Again the LORD spoke to Ahaz, saying, Sermons
Faith in the Eternal personified in the prophet, to whom all things desirable are to be hoped for, all things to be hoped for are possible; and distrust, the weakness of mere flesh and blood, represented in the timid Ahaz. Such is the illusion of appearances. The outwardly kingly man is the coward; the real king of men is the plain-looking prophet. I. THE CHALLENGE OF FAITH. In the Name of Jehovah, Isaiah bids the king ask a sign from above - a sign "going deep down to hell or high into heaven." Truth should be its own evidence to every mind; intuition is better than proof. Isaiah has seen and listened to God in the depths of his own spirit, and no sign in the air above or in the earth beneath can give him more assurance than he already possesses. Would any man but listen and look, he should find the shrine, the oracle, the Shechinah, in his own heart. Within that awful volume of the heart, it may be said, lies the mystery of mysteries. Yet not to all is it given to read therein clearly; all other reading, even in dead tongues, is easier. "Happiest they of human race
To whom our God has granted grace
To read, to fear, to hope, to pray,
To lift the latch and force the way!" The duller eye, untrained to such visions, needs the large bold characters of the visible sign. "It comes in with its palpable meaning to aid human weakness. The prophets complained of the craving for signs, yet were compelled to comply with it. Men trust their senses more than they trust the ghostly and majestic shape of abstract truth; and the appeal to the ear, as the Roman poet said, produces but a sluggish movement in the mind compared with the appeal to the faithful eye. We must all confess ourselves weak; needing to see before we can believe, instead of believing that we may see. Yet such incidents as this may remind us that there is a Spirit to help our infirmities, and restore its poise to the mind unhinged by doubt. When Midian threatened Israel in the days of old, God's voice was heard by Gideon: "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valor." Yet the heart of the hero still quailed. "O my Lord, if the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of?" (Judges 6:12, sqq.). Again the voice came: "Go and save Israel: have not I sent thee?" And again the diffident reply: "O my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is poor, and I am the least in my father's clan." Then the sign is asked for and granted; the fire, bursting from the rock, consumes Gideon's offering. God, in the strength of an almighty wisdom, "reasons together" with men. In our day it is equally hard to "hold on and hope hard in the subtle thing called spirit;" and we crave as urgently for signs, though not of the same kind. II. THE EXCUSE OF MISTRUST. The king alleges that he dare not "tempt Jehovah." True, this was a deep reproach of old against Israel's temper. At Rephidim, in the wilderness, Moses stigmatized the demand of the people for water by this phrase, "Is the Lord among us or not?" (Exodus 17:2). There lay the canker of guilty skepticism. In a general way the same thing is seen in our time, in the impatient demand that the difficulties of the great problem of the universe shall be cleared up to our private satisfaction. Who gave us the right thus to interrogate and cross-examine him whose works, as a whole, witness to his goodness and love? God did not copy our puny schemes in this construction; nor does he manage the universe as we manage a business, an expedition, the government of a state. "Ye shall not tempt the Lord your God," means - You shall not weigh him in the scales of your finite intelligence, nor call upon him to execute your wishes as if they were the same as his holy will. So difficult is it to distinguish the plea of honesty and humility from that of dishonesty and disbelief, it looks as if Ahaz might be right, and Isaiah wrong; the latter too bold, the former more reverent. Scripture may be made to mean anything and everything; the right heart alone reads the right meaning for particular time, place, and person. While it is the mark of presumption to "tempt God," it is the symptom of unbelief when proffered light and help are refused. III. THE PERSEVERANCE OF FAITH. With a rebuke of the king's spirit, charging him in effect with despising the goodness and tending to weary the patience of God, the prophet proceeds with his unasked-for message. What are we to learn from the expression, "wearying God?" All such poetical figures of Scripture have their deep meaning. To despise the