12 Give ear to me, Jacob, and Israel, my loved one; I am he, I am the first and I am the last.
Whose purpose and work was it? His who sent out the generations from the start. I the Lord, the first, and with the last, I am he.
I am the First and the Last, the start and the end.
I am the First and the Last, says the Lord God who is and was and is to come, the Ruler of all.
Give ear, O sea-lands, to me; and take note, you peoples from far: I have been marked out by the Lord from the first; when I was still in my mother's body, he had my name in mind:
The Lord, the King of Israel, even the Lord of armies who has taken up his cause, says, I am the first and the last, and there is no God but me.
But you are a special people, a holy nation, priests and kings, a people given up completely to God, so that you may make clear the virtues of him who took you out of the dark into the light of heaven.
And to the angel of the church in Smyrna say: These things says the first and the last, who was dead and is living:
And when I saw him, I went down on my face at his feet as one dead. And he put his right hand on me, saying, Have no fear; I am the first and the last and the Living one; And I was dead, and see, I am living for ever, and I have the keys of death and of Hell.
See now, I myself am he; there is no other god but me: giver of death and life, wounding and making well: and no one has power to make you free from my hand.
But to those of God's selection, Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power and the wisdom of God.
Among whom you in the same way have been marked out to be disciples of Jesus Christ:
Give attention to me, O my people; and give ear to me, O my nation; for teaching will go out from me, and the knowledge of the true God will be a light to the peoples.
Give ear to me, you who are searching for righteousness, who are looking for the Lord: see the rock from which you were cut out, and the hole out of which you were taken.
Come near, you nations, and give ear; take note, you peoples: let the earth and everything in it give ear; the world and all those living in it.
Give ear to me then, my sons: for happy are those who keep my ways.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Isaiah 48
Commentary on Isaiah 48 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 48
God, having in the foregoing chapter reckoned with the Babylonians, and shown them their sins and the desolation that was coming upon them for their sins, to show that he hates sin wherever he finds it and will not connive at it in his own people, comes, in this chapter, to show the house of Jacob their sins, but, withal, the mercy God had in store for them notwithstanding; and he therefore sets their sins in order before them, that by their repentance and reformation they might be prepared for that mercy.
Isa 48:1-8
We may observe here,
Isa 48:9-15
The deliverance of God's people out of their captivity in Babylon was a thing upon many accounts so improbable that there was need of line upon line for the encouragement of the faith and hope of God's people concerning it. Two things were discouraging to them-their own unworthiness that God should do it for them and the many difficulties in the thing itself; now, in these verses, both these discouragements are removed, for here is,
Isa 48:16-22
Here, as before, Jacob and Israel are summoned to hearken to the prophet speaking in God's name, or rather to God speaking in and by the prophet, and that as a type of the great prophet by whom God has in these last days spoken unto us, and that is sufficient: Come near therefore, and hear this. Note, Those that would hear and understand what God says must come near, and approach to him; let them come as near as they can. Let those that have hearkened to the tempter now come near, and hear this, that they may be confirmed in their resolutions to serve God. Those that draw nigh to God may depend upon this, that his secret shall be with them. Here,