Isaiah 54
10/25/2009
Sunday School
I. (1-39) Condemnation
A. Chapters 1-12 - ”Prophecies against Israel and Judah
B. Chapters 13-23 - ”Prophecies against the Nations
C. Chapters 24-27 - ”Prophecies of the Day of the Lord
D. Chapters 28-35 - ”Prophecies of Judgment and Blessing
E. Chapters 36-39 - ”Historical accounts
II. (40-66) Consolation
A. Chapters 40-48 - Israel’s God
B. Chapters 49-54 - Israel’s Messiah
1. \\#49:1-26\\ Messiah’s Mission
2. \\#50:1-11\\ Messiah’s Obedience
3. \\#51:1-52:12\\ Messiah’s Message
4. \\#52:13-53:12\\ Messiah’s Life
5. \\#54:1-17\\ Messiah’s Joy
I. \\#54:1-17\\ Messiah’s Joy
A. \\#1-5\\ Israel’s Eternal Blessedness
1. \\#1\\ "Sing… break forth into singing" - Songs are sung by the
joyful. Israel is told to sing because of the blessing they will
inherent in their end time.
2. \\#1-3\\ The reason for their joy is their propagation.
a. \\#1\\ Israel had been the "barren," but no more. Israel’s
barrenness has been brought about due to oppression and
persecution. As the millennial begins, all of that will be a
distant memory.
b. "thou didst not bear… didst not travail with child" - These
new children will be Israel’s without the normal and natural
process of childbirth. Perhaps these are the many who will
turn to Christ and worship Him through Israel during the
millennial. \\#Is 49:20-22\\
c. "more are the children of the desolate than… the married wife"
God will take desolate Israel and give them more nationals than
the nations who had a long, easy, luxurious history. (It seems
that the nations which today should be multiplying greatly,
have already begun to fulfill their part of this prophecy.)
d. \\#2\\ "Enlarge the place of thy tent… stretch forth the
curtains… lengthen the cords" - Due to their proliferation,
Israel will need a bigger tent, that is, more land. The original
boundaries of Israel were to be far beyond the land that God gave
in the days of Moses. In the end time, they shall inherit all
that God intended them to have.
Genesis 15:18 In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto
thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river,
the river Euphrates:
e. \\#3\\ The extent of their new kingdom is described:
(1) "thou shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left"
An expression to say that they will be bursting out at the
seams.
(2) "thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles" - Israel will have
dominion and authority over the Gentiles. In the
millennium, Jesus will rule over the Jews and the Jews will
rule over the nations.
(3) "make desolate cities to be inhabited" - Whether this applies
just within Israel’s borders, throughout their expanded
kingdom, or throughout the world is not clear; but the
places once forsaken will now be populated.
3. \\#4\\ The reason for joy is their forgiveness.
a. "Fear not" - Israel will not need to fear conquest from an enemy
or retribution from God.
b. "thou shalt not be ashamed" - Israel will not need to be ashamed
of their sins toward God. Those sins are gone.
c. "neither be thou confounded" - CONFOUNDED means humiliated,
confused, filled with regret. Israel’s past will no longer be
relevant. It has been forgiven.
d. "thou shalt not be put to shame" - Israel will not be made to feel
their same again. Once forgiven, the shameful deeds of Israel’s
past will not be brought up to them again.
e. "for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth" - Everything before
Israel’s conversion during the tribulation is called by God to be
their YOUTH. Like children who did not know any better, so God
will consider Israel’s past life.
f. "shalt not remember… thy widowhood" - Israel’s WIDOWHOOD is the
time when Israel was without a Husband, that is, without God.
4. \\#5\\ The reason for joy is their widowhood is ended.
a. "For thy Maker is thine husband" - Israel was married to Jehovah.
Of course, God did not die; but the separation and abandonment
that Israel is feeling is like He did. God has left Israel to her
own sins and the punishment it entailed.
b. God is re-introduced to Israel (a repeated occurrence in the last
half of the book of Isaiah).
(1) He is their MAKER.
(2) He is their HUSBAND.
(3) He is the LORD OF HOSTS.
(4) He is their REDEEMER.
(5) He is the HOLY ONE OF ISRAEL.
(6) He is the GOD OF THE WHOLE EARTH.
B. \\#6-10\\ Israel’s Temporary Afflictions
1. \\#6\\ The time of Israel’s judgment is referred to as the time of
"a woman (Israel) forsaken and grieved in spirit."
a. God refers to Israel’s time of judgment as A WOMAN… A WIFE OF
YOUTH… who had been REFUSED.
(1) The whole time period of judgment is described like a spat
between a husband and a wife.
(2) God, Israel’s husband, had sent Israel away because of
unfaithfulness.
b. Israel’s time of judgment could have several different starting
dates.
(1) It could have been when God determined to send the northern
kingdom into captivity.
(2) Perhaps it was in 722 BC, when He actually gave the northern
kingdom to Assyria.
(3) Perhaps it is in 586 BC, when God gave Judah into the hand of
Babylon.
(4) Or perhaps it is the undisclosed day which Ezekiel describes
in Ezekiel 10-11. The say the Glory of God departed from
Israel.
c. However, the end of this time is likely when Jesus returns to
Israel to stand on the Mount of Olives and delivers them from the
hand of their enemy. \\#Zech 14:1-7, Rev 19:11-21\\
2. \\#7\\ The Turning Point
a. "for a small moment have I forsaken thee" - Again, those many
years of Israel’s rebellion and judgment are described by God as
being only a short moment.
(1) Only a God of timeless eternity could use such a description
to apply to so many thousands of years.
(2) And the fact that God does use such a short term, insinuates
that the time Israel was forsaken of the Lord will be
small compared to the future time of God’s blessings.
b. "but with great mercies will I gather thee."
