Isaiah 7

Isaiah 7:8-21

8. a Kings

9. NEVERTHELESS, the dimes shall not be such as near in her vexation, when at the first of his people afflicted the land of Zebulon, and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan in Galilee of the nations. 2. The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. 3. Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy: they joy before thee, according to the joy in harvest, and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. 4. For thou hast broken the yoke of his burden, and the fluff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, in the day of Midian. 5. For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood, but this shall be with burning and fuel of fire. 6. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called, Wonderful, Counsellor, * The mighty God, § The everlasting Father, * The Prince of peace. 7. Of the increase of his government and peace: there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth even for ever: the zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this. 8. The glorious person of our Redeemer and Saviour is set forth under a variety of views, a question of his excellent greatness, and admirably adapted to encourage the faith and hope of his people. For unto us a child is born, unto us the human nature, born for our sake, to be a Saviour to the uttermost, unto us a foal is given; the Son of God, already in the eternal counsels appointed, and as certainly to be incense: as if he had then been at the earth; and lead the views of his humanity might fallen him in our eyes, the infinitely transcendent dignity of his person is insisted upon; and the government shall be upon his shoulders; though an infant, yet a king, invested with all power in heaven and earth, and especially all blushing his throne in the hearts of his people: and his name shall be called, Wonderful; his incarnation, life, death, reformation, of, &c. are full of wonders; his love, grace, redemption, amazingly great and glorious; and all he is and doth, justly challenges the admiration of angels as well as men; a Counsellor, which may be joined with wonderful: he is of the sacred Three, by whose indborn wisdom all things were created, and by whose designs of providence and grace the whole world above and beneath is administered; and to his teaching are his people indebted for their salvation, who, in every difficulty guided by his counsel, are safely brought at last to glory; The mighty God, or God the mighty One; very God as well as very many, sharing in all the uncommunicable attributes of Deity, self-existence, eternity, omnipotence, life, and mighty therefore to save all that come to him as their Redeemer; The everlasting Father, though in person distinct from the God the Father, yet one with him in offence and the unity of the godhead; and particularly the everlasting Father of his people, the children given him according to the sense of the eternal covenant of grace, and to whom he is the author of everlasting salvation; The Prince of peace; the procurer of peace between God and man, the giver of it to the troubled conscience; his subjects are all peaceable, and ruling in their hearts, he keeps them in perfect peace whilst stayed upon him, and will bring them shortly to everlasting peace and rest in glory. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end; from small beginning it shall increase more and more, till the ends of the earth remember themselves, and turn unto the Lord; and the peace he gives shall be eternal as his throne; Ephraim shall set away Judah, our Judah was Ephraim; all animosities between his people will subside, and, Oh that the time were come for this happy union of all true believers in one heart and one mind: upon the scene of David, and upon his kingdom, the Redeemer, the Son of David after the birth, will be exalted, to order it, the kingdom of his Israel, and to establish it with justice and judgment, confirming his people in righteousness and true holiness, and executing judgment on their enemies, henceforth even for ever; for his dominion is that which shall not be destroyed; he ever lives and ever reigns, not only in time, but to eternity: the need of the Lord of hosts will perform this; his faithfulness is engaged to fulfil his promise, his power almighty to accomplish his purposes; and therefore not a jot or tittle shall fail. Happy therefore, eternally happy, are those souls who are brought under this government of Jesus, and, by experience of his grace establishing that kingdom within them, which is righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost, can say with humble confidence, My King and my God.

10. The LORD sent a word unto Jacob, and it hath lighted upon Israel. 9. And ‘all the people shall know, even Ephraim, and the inhabitants of Samaria, that lay in the pride and flourish of heart; 10. The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones: the Sycamores are cut down, but we will change them into cedars. 11. Therefore the LORD shall set up the adversaries of Resin against him, and join his enemies

together. 12. The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind, and they shall devour Israel with open mouth: ‘for all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. 13. For the people turneth not unto him that tiniteth them,’ neither do they seek the LORD of hofts. 14. Therefore the LORD will cut off from Israel head and tail, branch and rush in one day. 15. The ancient and honourable, be it the head; and the prophet that tracheth lies, he is the tail. 16. For the leaders of this people cause them to err, and they that are & led of them are a destroyed. 17. Therefore the LORD shall have no joy in their young men, neither shall have mercy on their fatherless and widows: for every one is an hypocrite, and an evil deer, and every mouth speaketh it folly: ‘for all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. 18. For wickedness burneth as the fire, it shall devour the briers and thorns, and shall kindle in the thickets of the forest, and they shall mount up like the lifting up of fowls. 19. Through the wrath of the LORD of hofts is the land darkened, and the people shall be as the fuel of the fire: ’no man shall spare his brother. 20. And he shall snatch on the right hand, and be hungry; and he shall eat on the left hand, and they shall not be fatified: they shall eat every man the flesh of his own arm. 21. Manaffeh, Ephraim; and Ephraim, Manaffeh; and they together shall be against Judah: for all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

The same prophetic word which brings tidings of mercy to some, denounces the judgments of God on others. They who disregard his anger, shall feel the lighting down of his indignation, and know by dire experience how fearful a thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God. The kingdom of Israel hath her shortly approaching doom denounced; a moment’s respite is in mercy given before God strikes he warns, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come unto repentance.

