “this is My covenant with them: My Spirit Who Is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants’ descendants,” says the LORD, “from this time and forevermore.”
Now is described what His ‘being made a covenant’ to them involves. Their guarantee of the fulfillment of the covenant lies in the fact that the Servant will have the Spirit upon Him chapter 42 verse 1, and will have in His mouth the words of Yahweh Father God that we find out in chapter 50 verse 4, and will come to them. He is the direct Mediator of God’s Spirit and God’s word to His people.
And thus we see from our Precious Holy Spirit that now on these words of Adoni Yahweh, which have come from the mouth of His Servant (explained in chapter 50.3-8), will continue to come from the mouths of His servants, from the mouths of the Servant’s seed (listed in chapter 53.10) and from the mouths of their seed, and from the mouths of their seed’s seed from this time forth forever.
‘And as for Me.’ This differentiates Yahweh from the Redeemer of the previous verse and stresses His participation in all that the Redeemer is doing. While that Redeemer is active in His coming, Yahweh Himself will be active through Him by His Spirit and by His words.
So it is clear that preparatory to the fulfilling of the everlasting covenant in the everlasting kingdom, when the dead will have been raised, will be the period when the Servant will be made a covenant to His true people, and bringing that covenant to them will expand them through the proclamation of His word, through His seed and His seed’s seed. The fulfilment of this in our Lord Jesus Christ and His Apostles, and the church who resulted, is clear and specific, as His seed expanded and grew both widely, and this has continued on through the generations, until the final resurrection day will introduce the final everlasting kingdom. If we are His, we too are His seed.
But why is He then here called the Redeemer and not the Servant? The answer lies in the dual idea behind the Servant. The idea of the Servant includes His true seed, while here in the Redeemer strict differentiation is made between them. His people will continue on as the Servant. He alone is the Redeemer.
Folks, is this not also happening today? What can we do to rectify this horrible action? The answer lies in 2 Chronicles chapter 7 verse 14, “if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