riches of God's forbearance, to grieve his Spirit, to quench his Spirit, - these are ways of pointing out and stigmatizing that indifference and coldness to the true and Divine which may be a worse symptom than open hostility. We may either neglect to ask Divine guidance, we may disobey it when we have it intimated, or we may refuse its proffer. Perhaps this last state of mind is the worst. It shows the heart to be already prepossessed and biased. Ahaz was, in fact, under the influence of his false prophets and soothsayers. But why should he decline to hear at least what Isaiah had to say? He should have recognized that there were "two sides" in the great question at issue. Ahaz then warns us against listening to ex parte counsels. He who will only attend to the flattering echoes of his own wishes, is like him who trusteth in his own heart and who proves a fool. From Isaiah, again, the lesson comes back of faithful perseverance in our word and work, in spite of indifference, which threatens to blunt our edge and paralyze our energy. When a matter is on the conscience, let it come forth, "whether men will hear or whether they will forbear." We calculate consequences too much; and while few have the courage to risk danger by preaching unwelcome truth, perhaps fewer still have the faith in its worth to insist on pressing it upon reluctant ears. IV. THE SIGN FROM JEHOVAH. 1. It will be of mixed import. Partly it will confirm previous expectation, and partly it will intimate what had not been expected. It proclaims a happy event which Ahaz had not looked for, but also a calamity which he might have averted had he possessed greater faith and truth. Mysteriously, our wishes or fears have some creative influence on our future. "Omens follow those who look to them," whether for good or evil. "Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render a perfect and an honest man,
Commands all light, all influence, and all fate;
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still."
(Beaumont and Fletcher.) 2. The Immanuel. In a dark saying the prophet opens his mouth. "Lo! haalmah (the maiden, she who is no longer a girl, nor yet an old woman) will conceive, and bear a son, and then call his name With-us-God." Time is thus hinted at; it will be soon, perhaps in a year's time. Also the certainty and the joy of deliverance, as the boy's name betokens. It is the very rallying cry of Israel: "God with us." We must have a watchword in every noble cause, that shall condense its purport and sound the tocsin to every true aspiration and energy within. So the Crusaders shouted "Dieu le veut!" at the preaching of Peter the Hermit; so were English warriors heartened in the olden days by the cry of "England and St. George!" Notice how this phrase echoes and re-echoes - "Immanuel, God-with-us" - in Isaiah 8:8, 10 (cf. Isaiah 9:6). Every great. man raised up from time to time among us in politics, in religion, to deliver, to lead, to counsel, is, in his way, an heroic reflection of Israel's Messiah. To prophetic faith and hope a Messiah, a Deliverer, is ever at the doors. If the Eternal lives and reigns, and fulfils himself by the agency of men, we need not fear that when the hour strikes, the hero, with all the credentials of his anointing, will appear. 3. Speedy help. "Jehovah shall help thee, and that right early," is a chronic promise. When the boy is approaching years of maturity and of judgment, his food will be curds and honey; that is, before he comes to manhood, Ephraim and Damascus will be discomfited, and a new "golden age" will have set in. No more is known about any particular youth of Isaiah's time to whom the mystic prediction could refer than is known about the illustrious boy of Virgil's prophetic Eclogue, who was to restore good King Saturn's reign (Ecl. 4.). It is a misunderstanding of the nature of prophecy when we try to fix its forecasts to place or time. A prophecy is never fulfilled as we expect. It refers to a world not bounded by our horizons, and to a history which does not fall into our time perspective. This ideal Immanuel was destined yet to float before the pious hope of the nation for many centuries, till it was united with the real in the person of Jesus. 