Scripture Reading: Isa. 30; Isa. 31
Isaiah had a divine way of thinking, a divine philosophy, within him when he wrote his book. This divine philosophy included God's chastisement of Israel, His judgment upon the nations, the restoration of Israel, the restoration of the created yet fallen things, and the ushering in of the all-inclusive Christ.
At first, God "hired" Israel to be His testimony, His witness. But Israel failed God. Then God hired the many nations around Israel to chastise His chosen people. However, they did not do this according to what God had in His heart. They chastised Israel excessively, and this offended God. As a result, God came in to "fire" both the children of Israel and the surrounding nations. This matter was deeply impressed upon Isaiah.
God's chastisement of Israel and His judgment upon the nations who exercised excessive action upon Israel issues in three things: 1) Israel is brought back to God; 2) the created things are restored; and 3) the all-inclusive Christ is ushered in. The restoration of the created yet fallen things goes along with Israel's return to God. God intends to restore the created and fallen things, but there is the need for Israel to usher in this restoration. When Israel turns to God, there will be the restoration of all things. Then the all-inclusive Christ will be ushered in. This is the divine philosophy in the book of Isaiah.
This divine philosophy applies to us today. No matter who we are and what our race, culture, or nationality may be, we all are utter failures as far as God is concerned. This kind of realization will cause us to turn to God. Our success never causes us to turn to God. But when we look at our failures, we are humbled, we realize that we have a need, and we repent, confessing that we are hopeless. Although we may not know what we need, we know that we need something. Eventually, the all-inclusive Christ comes in to meet our need.
Especially in the first thirty-nine chapters of his prophecy, Isaiah's thought is focused on God's chastisement issuing in a return to God and bringing in the restoration and the all-inclusive Christ. This is the logic, the spiritual and heavenly philosophy, that dominates the book of Isaiah. Although this is not clearly written, it is nevertheless the basic and governing principle of Isaiah's writing. I hope that we will all see this crucial matter and keep it in mind as we turn to chapters thirty and thirty-one, where we will see that Jehovah's dealing with Israel's reliance on Egypt and His dealing with the nations issue in Israel's turn to Him and in His return to Israel with the restoration.
Isaiah 30:1-17 and 31:1 speak of Jehovah's dealing with Israel's reliance on Egypt.
In 30:1 and 2 the prophet speaks woe to the rebellious children, who devise counsel but not of Jehovah, and who pour out libations of alliance, but not of Jehovah's Spirit, in order to add sin upon sin; who go down to Egypt, yet do not ask of Jehovah's mouth, to take refuge in the refuge of Pharaoh, and to take shelter in the shadow of Egypt, which is their humiliation. These libations were drink offerings which the Gentiles poured out to their idols. When two parties or nations made an alliance or formed a league, they would pour a libation upon the earth to indicate that they had made an alliance. Israel had formed such an alliance with Egypt. Therefore, the refuge of Pharaoh will be their shame, and shelter in the shadow of Egypt, their humiliation. The people of Egypt cannot be a help or a profit to them but rather a shame and also a reproach (vv. 3-5).
In typology Egypt signifies the world. Whenever God's people are in a fallen condition or low estate, they go to Egypt (Gen. 42:10). Abraham did this (Gen. 12:10). Today, when Christians become low, they often go to the world. To go to Egypt, to rely upon Egypt, or to make an association with Egypt is sin. To go to the world or to rely upon the world can never be a profit, glory, or help to us. It always issues in humiliation, shame, and reproach (Isa. 30:5). I have seen a good number of saints who became unhappy with the church life and turned to the world. Then they went into the world, and eventually they stayed in the world. Many of them could not return from the world.
Here we need to learn a lesson. No matter how low we may be, we should not go to the world. Instead, we should look up. When we look up, the Lord has a way to bring us up.
Isaiah 30:9 says, "For this is a rebellious people,/False children,/Children who refuse to hear/The instruction of Jehovah." Here instruction indicates a teaching which is according to the law; it is the divine instruction given to God's people in the law. Apart from the law, God's people in the Old Testament did not have any instruction. However, in Isaiah 30 they refused to hear the instruction of the law.
In verse 15 Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, says, "In returning and rest you will be saved; / In quietness and in trust will be your strength." If they would return to God and rest in Him, they would be saved. Today, we first need to return to God and rest in Him. Then we will be quiet, we will trust, and we will have strength.
However, Israel was not willing to return to God and rest in Him. Rather, they said, "No, for we will flee on horses" (v. 16a). Therefore, they will flee until they are left like a bare mast upon a mountaintop and a standard on a hill (v. 17).
After Jehovah deals with Israel, He deals with the nations.
