22 Let your hearts be turned to me, so that you may have salvation, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is no other.
This, I say, is my Father's pleasure, that everyone who sees the Son and has faith in him may have eternal life: and I will take him up on the last day.
Having our eyes fixed on Jesus, the guide and end of our faith, who went through the pains of the cross, not caring for the shame, because of the joy which was before him, and who has now taken his place at the right hand of God's seat of power.
And the Lord said to Moses, Make an image of a snake and put it on a rod, and anyone who has been wounded by the snakes, looking on it will be made well. So Moses made a snake of brass and put it on a rod; and anyone who had a snakebite, after looking on the snake of brass, was made well.
O our God, will you not be their judge? for our strength is not equal to this great army which is coming against us; and we are at a loss what to do: but our eyes are on you.
But as for me, I am looking to the Lord; I am waiting for the God of my salvation: the ears of my God will be open to me.
And I will send down on the family of David and on the people of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of prayer; and their eyes will be turned to the one who was wounded by their hands: and they will be weeping for him as for an only son, and their grief for him will be bitter, like the grief of one sorrowing for his oldest son.
It is not enough for one who is my servant to put the tribes of Jacob again in their place, and to get back those of Israel who have been sent away: my purpose is to give you as a light to the nations, so that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth.
And no one has ever gone up to heaven but he who came down from heaven, the Son of man. As the snake was lifted up by Moses in the waste land, even so it is necessary for the Son of man to be lifted up: So that whoever has faith may have in him eternal life. For God had such love for the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever has faith in him may not come to destruction but have eternal life.
And I give them eternal life; they will never come to destruction, and no one will ever take them out of my hand. That which my Father has given to me has more value than all; and no one is able to take anything out of the Father's hand. I and my Father are one.
Looking for the glad hope, the revelation of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ;
You will give us an answer in righteousness by great acts of power, O God of our salvation; you who are the hope of all the ends of the earth, and of the far-off lands of the sea;
See, these are coming from far; and these from the north and the west; and these from the land of Sinim.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Isaiah 45
Commentary on Isaiah 45 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 45
Cyrus was nominated, in the foregoing chapter, to be God's shepherd; more is said to him and more of him in this chapter, not only because he was to be instrumental in the release of the Jews out of their captivity, but because he was to be therein a type of the great Redeemer, and that release was to be typical of the great redemption from sin and death; for that was the salvation of which all the prophets witnessed. We have here,
Isa 45:1-4
Cyrus was a Mede, descended (as some say) from Astyages king of Media. The pagan writers are not agreed in their accounts of his origin. Some tell us that in his infancy he was an outcast, left exposed, and was saved from perishing by a herdsman's wife. However, it is agreed that, being a man of an active genius, he soon made himself very considerable, especially when Croesus king of Lydia made a descent upon his country, which he not only repulsed, but revenged, prosecuting the advantages he had gained against Croesus with such vigour that in a little time he took Sardis and made himself master of the rich kingdom of Lydia and the many provinces that then belonged to it. This made him very great (for Croesus was rich to a proverb) and enabled him to pursue his victories in many countries; but it was nearly ten years afterwards that, in conjunction with his uncle Darius and with the forces of Persia, he made this famous attack upon Babylon, which is here foretold, and which we have the history of Dan. 5. Babylon had now grown exorbitantly rich and strong. It was forty-five miles in compass (some say more): the walls were thirty-two feet thick and 100 cubits high. Some say, They were so thick that six chariots might drive abreast upon them; others say, They were fifty cubits thick and 200 high. Cyrus seems to have had a great ambition to make himself master of this place, and to have projected it long; and at last he performed it. Now here, 210 years before it came to pass, we are told,
Isa 45:5-10
God here asserts his sole and sovereign dominion, as that which he designed to prove and manifest to the world in all the great things he did for Cyrus and by him. Observe,
Isa 45:11-19
The people of God in captivity, who reconciled themselves to the will of God in their affliction and were content to wait his time for their deliverance, are here assured that they should not wait in vain.
Isa 45:20-25
What here is said is intended, as before,