(1) This is that second and last regathering of Israel.
(2) The second regathering will occur after the anti-Christ
scatters Israel.
3. \\#8\\ The Turning Point Emphasized
a. The judgment
(1) "In a little wrath" - This is another statement that only
God could make. God calls those thousands of years that
Israel was persecuted, including the holocaust and the
future attack by the anti-Christ as a LITTLE WRATH. This
is not to minimize what Israel has gone through but to
emphasize how much worse God could have made it.
(2) "for a moment" - God repeats that from the scope of eternity,
those years of affliction were brief.
b. The blessedness
(1) "but with everlasting kindness" - The time of blessedness
is to be eternal.
(2) "with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee" - That
time will be full of God’s kindness and mercy.
4. \\#9\\ A Comparison
a. "For this is as the waters of Noah unto me" - While there are
probably several ways the ancient judgment of water compare to
this long judgment against Israel, God does not leave us to
figure it out.
b. As God had "sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over
the earth" so "I have sworn that I would not be wroth with"
Israel anymore. In the end time, God’s wrath toward Israel will
be over.
5. \\#10\\ God’s Enduring Word
a. Even though MOUNTAINS… DEPART and HILLS are REMOVED…
b. God’s KINDNESS and MERCY will not depart…
c. And His COVENANT OF PEACE shall not end.
d. Jesus makes a quote similar to this concerning all of the promises
of God.
Matthew 24:35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.
C. \\#11-17\\ Israel’s Divine Promises
1. \\#11-12\\ A Beautiful Home
a. \\#11\\ "O thou afflicted, tossed, with tempest, and not
comforted"
(1) God acknowledges all the affliction that He has allowed to
come upon Israel.
(2) Perhaps the saddest is that in all Israel has endured, they
were NOT COMFORTED. Jeremiah will write of this hardship.
Lamentations 1:2 She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her
cheeks: among all her lovers she hath none to comfort her: all her friends have
dealt treacherously with her, they are become her enemies.
(3) Israel had neither the presence of the Holy Ghost nor the
company of friends to help in the times of distress.
(4) Perhaps the isolation and loneliness she was forced to endure
was part of the price for seeking deliverance from other
nations.
b. "I will lay" - Yet, in Israel’s future blessedness. God will build
Israel into an earthly paradise. John details for those who are
apart of the New Covenant what our home will look like (Revelation
21-22). Isaiah details for those apart of the Old covenant what
their home will look like.
(1) "stones with fair colours"
(2) "foundations with sapphires"
(3) \\#12\\ "windows of agates"
(4) "gates of carbuncles"
(5) "borders of pleasant stones"
2. \\#13-14\\ A Changed People
a. \\#13\\ A TAUGHT people - "all of thy children shall be taught of
the Lord" - God Almighty will teach the children of Israel. This
will be very important as they will still be in their fleshly
bodies.
b. A PEACEFUL people - "and great shall be the peace of thy children"
Israel will have peace within and without. They will no longer
bear guilt, shame, or regret which steals the inner peace, and
they will have no enemies to steal their outward peace.
c. \\#14\\ A RIGHTEOUS people - "In righteousness shalt thou be
established" - Christ will have imputed to them His own
righteousness.
d. A BLESSED people - The long familiar marks of subjugation will be
gone in that day.
(1) "thou shalt be far from "OPPRESSION"
(2) "thou shalt not "FEAR"
(3) "TERROR" shall not come near thee"
3. \\#15-17\\ A Protected Land - While the conditions described are
ideal, there is a hint of aggression. From \\#Rev 20:7-10\\, we
learn that the millennium will end with Satan being loosed for a
season. At which time, he will resume his warfare against Israel.
Yet, his uprising will be short-lived. These verses appear to be
describing that event.
a. \\#15\\ The Uprising
(1) "they shall surely gather together" - The enemies of Israel,
under Satan’s influence, will gather one more time to rebel
against God and to destroy Israel.
(2) "but not by me" - This is interesting in that one of the
interpretations for \\#Rev 16:13-16\\ is that God Himself
draws the enemy armies to Armageddon. This is clearly
stated by other prophets.
Joel 3:2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the
valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my
heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.
Zechariah 14:2 For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and
the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and
half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people
shall not be cut off from the city.
If these three passages are describing Armageddon, then the
battle referred to in this text is different. Of course
God is ultimately in control of all things; but at
Armageddon, God is bringing nations to Jerusalem to be
judged for the hatred and evil they committed toward
Israel. At the end of the millennium, they will have no
such charges against them. They will simply be under the
control of Satan. In that aspect, God would not be the One
gathering these nations against Israel.
(3) "whosoever shall gather together… shall fall" - Even so,
these nations shall fail in their attack against Israel
because God is against them and for His people.
b. \\#16\\ A Comparison
(1) As God designed the iron SMITH to BLOW on THE COALS IN THE
FIRE…TO BRING FORTH AN INSTRUMENT so God has designed a
WASTER TO DESTROY the enemies of Israel.
(2) If this is a prophecy of the last battle of mankind, this
prophecy of it does not explain much. Outside of the facts
that there will be a battle and Satan will be defeated,
there is very little known of it.
c. \\#17\\ The Outcome
(1) "No weapon that is formed against thee (Israel) shall prosper"
(2) "every tongue that shall arise against thee… thou shalt
condemn." God will defeat the attackers weapons and words
for His people, Israel’s, sake.
(3) "This is the heritage" - Heritage means POSSESSION or RIGHT.
It is the right of God’s people to be protected by God.
(4) "and their righteousness" - Righteousness also means JUSTICE.
God is saying it is the right and just thing to do for His
who, for perhaps the first time in their history, will not
have brought destruction upon their own heads by their
disobedience.
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