1. A high charge is brought against them for sundry crimes and misdemeanours against the Majesty of heaven.

(1.) They braved God’s throanings with daring insolence. Though the Afghian had demolished their houses in the siege, they vaunted how soon they would restore them in greater magnificence, changing the bricks for them alone; and when the Yecamores were cut down for the befinger’s use, to burn or facilitate their approaches, they basified they would supply their place with coders. Note, Impenitence under warning providence, is a sad symptom of approaching ruin.

(2.) They were incorrigible, v. 13. nor in their deepest distresses deigned to humble their souls and seek to God. Note, If corrections bring us not to our knees now, God’s fierce wrath will be poured out, and prayer come too late to be heard.

(3.) Their magistrates and ministers concurred in hastening the judgment by their ill examples and lying promises. The leaders of this people, or they take their pity, deceive them, encouraging their false hopes, and seeing visions of peace for them when there is no peace. Note, When ministers, instead of zeal against men’s sins, suffer them to continue undisturbed, and speak smooth things to flatter them to their ruin, the case is desperate. The sick patient must needs die, if the physician administers poison instead of medicine.

(4.) Hypocrisy, falsehood, and wickedness, were reigning sins, v. 17. They who kept up the form of religion, were as a bombinable as the profane and abandoned sinner; the one renounced openly all respect to God; the other approached him with their lips, whilst their hearts were far from him, or, trusting on the meritoriousness of their outward duties and devotions, more fatally deceived themselves to their ruin.

2. A heavy punishment is threatened, temporal and eternal.

(1.) The ruin of their country, v. 11, 12. The adversaries of Rexin, whom Ahaa had hired, 2 Kings xvi. 7—9. had scarce sooner succeeded in the reduction of Demascus, than incorporating the Syrian forces with their own, they should fall upon Israel on one side, and the Philistines on the other, so that they should be grievously spoiled. Note, God sends lurid judgments first, and if these prove ineffectual, he hath heavier in force; for.

(2.) Because, by their continued impenitence, his wrath was not turned away, but his hand stretched out still, he will make a more terrible havock among them, v. 14, 15. neither young nor old, high or low, priest or people, should escape: nor would God extend the least compulsion to the most miserable objects, v. 17. Note, (1.) When God visits for sin, the highest in station shall be among the first to suffer; crowns plead no privilege at his bar. (2.) The minister that speaketh lies, to

Vol. II.

cruity favour with the great, conceives at their sins, or indolently negligent, is a blind leader of the blind, will shortly appear a character the most detectable and bare, and receive a punishment proportioned to his guilt and perfidy. (3.) The wickedness of the poor is as much remembered as the sins of the rich, and their wears and wretchedness here will be no exculpation, rather an aggravation of their sin, that when they had less of this world to ensnare them, they did not more carefully seek a better.

(3.) Intestine broils shall destroy them as well as the sword of the enemy, v. 20, 21. they should but and devour one another, and even the nearest relations not spare their own flesh and blood; various instances of which appeared when their desolations drew near; and the ravages the tribes made on each other, opened an easier conquest for their enemies. Note, Nothing so weakens God’s church as castible divisions, and perverse disputes for in the heat of religious controversy, the power of godliness is usually bad, and Satan reaps the spoil.

(4.) The wrath of God, terrible and eternal, would yet pursue them: their wickedness would kindle a fire of vengeance, which nothing could quench, and the smoke of their torment would ascend up for ever and ever: the darkness and distress of their outward situation, was but a faint image of their future prospects, when, as fuel for the flames, they should lie down in torment without measure and without end, v. 18, 19. for as in all their temporal judgments, their obituary provoked a repetition of the strokes, so in the eternal punishment of the wicked, God’s wrath will never be turned away, but his hand be stretched out still, for his wrath is for ever wrath to come.

Isaiah 7:18-30

against his people, and he hath stretched forth his hand against them, and hath smitten them; and the hills did tremble, and their carcades were torn in the midst of the streets: For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. 26. And he will lift up a design to the nations from far, and will his union them from the end of the earth; and behold they shall come with speed swiftly. 27. None shall be weary nor flumble amongst them: none shall flumber nor sleep: neither shall the girdle of their loins be looted, nor the latcher of their shoes be broken. 28. Whole arrows are sharp, and all their bows bent; their horses hoods shall be counted like flint, and their wheels like a whirlwind. 29. Their roring shall be like a lion, they shall roar like young lions: yea, they shall roar and lay hold of the prey, and shall carry it away fair, and none shall deliver it. 30. And in that day they shall roar against them, like the roaring of the sea: and if one look unto the land, behold darkness and furrow, and the light is darkened in the heavens thereof.

