Isaiah 28

Isaiah 28:1-8

In this chapter, 1. Ephraim is threatened for their pride and drunkenness, their security and sinfulness, ver. 1-8. But in the midst of this, a gracious promise is given to the remnant of his people, ver. 5, 6. 2. They are likewise threatened for their disability and untruthfulness, ver. 9-13. 3. The rulers of Jerusalem are threatened for their resident contempt of God’s judgment, 14, 15, 17-22. 4. A gracious promise intervenes, ver. 16. for the comfort of the faithful. 5. The certainty of God’s judgment is illustrated by the plenum’s issuing and throbbing, under divine instruction, ver. 23-29.

1. WO to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the lax valleys of them

Before Chall 718. Law art.

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Though judgments are denounced on all their foes, yet they will first begin at the house of God, and the sinners in Zion must feel the heaviest scourge. Such is the woe pronounced here on Ephraim, and Samaria the capital of the late revolted tribes.

1. The fins charged upon them are pride and drunkenness. Their country being rich and fertile, abundance twitted their vain hearts, and sensual appetite abused their distinguished mercies. Carousing at the lethal board, their heads with garlands crowned, they proudly defend sorrows, barlets of the wrath they provoked. Note, (1.) Pride on God’s gifts is the fore way to provoke him to deprive us of them. (2.) A drunkard is a monster in nature; and he that thus falsely chokes to degrade himself into a brute, justly deserves to be made a companion of devils.

2. Heavy is the curse the prophet is commissioned to pronounce on these proud drunkards. As they gave up their fables to the bare servitude of lull, and drowned their reason in excess, in just judgment they should be delivered to their foes. The king of Affyria, Salmanecer, like a resistible hail storm, or winter’s flood, should bear down all before him, v. 2. The crown of pride, their king and his mighty men, or Samaria the metropolis, or the crowns of garlands on the drunkard’s head, surprised in this defenceless and intoxicated state, he would cast down, and tread the drunkards under his feet, reducing them to state of most abject wretchedness, v. 3. Their glorious beauty, their numerous inhabitants, or their country docked with vineyards, and vallies thick with corn, shall fade as quickly as the flowers bloom departs, and be devoured by the bath of Affyria, as greedily as the first ripe fruit, v. 4. So that nothing but defoliation should be seen. Note, (1.) They who give the ruins to their appetites, and to drunkenness especially, are voluntary slaves, and court a servitude most wretched even now; affixing at present in the ruin of their health, fortune, and families, and bringing them hastily to that place of torment, where a drop of water will be fought in vain to cool a flaming tongue. (2.) God’s ministers must denounce his woes against men’s fine finely and plainly. (3.) Whatever the sinner here is proud of, it is but a fading flower, and at death at farthest, if not before, will vanish.

3. In the midst of the desistations of Ephraim, Judah and Benjamin, the residue of God’s people, have a gracious promise made to them. The Lord shall be a crown of glory, and a shadow of beauty to them, eminently distinguishing, and protecting them from the power of the Affyrians, under Hezekiah, a type of that Son of David, in whom the offices of King and Priest should be united. And for a spirit of judgment to him that fathith in judgment, which God would bestow on the king and his magistrates, to execute righteous judgment, which is the great happiness of every state; and for strength to them that turn the battle to the gate, enduring their generals and soldiers with courage to vanquish their enemies, and purse them to the gates of their city. Note, (1.) Christ is his people’s glory, and in his wisdom, righteousness, and strength, they are made more than conquerors over all their enemies. (2.) Whatever the Lord is to us, or doth for us, we are bound to ascribe the praise of all to him.

