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Scripture Reading: Isa. 1:5-9, 1:16-20, 24-25, 26-27, 28-31; 3:1-7, 3:17-18, 24-26; 4:1; 5:5-6, 9-10, 13-17, 24-30; 2:6
In this message we will cover Jehovah's chastisement on His beloved children Israel and His loving exhortation and promise to His chastised people.
After God exposes the actual situation of His people, He comes in to deal with them, to chastise them. His chastisement may be considered a governmental dealing.
Although God's people are different from the Gentiles and although in Isaiah God has a threefold love for His people, as a Father, a Mother, and a Husband, He still needs to deal with them. In His dealing God is often more serious than in His judgment. He may let the unbelievers go, but He will not let us go. He is very strict, very narrow, and very genuine in dealing with us because He has His divine government. He is not a God without regulating and controlling principles.
Part of the title of this message uses the words Jehovah's chastisement on His beloved children Israel. I use the expression beloved children to indicate that God's dealing with us is not with a negative motive. Rather, His dealing with us as His beloved children today is always with a very positive motive. Although He chastises us, He does not judge us or punish us. However, some saints may feel that God is punishing them and that they cannot bear this punishment. Nevertheless, I still say that, instead of punishing us, God chastises us in love. He is like a loving father who disciplines his children for their good. Once a child has grown to adulthood, he may realize that what he thought was punishment was actually his father's love.
Jehovah chastised the children of Israel because of their apostasy. The word apostasy means to forsake God and to turn to and serve another god. Israel's apostasy was most serious, and God chastised them because of it.
Jehovah struck them so that their whole head became sick and their whole heart faint (1:5). From the sole of the foot even to the head there was no soundness in it. There were only bruises, blows, and raw wounds, which had not been pressed out nor bound up nor softened with oil (v. 6). There was the striking but no healing or soothing.
Due to their apostasy, Jehovah caused their land to be a desolation. He also caused their cities to be burned with fire and their field to be devoured by strangers in their sight and overthrown by strangers to be a desolation (1:7).
Jehovah left the city of Zion like a booth in a vineyard, like a hut in a cucumber field, like a besieged city (1:8). Unless Jehovah of hosts had left to them a surviving few, they would have been like Sodom and would have resembled Gomorrah (v. 9). In order to keep them from being altogether destroyed, He left them a small number who survived.
The Lord Jehovah of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel, eased Himself of His adversaries and avenged Himself of His enemies (1:24). These adversaries and enemies were the children of Israel. They had rebelled against God to such an extent that they became not only the adversaries, who were within God's nation, but also the enemies, who were outside God's nation. God eased Himself and avenged Himself by chastising His rebellious children. Moreover, God turned His hand against Israel. He purged away their dross as with lye and removed all their alloy (v. 25).
Jehovah shattered the rebels and sinners together and terminated those who forsook Him (1:28). He caused them to be like a dried-up terebinth (or, oak) and like a garden that lacks water (vv. 29-30). God would also cause the strong man to become tow and his work a spark, and both the strong man and his work would burn together (v. 31).
Jehovah took away from Jerusalem and from Judah every kind of support — all the support of bread and all the support of water (3:1). He also took away from them all the leaders, such as the judge, the prophet, and the elder, leaving them no rulers (vv. 2-4). The people were then oppressed each by the other, and no one was willing to be the leader, because of the shortage of bread and clothing (vv. 5-7; 4:1).
As part of His chastisement of His people, God took away from them all their leaders, leaving them with no rulers. To have no ruler is God's chastisement. If a family does not have a ruler, that family will be in chaos. In such a family there would be neither father nor mother, neither elder brother nor elder sister. No one would be able to exercise any ruling, and the family would be in a pitiful situation. Likewise, if in a church there were no leading ones, that church would be in chaos.
It is significant that Isaiah links the ruler with the food supply. To be a ruler, you must feed the people. If you do not feed them, they will rebel. In the church, if there is no feeding, there is no ruling; and no ruling results in no food. Ruling and feeding go together as a pair. Ruling produces feeding, and feeding issues in ruling. If a church is well nourished, there surely must be proper ruling in that church. But when there is fighting in the church, this indicates that there is a shortage of food and of ruling. Ruling and feeding are not only a pair — they also work together in a cycle and give rise to each other. Thus, if there is feeding, there is ruling; and if there is ruling, there is feeding. When there is the proper feeding in the church life, everything will be in order.
Jehovah struck the scalp of the daughters of Zion with scabs, exposed their secret parts, and removed the beauty of their luxurious ornaments (3:17-18). There was rottenness instead of a sweet smell, an encircling rope instead of a belt, baldness instead of well-set hair, sackcloth instead of fine garments, and a brand instead of beauty (v. 24).
Jehovah caused the men of Zion to fall by the sword and her mighty in battle. He also caused her gates to mourn and lament and her city, being desolated, to sit on the ground (3:25-26).