4. The chastisement that must precede prosperity. The great Assyrian conquest and the desolation it brings must come, in punishment of the unfaithfulness of the royal house, and the estrangement of the nation from Jehovah's ways. It is only after long trial in the fire and thorough regeneration that prosperity can come. It is a doubtful picture of the future, in which rays of glory strike athwart dark masses of gloom. Such is ever our outlook, whether for personal history, as for Isaiah in the preceding chapter, or for a nation, as here. Never has the hope of Christ been wanting, never the promise of his coming died out; and never proclaimed without the intimation of woes and tribulations first to come. Christ's own forecasts of the future (see the closing chapters of Matthew) present the like half-veiled, half-revealed perspective. We must ever look out upon the coming time with confidence or with mistrust, according as our hearts are stayed, like Isaiah's, upon Jehovah, or weak, because trusting only to the arm of flesh, or to the irrational dreams of superstition, like Ahaz. - J. Rezin...and Pekah...went up toward Jerusalem to war against it. The reason of this war is not stated: but from the desire of those kings to dethrone Ahaz, and place on the throne in Jerusalem another, even Ben Tabeal, it may be inferred that Ahaz refused to join these two powers in a general rising against Assyria. Obviously, Ahaz was well advised in not taking a step of such decided opposition to Nineveh: for had he done so, the legions of that empire would only have spread desolation in Judah twenty or thirty years earlier than they did. To a certain extent, the policy commended by Isaiah was adopted: Ahaz did not take up his stand against Assyria. The prophet, of course, wanted more. For he urged an absolute and complete neutrality, in which Ahaz would have nothing at all to do with this power. So far as Ahaz acted on the prophet's advice, he was successful: for this confederacy against Jerusalem proved a failure.() Ahaz is timid and helpless, takes no position, and displays no promptitude or courage. Isaiah, on the contrary, steps forward with assurance: he is collected and calm: and his complete control of the political situation impresses us forcibly. () () God speaks comfort to many who not only are not worthy of it, but do not so much as inquire after it.() "We can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth": clever arguments, witty retorts, brilliant repartees, criticisms that dazzle by their brightness and exasperate by their acerbity, come and go, and Jerusalem stands, sunlit, fair, invincible.()
People Ahaz, Aram, David, Immanuel, Isaiah, Jashub, Jotham, Pekah, Remaliah, Rezin, Shearjashub, Tabeal, Tabeel, UzziahPlaces Assyria, Damascus, Egypt, Euphrates River, Jerusalem, Samaria, Syria, Washer's FieldTopics Addeth, Ahaz, Isaiah, Moreover, Saying, Spake, Speak, SpokeOutline 1. Ahaz, being troubled with fear of Rezin and Pekah, is comforted by Isaiah
10. Ahaz, having liberty to choose a sign, and refusing it, has for a sign, Christ promised
17. His judgment is prophesied to come by Assyria
Dictionary of Bible Themes Isaiah 7:10-14 5473 proof, through testing Library Immanuel
Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name IMMANUEL , God with us. T here is a signature of wisdom and power impressed upon the works of God, which evidently distinguishes them from the feeble imitations of men. Not only the splendour of the sun, but the glimmering light of the glow-worm proclaims His glory. The structure and growth of a blade of grass, are the effects of the same power which produced the fabric of the heavens and the earth. In His Word likewise He is …
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1Honour and Glory unto Him.
IN Revelation V, that great worship scene, beginning some day in heaven and going on into future ages, we read of the Lamb to whom honor and glory are due. He alone is worthy. And every heart who knows Him rejoicing in His love, cries out, "Thou art worthy!" Yea, the sweetest song for the redeemed soul is the outburst of praise, which we find on the threshold of His own Revelation. "Unto Him that loveth us and washed us from our sins in His own blood and hath made us kings and priests unto God and …
Arno Gaebelein—The Lord of Glory Estimate of St. Augustin.
Augustin, the man with upturned eye, with pen in the left hand, and a burning heart in the right (as he is usually represented), is a philosophical and theological genius of the first order, towering like a pyramid above his age, and looking down commandingly upon succeeding centuries. He had a mind uncommonly fertile and deep, bold and soaring; and with it, what is better, a heart full of Christian love and humility. He stands of right by the side of the greatest philosophers of antiquity and of …
St. Augustine—The Confessions and Letters of St On Turning the First Page of the Review which Follows...
