Book of Isaiah Isaiah 44
Verses 1-5, “I
will pour water on the thirsty land…I will pour out My
Spirit on your offspring…
Isaiah 44:1-5, “But now listen, O Jacob, my servant,
Verses 6-8, Who God
is…what has happened…what is yet to come—yes,
let him foretell what will come…
Verses
6-8, “This is what the Lord says—
Verses 9-20, idols, what are they?…the blacksmith takes a tool and works with it in
the coals…process for making idols described. This
is a comparison of the Great God as the Lord just described himself
above, to useless idols.
Verses
9-20, “All who serve idols are nothing, and the things they
treasure are worthless. Those who speak up for them are blind;
they are ignorant, to their own shame. Who
shapes a god and casts an idol, which can profit him nothing? He and his kind will be put to shame;
craftsmen are nothing but men. Let
them all come together and take their stand; they will be brought
down to terror and infamy.
The blacksmith takes a tool and works with it in the coals; he shapes
an idol with hammers, he forges it with the might of his arm. He gets hungry and loses his strength.; he drinks no water and grows faint. The carpenter measures with a line and
makes and outline with a marker; he roughs it out with chisels and
marks it with compasses. He
shapes it in the form of a man, of man in all his glory,
that it may dwell in a shrine. He
cut down cedars, or perhaps a cypress or oak. He
let it grow among the forest, or planted a pine, and the rain made
it grow. It is man’s fuel for burning; some
of it he takes and warms himself, he kindles a fire and bakes bread. But he also fashions a god and worships
it; he makes an idol and bows down to it. Half
of the wood he burns in the fire; over it he prepares his meal, he roasts his meat and eats his fill. He also warms himself and says, ‘Ah!
I am warm; I see the fire.’ From
the rest he makes a god, his idol; he bows down to it and worships. He prays to it and says, ‘Save me;
you are my god.’ They
know nothing, they understand nothing; their eyes are plastered over
so they cannot see, and their minds closed so they cannot understand. No
one stops to think, no one has knowledge or understanding to say ‘Half
of it I used for fuel; I even baked bread over its coals, I roasted
meat and I ate. Shall I make a detestable thing from what
is left? Shall I bow
down to a block of wood?’ He
feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; he cannot save
himself, or say,
‘Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?’”
Verses 21-23, ‘Remember
these things, O
Verses 21-23, “Remember these things
O Jacob, for you are my servant, O
Verses 24-28,
Verses 24-28, “This is what the Lord says—your
Redeemer, who formed you in the womb: I am the Lord, who has made
all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out
the earth by myself, who foils the signs of the false prophets
and makes fools of diviners, who overthrows the learning of the
wise and turns it into nonsense, who carries out the words of his
servants and fulfills the predictions of his messengers, who says
of Jerusalem,
‘It shall be inhabited,’ of the towns of Judah, ‘They
shall be built,’ and
of their ruins, ‘I will restore them,’ who says to the watery
deep,
‘Be dry, and I will dry up your streams,’ who says of
Cyrus, ‘He is my shepherd and will accomplish all that I please;
he will say of Jerusalem, ‘Let it be rebuilt,’ and of the
temple, ‘Let its foundations be laid.’” Now there’s a proof of God’s existence and a
powerful proof of God’s Word being true. Cyrus
hadn’t even been born yet! Isaiah
died between 695 and 680BC, and Cyrus would not be born for about 100
years. His grandparents may have been conceiving
Cyrus’
parents at that time. Yet
God prophecies Cyrus’ very name through Isaiah! I
know this doesn’t sound so amazing to you believers, but new
believers and those the Lord is drawing to himself need to see proofs
like this, and come to trust and know God’s Word is true. And
if prophecies like this are so literally fulfilled, the ones yet to
be fulfilled are literal too, not to be allegorized away in some amillennial
interpretation.
Isaiah 45
Verses 1-14 point
to Cyrus as the one God has raised up
to send the Jews back into the
Verses 1-13, “This is what the Lord says to his anointed,
to Cyrus, whose right hand I take hold of to subdue nations before
him and to strip kings of their armor, to open doors before him
so that gates will not be shut: I will go before you and will level
mountains; I will break down gates of bronze and cut through bars
of iron. I will give
you the treasures of darkness, riches stored in secret places,
so that you may know that I am the Lord, the God of
This
is what the Lord says—the Holy One of
Verses 14-25, But
from verse 14 onward the theme tends to shift over to the end times
when Israel is re-gathered, and salvation (vs. 22) is offered to
the whole world, where every knee will bow (vs. 23). God
again explains just who he is.
