Isaiah 58-59
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A. The LORD exposes the shallow worship of His people [58:1–5]
1. God’s people ask: “Why do our prayers go unanswered?” (1–3a)
a. Cry aloud, spare not … tell My people their transgression: God speaks loudly and directly. His people need to hear their transgression—but will they hear?
b. First, God describes the appearance: They seek Me daily, and delight to know My ways. On the surface, it seemed that God’s people loved Him and were devoted to Him. They had the reputation of a nation that did righteousness, and the looked like people who would take delight in approaching God.
c. Why have we fasted … and You have not seen? With this spiritual veneer, they felt God was unfair to them. “LORD, we have fasted, but You still don’t answer our prayer. Don’t you know that we seek you daily, delight to know Your ways, do righteousness, and take delight in approaching You? Yet You do not answer our prayers!”
2. God exposes the shallow worship of His people (3b–5)
a. In fact, in the day of your fast you find pleasure, and exploit all your laborers: Enough with the image; now God exposes the reality. The reality was that His people didn’t fast with the right heart, and did it only as an empty ritual. The reality was that even on a day when they fasted, they still exploited their employees. God didn’t accept their fasting when it wasn’t connect with a sincere heart of obedience.
i. “How can any nation pretend to fast or worship God at all, or dare to profess that they believe in the existence of such a Being, while they carry on the slave trade, and traffic in the souls, blood, and bodies of men! O ye most flagitious of knaves, and worst of hypocrites, cast off at once the mask of your religion; and deepen not your endless perdition by professing the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, while ye continue in this traffic!” (Adam Clarke, writing in 1823)
b. Indeed you fast for strife and debate, and to strike with the fist of wickedness: They fasted for needs, certainly; but selfish needs like “LORD, help me win this argument.” “LORD, help me defeat this person.” Though their prayer was accompanied with fasting, it was still a selfish, even wicked prayer—so God did not answer.
c. You will not fast as you do this day, to make your voice heard on high: The purpose of their fasting was to glorify themselves, to make their voice heard on high. God says, “No more. You will not fast as you do this day.”
d. Is it a fast that I have chosen? The kind of fasting God rebukes here is a hollow, empty, show, without the spiritual substance behind it. This isn’t the kind of fast God has chosen. Even though they do all the right things in fasting (bow down his head like a bulrush … spread out sackcloth and ashes), God does not even call this a fast.
i. The people of Isaiah’s day had the same problem as the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. They trusted in empty ritual, apart from the spiritual reality. Real fasting—fasting that is partnered with real repentance, and isn’t only about image—has great power before God (Matthew 17:21). But God sees through the hypocrisy of empty religious ritual, including fasting. In Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, He told how the self-righteous Pharisee made a special point to say, “I fast twice a week” (Luke 18:9–14).
ii. It isn’t that Isaiah or the LORD are down on fasting. They are down on any empty religious ritual. The answer isn’t to stop fasting, but to get right with God and make your fasting more than superficial. As Jesus said to His people about the empty religious rituals of the Pharisees, These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone (Matthew 23:23).
B. The character and blessings of true worship [58:6–14]
1. The kind of worship and fasting most acceptable to God (6–7)
a. Is this not the fast that I have chosen: To loose the bonds of wickedness: God tells His people, “If you want to fast the way that pleases Me, begin with getting right with your brothers and sisters. Stop oppressing others, and reach out to help others.”
b. First, they had to stop acting wickedly towards others (loose the bonds of wickedness … undo the heavy burdens … let the oppressed go free … break every yoke). Getting right with God begins by stopping the evil we do towards others.
c. Then, they had to start acting lovingly towards others (share your bread with the hungry … cover those without clothing, and to not hide yourself from your own flesh). Getting right with God continues by doing loving things for other people.
2. The blessings God promises for the true worshipper (8–12)
a. Then your light shall break forth like the morning: If God’s people would couple their fasting with lives of righteousness and love, then they would see their prayers answered. They would have lives full of light, full of healing, full of righteousness, full of the glory of the LORD. When they called out to God, then the LORD will answer.
b. If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness: Again, the LORD gives them three things to stop doing. They must stop oppressing others, treating them as animals bound with a yoke. They must stop pointing … the finger at others, and see where they are to blame. They must stop speaking wickedness.
i. These are sins of commission. They are sins that we go out and do against the LORD and against others. If we will walk right with God, we must stop and guard against sins of commission.
c. If you extend your soul to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted soul: Again, the LORD gives them two things to start doing. They needed to minister to the hungry with more than food; they had to extend their soul to the hungry. They had to look for the afflicted soul and seek to satisfy it.
i. Failing to do these are sins of omission. They are things that we should have done, yet we have not. If we will walk right with God, we must open our eyes and do what is our loving duty before Him.