On turning the first page of the review which follows, follows, "by Rowland Williams, D.D. Vice-Principal and Professor of Hebrew, St. David's College, Lampeter; Vicar of Broad Chalke, Wilts,"--we are made sensible that we are in company of a writer considerably in advance of Dr. Temple, though altogether of the same school. In fact, if Dr. Williams had not been Vice-Principal of a Theological College, and a Doctor of Divinity, one would have supposed him to be a complete infidel,--who found it convenient …
John William Burgon—Inspiration and Interpretation Gihon, the Same with the Fountain of Siloam.
I. In 1 Kings 1:33,38, that which is, in the Hebrew, "Bring ye Solomon to Gihon: and they brought him to Gihon"; is rendered by the Chaldee, "Bring ye him to Siloam: and they brought him to Siloam." Where Kimchi thus; "Gihon is Siloam, and it is called by a double name. And David commanded, that they should anoint Solomon at Gihon for a good omen, to wit, that, as the waters of the fountain are everlasting, so might his kingdom be." So also the Jerusalem writers; "They do not anoint the king, but …
John Lightfoot—From the Talmud and Hebraica Letter vi (Circa A. D. 1127) to the Same
To the Same He protests against the reputation for holiness which is attributed to him, and promises to communicate the treatises which he has written. I. Even if I should give myself to you entirely that would be too little a thing still in my eyes, to have recompensed towards you even the half of the kindly feeling which you express towards my humility. I congratulate myself, indeed, on the honour which you have done me; but my joy, I confess, is tempered by the thought that it is not anything …
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux—Some Letters of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux The Debt of Irenæus to Justin Martyr
If we are to proceed with safety in forming a judgment as to the relation between Justin and Irenæus in respect of the matter which they have in common, it will be necessary not merely to consider a number of selected parallels, but also to examine the treatment of a particular theme in the two writers. Let us set side by side, for example, c. 32 of Justin's First Apology with c. 57 of the Demonstration. Justin has been explaining to his Roman readers who the Jewish prophets were, and then …
Irenæus—The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching Bunsen's Biblical Researches.
When geologists began to ask whether changes in the earth's structure might be explained by causes still in operation, they did not disprove the possibility of great convulsions, but they lessened necessity for imagining them. So, if a theologian has his eyes opened to the Divine energy as continuous and omnipresent, he lessens the sharp contrast of epochs in Revelation, but need not assume that the stream has never varied in its flow. Devotion raises time present into the sacredness of the past; …
Frederick Temple—Essays and Reviews: The Education of the World Jewish views on Trade, Tradesmen, and Trades' Guilds
We read in the Mishnah (Kidd. iv. 14) as follows: "Rabbi Meir said: Let a man always teach his son a cleanly and a light trade; and let him pray to Him whose are wealth and riches; for there is no trade which has not both poverty and riches, and neither does poverty come from the trade nor yet riches, but everything according to one's deserving (merit). Rabbi Simeon, the son of Eleazer, said: Hast thou all thy life long seen a beast or a bird which has a trade? Still they are nourished, and that …
Alfred Edersheim—Sketches of Jewish Social Life Redemption for Man Lost to be Sought in Christ.
1. The knowledge of God the Creator of no avail without faith in Christ the Redeemer. First reason. Second reason strengthened by the testimony of an Apostle. Conclusion. This doctrine entertained by the children of God in all ages from the beginning of the world. Error of throwing open heaven to the heathen, who know nothing of Christ. The pretexts for this refuted by passages of Scripture. 2. God never was propitious to the ancient Israelites without Christ the Mediator. First reason founded on …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion The Scriptures
Q-II: WHAT RULE HAS GOD GIVEN TO DIRECT US HOW WE MAY GLORIFY AND ENJOY HIM? A: The Word of God, which is contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him. 2 Tim 3:16. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God,' By Scripture is understood the sacred Book of God. It is given by divine inspiration; that is, the Scripture is not the contrivance of man's brain, but is divine in its origin. The image of Diana was had in veneration …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity The Mercy of God
The next attribute is God's goodness or mercy. Mercy is the result and effect of God's goodness. Psa 33:5. So then this is the next attribute, God's goodness or mercy. The most learned of the heathens thought they gave their god Jupiter two golden characters when they styled him good and great. Both these meet in God, goodness and greatness, majesty and mercy. God is essentially good in himself and relatively good to us. They are both put together in Psa 119:98. Thou art good, and doest good.' This …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity The Plan for the Coming of Jesus.