Jehovah removed the hedge of Israel as His vineyard so that it would be consumed, and He broke down its wall so that it would be trampled (5:5). He made it a waste, not pruned nor hoed, and He also commanded the clouds not to pour rain upon it (v. 6). Furthermore, He caused many houses to become desolate, great houses to be without inhabitants (v. 9). The produce of the vineyard and the field were reduced to the lowest amount (v. 10).
In 5:13-17 we see that Jehovah put the people into exile. Their nobility became famished men, and their multitudes were parched with thirst. Hence, Sheol enlarged its appetite and opened its mouth wide, without limit. Jerusalem's splendor, din, and uproar and the jubilant within her descended into Sheol. Thus, the ordinary man was humbled, and the man of distinction and the eyes of the haughty were abased. But Jehovah of hosts was exalted in judgment, and the holy God showed Himself holy in righteousness. Lambs grazed there as in their pasture, and strangers ate the wastelands of rich men.
In His judgment over the nations, Jehovah of hosts is exalted, and the holy God shows Himself holy in righteousness (5:16). If we are not righteous, we cannot be holy. Without righteousness there is no base for being holy. Righteousness is the base for holiness, and upon this base holiness is exhibited. Hence, holiness is higher than righteousness. With His righteousness as the base, God shows Himself as the holy God. In righteousness He exhibits His holiness.
God could expect only righteousness from the nations because they are not the sons of God. It is with His sons that God expects to see holiness (Heb. 12:5-11). God's chastening and disciplining is to uplift us from righteousness to holiness. In His salvation, He first justified us to make us righteous in Christ. After this, we need to go on to be sanctified, to be made holy. To be righteous is to match God's way of doing things outwardly, but to be holy is to match God's nature inwardly. As the sons of God, we need to go on from righteousness to reach holiness, to show ourselves holy in righteousness.
As a tongue of fire consumes the stubble and the chaff sinks in flames, the root of those who were unjust and evil would be like decay, and their bud would disappear like dust (Isa. 5:24a). Because God's people rejected the instruction of Jehovah of hosts and despised the speaking of the Holy One of Israel, the anger of Jehovah burned against them, and He stretched out His hand over them and struck them (vv. 24b-25a). The mountains quaked, and the corpses of the people were like garbage in the middle of the street. In spite of all this, Jehovah's anger was not turned away; rather, His hand was still stretched out to chastise them (v. 25b).
Finally, Jehovah lifted up a standard to a distant nation and summoned it to come in a swift, strong, and terrifying way to seize Israel as its prey (5:26-30a). Then one would look upon the land and behold darkness and distress, and the light would be darkened in its clouds (v. 30b). The Babylonians did the very things described in these verses.
According to 2:6, Jehovah abandoned His beloved people, the house of Jacob, because they were full of the customs from the east (the nations). His people had forsaken God's law and instructions given through Moses and picked up many customs from the nations, from the Gentiles.
After Jehovah's chastisement on His beloved children, we have His loving exhortation and promise to His chastised people.
Jehovah's loving exhortation has both a negative side and a positive side (1:16-17).
On the negative side, God charged the people to wash themselves, to cleanse themselves, to turn away the evil of their deeds from before His eyes, and to cease doing what is evil (v. 16).
On the positive side, God charged them to learn to do good, to seek justice, to correct the ruthless, to defend the orphan, and to plead for the widow (v. 17). The ruthless ones were those who oppressed others. The people were to be released from the oppression exercised by the ruthless. God cares for the oppressed, the orphans, and the widows. Therefore, He told His people to keep their hands off the oppressed, to defend the orphan, and to plead for the widow.
Jehovah's loving promise is a promise of forgiveness and of restoration.
Concerning the promise of forgiveness, Jehovah first extends an invitation: "Come now and let us reason together" (1:18a). God invites the people to reason with Him about their sins.
The invitation is followed by Jehovah's forgiveness through washing. Isaiah speaks of this in 1:18b. "Though your sins are like scarlet,/They will be as white as snow;/Though they are as red as crimson,/They will be like wool." Although His people were so sinful, God was willing to forgive them.
In 1:19 and 20 we have the issue of the people's obedience. If they were willing and listened, they would eat the good of the land. But if they refused and rebelled, they would be devoured by the sword.
In 1:26 and 27 we have the promise of restoration.
First, to save the people from their chaotic situation, God would restore the leaders. He promised to restore their judges as at the first and their counselors as at the beginning (v. 26a). This mercy from God would bring their situation back to its original condition.
There was also the promise to restore the city of Zion and its people. The city would be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city (v. 26b). Zion would be ransomed with justice, and her returning ones with righteousness (v. 27). They had become a chaos because they had given up justice and righteousness. But God's restoration would bring them back to the beginning.