ii. This prayer, “A General Confession of Sin,” from the Book of Common Prayer (1559 edition), expresses repentance for both sins of commission and omission:
Almighty and most merciful Father, we have erred and strayed from thy ways, like lost sheep. We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. We have offended against thy holy laws. We have left undone those things which we ought to have done, and we have done those things which we ought not to have done, and there is no health in us. But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us miserable offenders. Spare thou them, O God, which confess their faults. Restore thou them that be penitent, according to thy promises declared unto mankind, in Christ Jesu our Lord. And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake, that we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life, to the glory of thy holy name.
d. Then your light shall down in the darkness, and your darkness shall be as the noonday: To the repentant, God promises blessing. Not only will they have light, but even their darkness shall be as the noonday!
e. The LORD will guide you continually: This is a promise for those who do more than just empty religious rituals. To have the guidance of the LORD, empty religious ritual isn’t enough. We need to seek God with both sincere hearts and sincere actions.
f. And satisfy your soul in drought, and strengthen your bones: Those who serve God with sincere hearts and actions enjoy a health and life of the soul that is impossible for the superficial follower of God to know.
g. Those from among you shall build the old waste places: Those who serve God with sincere hearts and actions also accomplish things for God’s kingdom. They build, and are called the Repairer of the Breach, the Restorer of Streets to Dwell in. You can’t build anything for God’s kingdom on the foundation of a superficial walk with God.
i. How there needs to be a rebuilding work today! “We live in a broken world. In every direction there are breaches which are wide and deep. There are broken hearts and broken homes, and that which once was sacred is but a waste place. Whereas once there was a carefully guarded fence around the sanctity of family life, sex life, and the right to personal privacy, now there is just a waste place. The wall of protection is in ruins, and life has lost all its meaning.” (Redpath)
h. This passage shows several characteristics of a life right with God.
• It is an enlightened life: Your light shall down in the darkness.
• It is a guided life: The LORD will guide you continually.
• It is a satisfied life: And satisfy your soul in drought.
• It is a fragrant life: Like a watered garden.
• It is a freshly sustained life: Like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.
• It is a productive healing life You shall build up the old waste places.
3. True Sabbath keeping and the blessings of it (13–14)
a. Call the Sabbath a delight … the holy day of the LORD honorable: The Sabbath was another empty religious observance for the Jewish people of Isaiah’s day. God calls them to take a delight in the heart and in the purpose of the Sabbath—to honor Him, not doing your own ways.
i. This fits in perfectly with the fulfillment of the Sabbath in light of the finished work of Jesus. We keep the Sabbath when we set aside every day to honor Him, and by not doing your own ways as a means of justifying ourselves.
ii. Are Christians required to keep the Sabbath today? The New Testament makes it clear that Christians are not under obligation to observe a Sabbath day (Colossians 2:16–17; Galatians 4:9–11), because Jesus fulfills the purpose and plan of the Sabbath for us and in us (Hebrews 4:9–11).
iii. Galatians 4:10 tells us that Christians are not bound to observe days and months and seasons and years. The rest we enter into as Christians is something to experience every day, not just one day a week—the rest of knowing we don’t have to work to save ourselves, but that our salvation was accomplished in Jesus (Hebrews 4:9–10).
iv. The Sabbath commanded here and observed by Israel was a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ (Colossians 2:16–17). We have a rest in Jesus that is ours to live in every day. Therefore, since the shadow of the Sabbath is fulfilled in Jesus, we are free to keep any day—or no day—as a Sabbath after the custom of ancient Israel. However, though we are free from the legal obligation of the Sabbath, we dare not ignore the importance of a day of rest—God has built us so that we need one.
v. If anyone would insist on the Sabbath, they must also insist on the six-day work week. Exodus 20:9, in the command regarding the Sabbath, says Six days you shall labor and do all your work. Adam Clarke says on that passage, “He who idles his time away in the six days is equally culpable in the sight of God as he who works on the seventh.” (Clarke)
b. When we keep the meaning of the Sabbath, not merely as an empty religious ritual, then you shall delight yourself in the LORD. God will bless us, and we shall delight, not only in the blessings, but in the LORD Himself. We know it is sure, because the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
c. In this chapter, God exposed the emptiness of two religious rituals as practiced in Isaiah’s day: fasting and Sabbath keeping. Both of these are expressions of not doing things. In fasting, you don’t eat. In Sabbath keeping, you don’t work. An important aspect to this chapter is showing us that what we don’t do isn’t enough to make us right before God. Our walk with God shouldn’t only be defined by what we don’t do. What do we do for the LORD?