4. A heavy complaint is lodged against Judah for their fins. In her were found the fins of Israel, and the same drunkenness led them aflory from God. Yes, to generally hail their scandalous fins spread, that priest, prophet, and people were alike infected with it. The consequence of which was, that the pretended prophet uttered the fancies of his inflamed brains for visions, deceiving, and being deceived; the priests, instead of the condescension discharge of their office, without God’s law, misinterpreted his oracles, and led their hearers into that errors: or on the bench, decided wrong, to the great injury of

truth and justice, v. 7. Yes, so common and infamous was their drunkenness, that every noble was full of vomit, and no place clean; a scene as loathsome in the eyes of sober men, as detestable in the sight of God. Note, Drunkenness is vile and brutish in every man; but in a priest, a minister of the faculties, what words can express the infamy, impiety, and scandalousness of the crime!

Babes Chick P. 2

9. ¶ ‘Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? ’them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breaths. 10. For ‘precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little and there a little. 11. For ‘with flammering lips, and another tongue, will he speak to this people. 12. To whom he said, ‘This is ’the rift misremain ye may cause’ the weary to rift, and this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear. 13. But the word of the LORD was unto them, precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little and there a little; ’that they might go and fall backward, and be broken, and feared, and taken.

that he can wrap himself in it. 21. For the LORD shall rise up as an mount Peraxim, he shall be wreck as as the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pals his act, his strange act. 22. Now therefore be ye not ‘mockery, lest your bands be made strong: for I have heard from the Lord GOD of hosts a consumption, even determined upon the whole ye earth.

Isaiah 28:14-22

This prophecy some apply to the men of Judah, and their destruction by the Affevians; but it seems to belong especially to the Jews in Christ’s day, and the defoliations which the Romans shortly after brought upon them.

1. The scornful men who rejected the prophetic admonition, too great to take rebuke, and infatuated to their ruin, boasted themselves secure. The death and hell the prophet threatened, they feared not: they thought themselves as safe, as if they had made a compact with the grave; and were confident whenever overflowing scourge passed through the land, it should not come to them; making lies their refuge, and hiding themselves under fullhood, the lying prophets, who encouraged them; or their own strength, wealth, and policy, to overcome or over-reach their afterthrifies. By the overflowing scourge, the Romans army seems intended, against which they thought themselves safe, but found, too late, their sad delusion. Note, (1.) When we are in a covenant with God through a Redeemer, and at peace with him through the blood of sprinkling; then, and only then, have we made a covenant with death, and cannot be hurt thereby. (2.) Vain confidence buoy up sinners to the left, but there will then be found a lie in their right hand.

2. The prophet admonishes them, where alone they can safely place their confidence. Behold, I lay in Zena a foundation, the Lord Jesus Christ, after foundation than whom no man can lay; a flame, a rock, firm and immovable; a tried flame, who hath been proved the farer support of his farms in every age; or a flame of trial, by whom men’s flates are discovered, and their characters determined; a precious corner-stone, supporting the whole spiritual building, and unstimately prized by every believer, who knows the value of such a Redeemer; a farer foundation, that will stand for eternity, and on which we may lately trust body and soul: he that believer, shall not make haste, but under every trial patiently wait the Lord’s leisure; and then will never be confounded, or abhorred, as it is rendered, I Pat. 26. 6. for he hath never failed those who trust him, and never can or will disappoint their hopes.

