ISAIAH CHAPTER 51

GOD COMFORTS ISRAEL

 

Now as we move into chapter 51 we will find that once again God is urging His people to listen. There are four phrases to that effect in this chapter: “Listen to Me” (verse 1), “Pay attention to me,”. . . “give ear” (verse 4), “Listen to Me” (verse 7), and “Please hear this” (verse 21). In verse 9 the phrase “Awake, awake” is in a prayer addressed to the Lord. God wants His people in Babylon to hear what He has to say to them.

Isaiah 51:1-3 NAS:
1 “Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness, Who seek the Lord: Look to the rock from which you were hewn And to the quarry from which you were dug.
2 “Look to Abraham your father And to Sarah who gave birth to you in pain; When he was but one I called him, Then I blessed him and multiplied him.”
3 Indeed, the Lord will comfort Zion; He will comfort all her waste places. And her wilderness He will make like Eden, And her desert like the garden of the Lord; Joy and gladness will be found in her, Thanksgiving and sound of a melody.

In this chapter we find these three admonitions[fn] which are addressed to the faithful remnant in Israel, the people described in Isaiah 50:10. In the first admonition (51:1–3), the Lord told them to look back and remember Abraham and Sarah, the direct ancestors of the Jewish nation (Genesis12–25). From these two elderly people came a nation as numerous as the dust of the earth and the stars of the heaven (Genesis 13:16; 15:5). The remnant leaving Babylon was small and weak, but God was able to increase them into a mighty nation and would also one day turn their ravaged land into a paradise. “Be comforted!” God said to His people. “The best is yet to come.”[fn]

Here God is speaking to those who pursue righteousness (Matthew 5:6) and seek Him. The believing remnant in Israel was to think back on their history. The rock from which they were cut, figuratively speaking, is explained in verse 2 as Abraham and Sarah, the “founders” of the nation. God gave the patriarch many descendants just as He had promised (Genesis 12:2; 15:5). For many years Abraham and Sarah had no children, but they believed God when God told them in Genesis 15:5:“Look up into the sky and count the stars if you can. That’s how many descendants you will have!” Though they had not yet seen the completion of God’s promises about Israel being a nation in the land (Genesis 15:18-21), Israel had God’s promises that God’s kingdom will one day be established on the earth. Because of God’s compassion (Isaiah 49:10, 15) the land will someday be fruitful like the Garden of Eden. Because of this, as we’ll see in verse 11, joy will prevail among the remnant of the people of Israel.

Isaiah 51:4-6 NAS:
4 “Pay attention to Me, O My people, And give ear to Me, O My nation; For a law will go forth from Me, And I will set My justice for a light of the peoples.
5 “My righteousness is near, My salvation has gone forth, And My arms will judge the peoples; The coastlands will wait for Me, And for My arm they will wait expectantly.
6 “Lift up your eyes to the sky, Then look to the earth beneath; For the sky will vanish like smoke, And the earth will wear out like a garment And its inhabitants will die in like manner; But My salvation will be forever, And My righteousness will not wane.

In the second command, Isaiah 51:4–6, God told them to look ahead and realize that justice would come to the world and they would be vindicated by the Lord. Note the emphasis on the word “My”; “My people, My nation, My justice, My righteousness, My arms, and My salvation.” This is the grace of God, doing for His people what they did not deserve and what they could not do for themselves. The arms of the Lord is a key concept in Isaiah’s prophecy conveying the ideas of strength, power, and salvation.[fn] Heaven and earth will pass away, but God’s righteousness and salvation will last forever (Hebrews 1:11). That righteousness will be displayed in a special way when Messiah (Jesus) returns and establishes His kingdom on earth in the end times.[fn]

Isaiah 51:7, 8 NAS:
7 “Listen to Me, you who know righteousness, A people in whose heart is My law; Do not fear the reproach of man, Nor be dismayed at their revilings.
8 “For the moth will eat them like a garment, And the grub will eat them like wool. But My righteousness will be forever, And My salvation to all generations.”

The third admonition (51:7–8) focuses on looking within, where we find either fearor faith. Why should the nation fear men when God is on its side? “Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid” (Isaiah 12:2). “Sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself, and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread” (Isaiah 8:13).

To have God’s law in your heart means to belong to Him and be saved (Jeremiah 31:31–34; Hebrews 10:16).

The moth and the worm shall destroy the enemy, but God’s salvation will endure. Moths and worms do not do their work conspicuously, but they work efficiently just the same. The seeds of destruction were already in the Babylonian Empire, and the leaders did not know it.[fn] The leaders in the United States don’t know it either.