Isaiah 59—The Reality Check
A. The sin God sees [59:1–8]
1. The problem of God’s people: what the cause is not (1)
a. Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save: God’s people wondered why God did not seem to rescue them from their trials. They wondered if perhaps God had diminished in strength—if His hand had become shortened. Isaiah the prophet assures them that this is not the case.
i. This touches on one of the greatest problems in practical theology: how can there be a God of love and all power when there is human suffering? If we loved someone and had the power to end their suffering, wouldn’t we do it? Isaiah addresses those who wondered if God wasn’t all powerful, and that is why their suffering continues.
ii. Rabbi Harold Kushner wrote a remarkably wide-selling book titled When Bad Things Happen to Good People. It sold more than a half a million copies before going to paperback and was on the New York Times best-seller list for a whole year. The whole point of his book is to say God is all loving but not all powerful, that God is good, but not sovereign. So, when bad things happen to good people, it is because events are out of God’s control. Kushner advises his readers to “learn to love [God] and forgive him despite his limitations.” This certainly is not the God of the Bible, because the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save. Isaiah simply says, “Behold this. See this.”
b. Nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear: Perhaps the problem isn’t that God lacks power. Perhaps He lacks knowledge of our problem, or interest in our problem. But this isn’t the situation at all, as Isaiah reminds us. God’s ear is not heavy. He can hear us just fine.
2. The problem of God’s people: what the cause is (2)
a. But your iniquities have separated you from your God: The problem isn’t with God’s power, His knowledge, or His interest. The problem is with our iniquities. Sin has separated you from your God.
i. In what way does sin separate us from God? Sin does not necessarily separate us from the presence of God, because God is present everywhere (Psalm 139:7) and even Satan can have an audience with God (Job 1:6). Sin does not separate us from the love of God, because God loves sinners (Romans 5:8). But sin still does separate.
• Sin separates us from fellowship with God, because at least at the point of our sin, we no longer think alike with God.
• Sin separates us from the blessing of God, because at least at the point of our sin, we are not trusting God and relying on Him.
• Sin separates us from the some of the benefits of God’s love, even as the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11–32) was still loved by the father, but didn’t enjoy the benefits of his love when he was in sin.
• Sin separates us, in some way from the protection of God, because He will allow trials to come our way to correct us.
ii. How easy it is for us to blame our problems on everything except our iniquities! We will even blame God before seeing that the problem is with us! We will deny who God is before seeing that the problem is with us!
b. And your sins have hidden His face from you: This explains why God’s people no longer felt the face of the LORD shining on them (Numbers 6:25). It was their sins, not the inability of God to hear, or his lack of interest in hearing.
i. This helps us understand—at least in a small way—the cry of Jesus from the cross, My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? (Matthew 27:46). As Jesus stood in the place of guilty sinners, there was some way in which the face of God the Father was hidden from Him. Not in an ultimate, absolute sense; but in some way. But that was for our sins, not His own!
3. A detailed description of the sins of God’s people (3–8)
a. Your hands are defiled with blood: They practiced and approved of violence and murder.
b. Your lips have spoken lies: They lied with ease and regularity.
c. No one calls for justice: They did not share God’s heart for what was fair and good; everyone simply thought in terms of their own good. Both justice and truth were distant concepts, and instead of justice there were empty words, instead of truth there were lies.
i. Motyer on empty words: “Isaiah is not describing but diagnosing. They may think they are acting sensibly but actually it is all nonsense.”
d. They conceive evil and bring forth iniquity, as if they were snakes giving birth to more evil serpents, bringing forth nothing but death (he who eats of their eggs dies) and more evil (from that which is crushed a viper breaks out).
i. Clarke on weave the spider’s web: “By their plots they weave nets, lay snares industriously, with great pains and artifice, whereby they may entangle and involve their poor neighbors in intricacies and perplexities, and so devour them, as the spider weaves her web to catch flies, and then to feed on them.” But their webs will never cover them before God; Their webs will not become garments, nor will they cover themselves with their works.
e. The act of violence is in their hands. Their feet run to evil: Both hands and feet are given to sin. But it doesn’t end there; even their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity.
f. They have made themselves crooked paths; whoever takes that way shall not know peace: Their choice and the consequences are plain. Their crooked paths will never lead them into the way of peace, meaning peace in the full sense of shalom.
i. Paul quotes Isaiah 59:7–8 in Romans 3:15–17. He uses this passage, connected with other Old Testament passages, to demonstrate that man is a sinner from “head to toe.”
ii. In light of all this sin, it is amazing—absolutely amazing—that God’s people could still believe (as they did in Isaiah 59:1) that the problem was with God, and not them!