God's Darling, Psalms 8:5-8.--the plan for the new man--the Hebrew picture by itself--difference between God's plan and actual events--one purpose through breaking plans--the original plan--a starting point--getting inside. Fastening a Tether inside: the longest way around--the pedigree--the start. First Touches on the Canvas: the first touch, Genesis 3:15.--three groups of prediction--first group: to Abraham, Genesis 12:1-3; to Isaac, Genesis 26:1-5; to Jacob, Genesis 28:10-15; through Jacob, …
S. D. Gordon—Quiet Talks about Jesus Questions.
LESSON I. 1. In what state was the Earth when first created? 2. To what trial was man subjected? 3. What punishment did the Fall bring on man? 4. How alone could his guilt be atoned for? A. By his punishment being borne by one who was innocent. 5. What was the first promise that there should be such an atonement?--Gen. iii. 15. 6. What were the sacrifices to foreshow? 7. Why was Abel's offering the more acceptable? 8. From which son of Adam was the Seed of the woman to spring? 9. How did Seth's …
Charlotte Mary Yonge—The Chosen People Commencement of the Legends Concerning Jesus --His Own Idea of his Supernatural Character.
Jesus returned to Galilee, having completely lost his Jewish faith, and filled with revolutionary ardor. His ideas are now expressed with perfect clearness. The innocent aphorisms of the first part of his prophetic career, in part borrowed from the Jewish rabbis anterior to him, and the beautiful moral precepts of his second period, are exchanged for a decided policy. The Law would be abolished; and it was to be abolished by him.[1] The Messiah had come, and he was the Messiah. The kingdom of God …
Ernest Renan—The Life of Jesus Of Faith. The Definition of It. Its Peculiar Properties.
1. A brief recapitulation of the leading points of the whole discussion. The scope of this chapter. The necessity of the doctrine of faith. This doctrine obscured by the Schoolmen, who make God the object of faith, without referring to Christ. The Schoolmen refuted by various passages. 2. The dogma of implicit faith refuted. It destroys faith, which consists in a knowledge of the divine will. What this will is, and how necessary the knowledge of it. 3. Many things are and will continue to be implicitly …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion Jesus Makes his First Disciples.
(Bethany Beyond Jordan, Spring a.d. 27.) ^D John I. 35-51. ^d 35 Again on the morrow [John's direct testimony bore fruit on the second day] John was standing, and two of his disciples [An audience of two. A small field; but a large harvest]; 36 and he looked [Gazed intently. The word is used at Mark xiv. 67; Luke xxii. 61 Mark x. 21, 27. John looked searchingly at that face, which, so far as any record shows, he was never to see on earth again. The more intently we look upon Jesus, the more powerfully …
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel The Upbringing of Jewish Children
The tenderness of the bond which united Jewish parents to their children appears even in the multiplicity and pictorialness of the expressions by which the various stages of child-life are designated in the Hebrew. Besides such general words as "ben" and "bath"--"son" and "daughter"--we find no fewer than nine different terms, each depicting a fresh stage of life. The first of these simply designates the babe as the newly--"born"--the "jeled," or, in the feminine, "jaldah"--as in Exodus 2:3, 6, 8. …
Alfred Edersheim—Sketches of Jewish Social Life Isaiah
CHAPTERS I-XXXIX Isaiah is the most regal of the prophets. His words and thoughts are those of a man whose eyes had seen the King, vi. 5. The times in which he lived were big with political problems, which he met as a statesman who saw the large meaning of events, and as a prophet who read a divine purpose in history. Unlike his younger contemporary Micah, he was, in all probability, an aristocrat; and during his long ministry (740-701 B.C., possibly, but not probably later) he bore testimony, as …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament Links Isaiah 7:10 NIV
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