God’s work of salvation and standards of righteousness will continue forever according to verse 8. Therefore, knowing this fact, the remnant with God’s Law within them (in the end times) and eternal hope before them, should take courage and not be disheartened by their enemies. Those enemies will perish like a moth-eaten garment, a description the Servant used earlier.

Isaiah 51:9-11 NAS:
9 Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord; Awake as in the days of old, the generations of long ago. Was it not You who cut Rahab in pieces, Who pierced the dragon?
10 Was it not You who dried up the sea, The waters of the great deep; Who made the depths of the sea a pathway For the redeemed to cross over?
11 So the ransomed of the Lord will return And come with joyful shouting to Zion, And everlasting joy will be on their heads. They will obtain gladness and joy, And sorrow and sighing will flee away.

“Awake, awake” meaning “Listen to Me” was spoken by God elsewhere to admonish the people, but here in verse 9 “awake, awake” is a prayer, a call to the Lord (51:9-16). The remnant in Babylon prayed as though God were asleep and needed to be awakened.[fn] Their explanation to themselves regarding God’s silence had been that He must be asleep. They had forgotten Psalm 121:3, 4, NAS:

3 He will not allow your foot to slip; He who keeps you will not slumber.
4 Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.

They wanted God to bare His arm as He did when He defeated Pharaoh and redeemed His people from Egyptian bondage. They reminded God—and in the process reminded themselves—of the mighty work God had done to deliver them from Egypt. The return from Babylon was looked upon as another, or a new “exodus” (Isaiah 43:16-17; 49:9-12), with God wholly in charge and the enemy completely defeated.[fn]

Isaiah 51:12-16 NAS:
12 “I, even I, am He who comforts you. Who are you that you are afraid of man who dies And of the son of man who is made like grass,
13 That you have forgotten the Lord your Maker, Who stretched out the heavens And laid the foundations of the earth, That you fear continually all day long because of the fury of the oppressor, As he makes ready to destroy? But where is the fury of the oppressor?
14 “The exile will soon be set free, and will not die in the dungeon, nor will his bread be lacking.
15 “For I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea and its waves roar (the Lord of hosts is His name).
16 “I have put My words in your mouth and have covered you with the shadow of My hand, to establish the heavens, to found the earth, and to say to Zion, ‘You are My people.’ ”

God replied to their prayer with words of comfort.[fn] He reminded them again of the weakness of man (Isaiah  40:6–8) and the power of God the Creator (51:13). Because they are His people, with whom He has deposited His Word, He will release them, protect them, and provide for them. They had an important task to perform and He would enable them to do it.[fn]

Isaiah 51:17-23 NAS:
17 Rouse yourself! Rouse yourself! Arise, O Jerusalem, You who have drunk from the Lord’s hand the cup of His anger; The chalice of reeling you have drained to the dregs.
18 There is none to guide her among all the sons she has borne, Nor is there one to take her by the hand among all the sons she has reared.
19 These two things have befallen you; Who will mourn for you? The devastation and destruction, famine and sword; How shall I comfort you?
20 Your sons have fainted, They lie helpless at the head of every street, Like an antelope in a net, Full of the wrath of the Lord, The rebuke of your God.
21 Therefore, please hear this, you afflicted, Who are drunk, but not with wine:
22 Thus says your Lord, the Lord, even your God Who contends for His people, “Behold, I have taken out of your hand the cup of reeling, The chalice of My anger; You will never drink it again.
23 “I will put it into the hand of your tormentors, Who have said to you, ‘Lie down that we may walk over you.’ You have even made your back like the ground And like the street for those who walk over it.”

The word translated “Rouse” in verse 17 is the exact same Hebrew word translated “awake” in verse 9. The Remnant of Israel had asked God to awaken, to be alert in verse 9, and to do something. Now God asks the people to be awake, because He is about to do something. Their suffering was coming to an end. In the exile they had drunk, that is experienced, God’s wrath fully, all the way to the bottom of the cup. In the horrible destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, many of their young sons had died. Devastation, destruction, famine, and sword spoke of the awful suffering of the people of Jerusalem. Young men, objects of God’s wrath, had been killed in the streets of Jerusalem. However, God pronounced that this time of judgment was over. Now the judgment, again pictured as a cup to be drunk, would be given to her enemies who had walked on the dead bodies in Jerusalem. The Babylonians, who had destroyed Jerusalem, would in turn suffer God’s wrath.

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