B. The effects of sin the people see [59:9–15a]
1. Because of their sin, darkness comes (9–11)
a. Therefore justice is far from us, nor does righteousness overtake us: Because God’s people had no interest in justice, God did not bless them with it. Because God’s people did not care about righteousness, God did not bless them with it. This is the principle of Jesus stated in Matthew 13:12: whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.
b. We look for light, but there is darkness! Now, having given themselves over to darkness, when they want the light, it isn’t there. When you always have the light to go to, the darkness feels “fun.” It seems mysterious and adventurous. But when the light is taken away, we despair in the darkness.
2. Confessing their sin and admitting their guilt (12–15a)
a. Our sins testify against us … righteousness stands afar off: Now God’s people are in a better place. They have had their reality check, and see things as they are. No longer do they blame the “shortened hand” of God, or His “heavy ear.” They know it is because of their own sins that righteousness stands afar off.
C. The salvation and redemption the LORD sees [59:15b–21]
1. What the LORD saw (15b–16a)
a. The LORD saw it, and it displeased Him, that there was no justice: The state of God’s people was no mystery to the LORD. They cried out in Isaiah 59:12–15a, stating how desperate their condition was—and the LORD knew it all along.
b. He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor: Not only was the state of God’s people bad; but no one among them took the lead in getting it right. Where was the man would lead the people in righteousness? He could not be found. Where was the intercessor who would plead God’s case to the people, and the people’s repentance to their God? No intercessor could be found.
2. What the LORD did (16b–19)
a. Therefore His own arm brought salvation for Him: God waited and waited for a disobedient Israel to turn to Him. He waited and waited for a man to lead them back to Him, or an intercessor to plead before Him. None arose; so the LORD did it Himself. If a man or an intercessor would have stepped forth, it would have saved Israel a lot of calamity. But the fact that no man, or no intercessor stepped forward didn’t derail God’s plan. He waited to work in partnership through a man. He waited to work through an intercessor. But God’s work would still go forth if none arose!
b. He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head: No man stepped forward to work with the LORD, so the LORD puts on his armor and goes forth to destroy His enemies, protect His people, and glorify His name!
i. Most people don’t pick up the connection between Isaiah 59:17–18 and Paul’s comments on our spiritual armor in Ephesians 5:10–17. In that passage, Paul calls that armor the whole armor of God, and it is God’s armor in the sense that it belongs to Him—after all, He uses it here in Isaiah 59:17–18—and He allows us to use it to fight for Him.
ii. We may see a connection. If we don’t put on the armor of God and fight for Him, then eventually God will put it on Himself and fight for His glory. But God’s preference is to work in and through us, with us using His armor.
c. The end result will be wonderful: So shall they fear the name of the LORD from the west, and His glory from the rising of the sun. In His ultimate victory—which He wants us to share in, but will accomplish with or without us—the glory of the LORD will be known and respected from east to west.
d. When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the LORD will lift up a standard against him. The enemies of the LORD will never triumph over Him. Even if they come in like a flood, and seem unstoppable, the LORD will lift up a battle-standard against him, and he will be stopped. God gives His people the glorious privilege of being more than conquerors (Romans 8:37), but will win it with or without us.
3. What the LORD said (20–21)
a. The Redeemer will come to Zion: After speaking in the third-person through the prophet, now the LORD speaks in the first-person through the prophet. When He speaks, He declares: the Redeemer—the goel—will come to Zion.
i. The goel—sometimes translated kinsman-redeemer, here simply as Redeemer—had a specifically defined role in Israel’s family life. The kinsman-redeemer was responsible to buy a fellow Israelite out of slavery (Leviticus 25:48). He was responsible to be the “avenger of blood” to make sure the murderer of a family member answered to the crime (Numbers 35:19). He was responsible to buy back family land that had been forfeited (Leviticus 25:25). And he was responsible to carry on the family name by marrying a childless widow (Deuteronomy 25:5–10). In these, we see that the goel, the kinsman-redeemer, was responsible to safeguard the persons, the property, and the posterity of the family.
ii. When the New King James Version capitalizes Redeemer, it does so rightly—because our goel is Jesus Christ. He is our near kinsman because He has added perfect humanity to His deity. He is the one who buys us out of slavery. He is the one who avenges wrongs done to us. He protects our inheritance, and blesses and guards our posterity. This promise of the LORD in Isaiah 59:20 could be reworded, “I will send My Messiah, the Redeemer for all humanity, Jesus of Nazareth!”
b. Who does the Redeemer come to? To those who turn away from transgression. The goel only worked for those who asked for His services, and knew they needed Him.
c. My Spirit who is upon you, and My words … shall not depart from your mouth … from this time and forevermore: The covenant God makes with His people promises an abiding Spirit and an enduring word. God accomplishes His purpose in people and through all creation through both the Spirit and the word.
Isaiah 60—The Glorious Light
David Guzik, Isaiah, David Guzik’s Commentaries on the Bible (Santa Barbara, CA: David Guzik, 2000), Is 58:1–Is 60.