3. He warns them of the folly, sin, and danger of their conduct, in trusting on lying vanities. For when the Lord shall lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, as heldens, to prove their work first, their ways will be found pervade, and their judgment order; then there vain hopes shall fail; and the half-flame swamp away their refuge of lies. The army of the enemy as easily and utterly overwhelming them, thro’ lying prophets, their riches and temple together, or whatever else they trust in, as the waters of the deluge did the sinners of old, p. 17. Then their covenant with death would be proved a delusion; and the sword of the Chaldeans, or rather the Romans, as an overflowing scourge, pals through, and as mine in the flames they should be trodden down, v. 18. Even the time it gets forth, neither policy nor power will be able to oppose it; if shall take you as prisoners for captivity, or feast you as criminals for the sword; and this continually and thoroughly, till God’s judgments are executed. Morning he morning it shall pass over, by day and by night without interruption the hope would be carried on, and the devastations increase; and it shall be a question only to understand the report, so terrible would the tidings be which those who fled into Jerusalem should carry of the ravages of the Chaldean or Roman army. For the bed is shorter, than that a man can first himself in it: and the covering narrower, than that he can wrap himself in it, which either describes the insufficiency of their projects, and the uncomfortableness of their state, when their beds would give them no repose; or the case of Jerusalem, clouded with those who fled thither, whose useless number increased the miseries of the besieged. For the Lord shall rise up as in mount Peraxim, and against his arm resistance is vain; he shall be wreck as in the valley of Gibeon; two eminent instances wherein he displayed his terrible majesty against his enemies, 2 Sam. v. 20. ‘fish. v. 10—13. that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pals his act, his strange act; he used to fight for them, but now is turned to be their enemy, and their fall is fine. Note, (1.) If God lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, who can stand, or bear the scrutiny? (2.) It is the folly of the fell-righteous and the hypocrite that they cry peace, when there is no peace. (3.) If sinners cannot bear the report of God’s terrors without vexation, nor bear of hell, and warrants, and eternal despair without commotion, how will they endure them? (4.) They who think their moral duties will yield them a covering in the day of God, and seek repose in their own righteousness, will find the bed too short, the covering too narrow,

and perish in their own deceiving. (5.) Vengeance is God’s strange work; he delighteth not in the death of a finner.

4. The whole is prettied upon their consciences for their conviction and reformation. Now therefore, to-day, which is called to-day, and yet there is mercy, be ye not mockery, despising these divine notices; left your hands be made strong; and aggravated guilt provoke a heavier judgment: for I have heard from the Lord of hosts, who cannot lie, and is able to make good his word, a consumption, now determined upon the whole earth, or land of Judea; it shall be swept as with the before of destruction, See Dan. ix. 27. Note, (1.) It is merciful in God to give sinners warning; he leaves them then without excuse. (2.) Mockers will be strangely disappointed, when the terrors they despised seize them, and the warnings they ridiculed are proved dreadful realities.

5. ¶ Give ye ear, and hear my voice, hearken and hear my speech. 24. Doth the plowman plow all day to sow? doth he open and break the clods of his ground? 25. When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and cast in the principal wheat, and the appointed barley, and the rye in their place? 26. ¶ For his God doth it, it is not to be a great deal, and doth teach him. 27. For the fitches are not threshed with a threshing-instrument, neither is a cart-wheel turned about upon the cummin; but the fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the cummin with a rod. 28. Bread-corn is bruised; because he will not ever be threshing it, nor break it with the wheel of his cart, nor bruise it with his horsemen. 29. This also cometh forth from the LORD of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.

Isaiah 28:23-29

The prophet, in God’s name, calls on them for attention, v. 23, and gives them a parable of warning.

1. He bids them regard the husbandman; what various methods he uses; how prudently he plows and sows, casting the seed into the proper foil, and on the appointed fasties; and when he hath gathered his fruits, how widely he manages them, using more force with the seeds that are more firm and difficult to be beat out of the ear, and his wish had to be made to be bruised, v. 27. And when the bread-corn is beat out with the threshing-instrument, (which was a kind of sow cart, drawn by horses or oxen, with 100 spikes at the bottom) he does not suffer it to be trampled on too much, or broken with the wheel on the floor, but carries it to the mill to be ground. So,

2. God would not always be warning, and making preparations for the execution of his judgments, but inflict them according to the several defects of sinners. Note, (1.) All wisdom cometh from above. If the husbandman is taught to plow and sow aright, he owes it to God wonderful in counsel. (2.) The heart of man is as the fallow ground, obdurate and unfruitful, till God in his word breaks up the stubborn foil, and awakens the sinner’s conscience. (3.) Christ is the living seed; the heart that receives him will yield fruit unto God. (4.) God knows the several dispositions of his people, and dispenses his word and provisions in such a way towards them, as may most effectually answer the purposes of his grace. (5.) In proportion to their guilt and provocations will be the execution of the divine vengeance on the wicked. (6.) In all his ways and works God will manifest his own glory, and appear wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.