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One-sentence summary: Isaiah prophesies of Israel's coming Savior, Who will save His people from their sins.
The Lord tells the coastlands and far-off people to listen. "The Lord has called me from the womb," says Isaiah. "He has made my mouth like a sharp sword. In the shadow of His hand, He has hidden me and made me like a polished shaft... in His quiver He has hidden me." Israel is the Lord's servant. Isaiah says his just reward is with the Lord, and God will be his strength. The Lord says it is too small a thing for Him (the coming Savior) to be His servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and restore the preserved ones of Israel; the Lord will also give Him as a light to the Gentiles to be His salvation to the ends of the earth. The Lord says, "In an acceptable time, I have heard you, and in the day of salvation, I have helped you. I will preserve you and give you as a covenant to the people to restore the earth, to cause them to inherit the desolate heritages, that you may say to the prisoners, 'Go forth!' To those who are in darkness, 'Show yourselves!' They will feed along the road.. they will neither hunger nor thirst... for He Who has mercy on them will lead them... by springs of water He will guide them." They will come from afar. Isaiah says, "Sing, oh heavens! Be joyful, oh earth! And break out in singing, oh mountains! For the Lord has comforted His people and will have mercy on His afflicted." God will remember Zion. But Zion said, "The Lord has forsaken me, and my Lord has forgotten me." But the Lord replies, "Can a woman forget her nursing child and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you. See! I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands. Your walls are continually before Me." The Lord says that He will set up a standard for the nations, and they will carry Israel's sons on their shoulders. They will bow down to them and lick up the dust of their feet, and then Israel will know that He is the Lord. He says, "For they will not be ashamed who wait for Me." The Lord will contend with those who contend with them, and all will know that the Lord is their Savior and Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.
The Lord asks where the divorce certificate is that He divorced them with. He asks why no one answered when He called. "Is My hand shortened at all that it cannot redeem? Or have I no power to deliver?" He says when He rebukes, the seas dry up, and He "[clothes] the heavens with blackness." Isaiah says, "The Lord God has given me the tongue of the learned that I should know how to speak a word in season to him who is weary. He awakens me morning by morning. He awakens my ear to hear as the learned. The Lord God has opened my ear." There is an interesting part here where Isaiah says he turned the other cheek and did not "hide [his] face from spitting," and he talks about men plucking out his beard (all a reference to Christ.) He says, "I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I will not be ashamed. He is near Who justifies me. Who will contend with me? Let us stand together. Who is my adversary? Let him come near me. Surely the Lord God will help me. Who is he who will condemn me? Who among you fears the Lord? Who obeys the voice of His Servant? Who walks in darkness and has no light? Let him trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God." He tells those who make their own fire to walk in the light of it, but they will lie down in torment.
The Lord tells those who follow after righteousness and seek the Lord to listen. "Look to the Rock from which you were hewn, and to the hole of the pit from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you... For the Lord will comfort Zion... He will make her wilderness like Eden and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of melody." The Lord says that His justice will be a light to the people. He says His righteousness is near, and His salvation has gone forth. The coastlands will trust in Him. He tells them to lift their eyes to the heaven and look down to the earth. "For the heavens will vanish away like smoke. The earth will grow old like a garment... but My salvation will be forever, and My righteousness will not be abolished." He tells those who know righteousness and who have God's law in their hearts to listen. He tells them not to fear the reproach of men or be afraid of their insults, because they will not last, but His righteousness will be forever and His salvation "from generation to generation." Isaiah tells the arm of the Lord to awake and put on strength, and he praises all His great deeds of old. "The ransomed of the Lord will return and come to Zion with singing, with everlasting joy on their heads. They will obtain joy and gladness. Sorrow and sighing will flee away." The Lord says, "I, even I, am He Who comforts you. Who are you that you should be afraid of a man who will die... a man who will be made like grass?" Yet they forget the Lord who made the heavens and the earth, and they have feared the "fury of the oppressor." The Lord has put His words in their mouth and covered them with the shadow of His hand. Isaiah tells Jerusalem to awake. They have drunk of the Lord's wrath, and no one is there to guide her or "take her by the hand." Desolation and destruction, famine and sword have come to her. The Lord, "Who pleads the cause of His people," says that He has removed the cup of His wrath, and that they will not drink it anymore, but it will be put into the hands of those who have afflicted them and walked all over them.
Isaiah tells Zion to awake and put on her strength and for Jerusalem to put on her holy garments. "For the uncircumcised and the unclean will no longer come to you. Shake yourself from the dust! Arise!... Loose yourself from the bonds of your neck, oh captive daughter of Zion, for thus says the Lord, 'You have sold yourselves for nothing, and you will be redeemed without money.'" They went down to Egypt, and then the Assyrians "oppressed them without cause," and the Lord's name is "blasphemed continually every day." In that day, they will know the Lord is He Who speaks. Isaiah says, "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of Him Who brings good news, Who proclaims peace, Who brings glad tidings of good things, Who proclaims salvation, Who says to Zion, 'Your God reigns!'" He tells the waste places to sing, because the Lord has comforted His people and redeemed Jerusalem and shown His strong arm to all the nations. All the ends of the earth will see His salvation. The Lord says, "Touch no unclean thing. Go out from the midst of her." The Lord will go before them and be their rear guard. His Servant will deal wisely and be exalted. Of the coming Messiah, the Lord says, "His visage was marred more than any man, his form more than the sons of men. So will He sprinkle many nations. Kings will shut their mouths at Him."
The Lord continues to speak of Israel's Savior. "Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For He will grow up before Him as a tender plant and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and we hid, as it were, our faces from Him. He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth." He was also "cut off from the land of the living." His grave was with the wicked, but with the rich at his death, because He had done no violence nor was any deceit in His mouth. "Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him." His soul will be an offering for sin, and He will see His seed. He will prolong His days and see the labor of His soul and be satisfied. The Lord says, "By His knowledge My righteous Servant will justify many, for He will bear their iniquities. Therefore, I will divide Him a portion with the great, and He will divide the spoil with the strong, because He poured out His soul unto death, and He was numbered with the transgressors. And He bore the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors."
Thoughts/discussion questions:
Jesus truly is the "suffering Servant." Let us identify with Him in His suffering so we can identify with Him in His glory.