Two woes are denounced, but there are others yet to come equally grievous, and all during their origin from fire, which then, now, and ever is the cause of all our misery. Happy, did we but take warning by others woes, and flee their iniquities.

1. Their fins are many.

(1.) They draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and fin as it were toils a one rope, strain every nerve, use every argument to accomplish their wicked purposes; ruffling into temptation, and bent on gratifying their lurks at all events.

(2.) They dread God, despised the warnings of his prophets, and when his Son appeared, treated his pretensions with contempt. They joy, let him make fixed, and higher for sure; the men of that generation said, where are the threatened judgments? deriding their prophets who brought the millage: the Jews said, if he be the Son of God, let him come down from the cross; and the infidel finner continues thus to treat God’s warnings in every age.

(3.) They fought to confound good and evil, willfully misrepresented truth as fasthood, branding the ways of godliness as miserable, and boasting the paths of sin to be the only substantial bliss, v. 20. Not, The devil and wicked men study ever to dread up religion and its perfection in the most forbidding colours, which every glaring vice is palliated with some soft name, or pleaded for as commendable. Seriousness and singularity are termed pride and moroseness, which a life of dissipation is called a little innocent pleasure; a debauch, good company; forbid parsimony, frugality; and daring infidelity, free-thinking: but names alter not things, nor change their nature; the sweetness of God’s good ways abides the same, and all the gladies of sinners will not prevent their feeling the bitterness of the flames of hell.

(4.) They were proud and self-sufficient, wise in their own eyes, though so infatuated, and prudent in their own light, valuing themselves on their understanding and management. Thus the Pharisees said, we see, when most deeply their sin remained. Not, Concert of our own wisdom and righteousness, is among the most fatal errors.

(5.) They were mighty to drink wine, strong heads, and gloried in the quantity of liquor they could carry off; and men of strength to mingle strong drink, delighting in being able to drink others down. Not, (1.) They who were mighty to drink wine, must shortly drink of the wine of the wrath of God. (2.) The strength of a man’s constitution will not exculpate him from the guilt of drunkenness. To sit long at the cyan, and delight in them, is as evil as to fill the table with vomit, or flagger in their walk. (3.) They who glory now in their shame, of having out-drank their companions, in hell will find small joy in their exploits.

(6.) They barely perverted justice for gain. Their magistrates justified the wicked for reward, money covered all crimes; which they take away the righteousness of the righteous from him, the poor that cannot bribe, or the upright that dare not, however just their cause, are sure to be cast: for iniquities like these, God will visit, and his soul be arranged of such a people as this. Therefore,

2. He denounces their doom. Because they have cast away the love of the Lord, the doctrine sent them by his prophets, and the gospel preached by his Son, and despised the word of the holy One of Jesus, treated it with contempt and disregard, therefore as his fire downwards the double, and the flame confounds the chief, to ludicrous, terrible, restless, and irreparable should their destruction be; if that their rest shall be as ruthless, and therefore the whole political tree must perish; and their idolatry go up at the day, all their pomp, rahas, and glory be dispersed, as wickedness becomes the wind. Therefore is the anger of the Lord kindled against his people, once his chosen, now spoilage from him, and exposed to his wrath. Present judgments were upon them, their priors

gain in their streets, and none to bury them; yet these but the beginning of fairness: God’s anger was far from being turned away, and greater woes to come, his hand being stretched out still, v. 25. He will set up an enigma, as the signal for marching, to the nations from far; the Romans, composed of various people, and bringing their troops from distant provinces: he will hold more him, or them, the army, or the general, as a shepherd whistles his dog to come. Instantly they will obey, marching speedily; no weariness shall retard, or difficulties throught them: so eager would they be to hasten to the siege, that they would march day and night, and not even undress themselves, or loose their shoes, to lie down to sleep by the way; expressions denoting their indefatigable diligence, v. 27. Then arches ready to shoot, their cavalry strong, their charters of war soft, and thundering along, v. 28. Fence as lions, their hair should intimidate; strong as lions, their defenceless prey would fall, and none be able to deliver the devoted people of Judea from the cavenog Roman folders, v. 29. In that day of the siege of Jerusalem, they should roar with their founts and buttering engines, as the tempelinous sea, and the land of Judæ is te ranged and funk under its distress, as if the luminaries of heaven were extinguished, Manti. xxiv. 29. their whole polity, civil and ecclesiastical, be utterly dishonest; and priests, princes, and people, sink in one promiscuous ruin. Not, (1.) When sinners reject the country of God against their own lust, they bring upon themselves swift destruction. (2.) God never wants instruments to rest out his vengeance upon a guilty nation. (3.) When the Lord gives the word, the demnation of the wicked no longer flumbers. (4.) They who have fled from the light of truth to the darkness of sin, are justly consigned to the eternal darkness.