“Verses 14-25, “This is what the Lord says: ‘The
products of Egypt and the merchandise of Cush [that is, the Upper
Nile region] and those tall Sabeans—they will come over to
you and will be yours; they will trudge behind you, coming over
to you in chains. They
will bow down before you and plead with you, saying, ‘Surely God is with you, and there is no other; there is
no other god.’’
Truly you are a God who hides himself, O God
and Savior of
“For this is what the Lord says—he who created the heavens, he is God; he who fashioned
and made the earth, he founded it; he did not create it to be empty,
but formed it to be inhabited—he says: ‘I am the Lord,
and there is no other. I have not spoken in secret, from somewhere
in a land of darkness; I have not said to Jacob’s descendants, ‘Seek
me in vain.’ I,
the Lord, speak the truth; I declare what is right.
‘Gather together and come; assemble,
you fugitives from the nations. Ignorant
are those who carry about idols of wood, who pray to gods that
cannot save. Declare what is to be, present it—let
them take counsel together. Who
foretold this long ago, who declared it from the distant past? Was it not I, the Lord? And there is no God apart from me, a righteous
God and Savior; there is none but me.’
‘Turn
and be saved, all you ends of the earth; for I am God, and there
is no other. By myself
I have sworn, my mouth has uttered in all integrity a word that
will not be revoked: Before me every knee will bow; by me every
tongue will swear. They
will say of me, ‘In the Lord alone are righteousness and
strength.’’ All
who have raged against him will come to him and be put to shame. But
in the Lord all the descendants of
Isaiah 46
Verses 1-2, false
gods of
Isaiah 46:1-2, “Bel bows down, Nebo stoops low; their
idols are borne by beasts of burden. The
images that are carried about are burdensome, a burden for the
weary. They stoop and bow down together; unable
to rescue the burden, they themselves go off into captivity.”
Verses 3-4 beautiful
promise to uphold all who remain of
God is watching
over until their regathering.)
Verses 3-4, “Listen to me, O house of Jacob, all you
who remain of
Verses
5-10, Who God is.
Verses 5-10, “To whom will you compare me or count
me equal? To whom will
you liken me that we may be compared? Some
pour out gold from their bags and weigh out silver on the scales;
they hire a goldsmith to make it into a god, and they bow down
and worship it. They lift it to their shoulders and carry
it; they set it up in its place, and there it stands. From that spot it cannot move. Though one cries out to it, it does not
answer; it cannot save him from his troubles. Remember
this, fix it in mind, take it to heart, you rebels. Remember the former things, those of long
ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is
none like me. I make known the end from the beginning,
from ancient times, what is still to come. I
say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.” This declaration
by God about who he is precedes a type of warning, and serves
too as a warning.
Verses 11-13, the
next verses are a warning, coupled this statement above, about
trouble coming from the east, leading ultimately to the 2nd Coming
of Jesus. Could also have a prior fulfillment in
Yeshua’s 1st coming, but this implies a
bigger granting of salvation to
Verses 11-13, “From the east I summon a bird of prey;
from a far-off land, a man to fulfill my purpose. What I have said, that will I bring about;
what I have planned, that will I do. Listen
to me, you stubborn-hearted, you who are far from righteousness. I
am bringing my righteousness near, it is not far away; and my
salvation to
Isaiah 47
Fall of
Isaiah 47:1-15, “‘Go down,
sit in the dust, Virgin Daughter of
Our
Redeemer—the Lord Almighty is his name—is the Holy
One of
Now
then, listen, you wanton creature, lounging in your security and
saying to yourself, ‘I am, and there is none besides me. I
will never be a widow or suffer the loss of children.’ Both of these will overtake you in
a moment, on a single day: loss
of children and widowhood. They
will come upon you in full measure, in spite of your many
sorceries and all your potent spells. You
have trusted in your wickedness and have said, ‘No one sees
me.’ Your wisdom and knowledge mislead you
when you say to yourself, ‘I am, and there is none besides
me.’ Disaster will come upon you, and you will
not know how to conjure it away. A
calamity will fall upon you that you cannot ward off with a ransom;
a catastrophe you cannot foresee will suddenly come upon you.
‘Keep on, then, with your magic spells and with your many sorceries, which you have labored at since childhood. Perhaps
you will succeed, perhaps you will cause terror. All
the counsel you have received has only worn you out! Let your astrologers come forward, those
stargazers who make predictions month by month, let them save you
from what is coming upon you. Surely
they are like stubble; the fire will burn them up. They
cannot even save themselves from the power of the flame. Here are no coals to warm anyone; here
is no fire to sit by. That
is all they can do for you—these you have labored with and
trafficked with since childhood. Each of them goes on in his error; there
is not one that can save you.”
|