In 30:27 we are told that the name of Jehovah comes from a distance, burning with His anger and heavy with smoke. His lips are full of indignation, and His tongue is like a devouring fire. His breath, like an overflowing stream, reaches up to the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of nothingness (v. 28). Here nothingness signifies the result of destruction. God sifts the nations with the sieve of destruction. Furthermore, a bridle that leads them to err is in the jaws of the peoples.
Jehovah will cause the majesty of His voice to be heard and the descending of His arm to be seen, with the blasting of anger and the flame of devouring fire, in cloudburst, downpour, and hailstones (v. 30). For at the voice of Jehovah, Assyria will be dismayed; with a staff He will strike (v. 31). Every pass of the appointed rod, which Jehovah will lay upon him, will be with tambourines and harps; and in battles of brandishing weapons He will fight against them (v. 32). Their king will be burned in the fire of Topheth (v. 33). Topheth, a valley of continual fire not far from Jerusalem where filthy and evil things were burned, is a symbol of the lake of fire (Rev. 20:15).
According to Isaiah 31:2 and 3, Jehovah will rise up against the house of evildoers, who go down to Egypt for help and commit iniquity, and against those who help them. The Egyptians are mere men and not God, and their horses are mere flesh and not spirit. Thus Jehovah will stretch out His hand, and he who helps will stumble, he who is helped will fall, and all of them will be consumed together.
The Assyrian will fall by the sword not of a man, and the sword not of man will devour him. Thus he will flee from a sword, and his young men will be forced into labor (v. 8). Concerning the Assyrian, Jehovah, whose fire is in Zion and whose furnace is in Jerusalem, declares, "And his rock will pass away in terror,/And his princes will be dismayed by the standard" (v. 9). To His people God will be the fire and the furnace.
In 30:15 and 31:6 and 7 we have a word concerning Jehovah's dealing with Israel's reliance on Egypt and His dealing with the nations issuing in Israel's turn to Jehovah. As we have seen, in 30:15 Jehovah says, "In returning and rest you will be saved;/In quietness and in trust will be your strength." In 31:6 and 7 Isaiah says, "Return to Him from whom men have deeply revolted, O children of Israel. For in that day each man will cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold, which your hands have made for you as a sin."
Jehovah waits to be gracious to Israel. Therefore, He remains on high to have compassion on them; for He is a God of justice. Blessed are those who wait for Him (30:18).
As the lion or the lion cub roars over its prey and because of it a crowd of shepherds is called out, but it is not frightened by their voice, nor overcome by their noise, so Jehovah will descend to wage war on Mount Zion and on its hill. Like flying birds so will Jehovah of hosts protect Jerusalem. He will protect and deliver it; He will pass over and rescue it (31:4-5). Just as there was a time when Jehovah gave up Israel, so there will be a time when He, like birds overshadowing their young, will return to Israel and protect her.
Jehovah's fire is in Zion and His furnace is in Jerusalem for the protection of Israel (v. 9b).
When Jehovah returns to Israel, He will return with the restoration.
A people will dwell in Zion at Jerusalem, and they will weep no more. Jehovah will be most gracious to them at the sound of their cry. When He hears it, He will answer them (30:19).
Though the Lord has given them the bread of adversity and the water of oppression, their Teacher will no longer hide Himself in a corner, but their eyes will see their Teacher. Also, when they turn to the right or to the left, their ears will hear a word behind them, saying, "This is the way, walk in it" (vv. 20-21). The Teacher here is Christ. As our Teacher, Christ will no longer hide Himself in a corner, that is, at the crossroads, the place where we make a turn. When we are going astray or are taking the wrong way, He lets us go. But when we arrive at a corner, He is there. At the crossroads we have the choice to go to the right or to the left (v. 21). It is at the crossroads that Christ tells us the way to take.
According to verse 22, the people will defile the silver covering of their graven images and the gold plating of their molten idols. They will scatter them like some dirty thing, saying to it, "Go away!" Then Jehovah will give rain for their seed, which they will sow in the ground, and the bread of the increase of the ground; and it will be fat and plenteous. Their livestock will feed in that day in a vast pasture, and the oxen and donkeys that work the ground will eat salted fodder that has been winnowed with shovel and fork. Moreover, upon every high mountain and upon every prominent hill there will be brooks and streams of water (vv. 23-25). In our spiritual experience today, we may experience the Spirit as rain, as brooks, and eventually as streams.
In verse 26 Isaiah goes on to speak regarding the lights in the heavenly host. The light of the moon will be like the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, like the light of seven days, on the day when Jehovah binds up the breach of His people and heals the wound left from His stroke.
In verse 29 we see that the people will have a song as in the night when the feast is sanctified. They will also have gladness of heart as when one marches to the flute to go to the mountain of Jehovah, to the Rock of Israel. This indicates that when Jehovah returns to His people with the restoration, their gladness and enjoyment will be extraordinary.
