2 Why do you give your money for what is not bread, and the fruit of your work for what will not give you pleasure? Give ear to me, so that your food may be good, and you may have the best in full measure.
For they have been planting the wind, and their fruit will be the storm; his grain has no stem, it will give no meal, and if it does, a strange nation will take it.
I will give the priests their desired fat things, and my people will have a full measure of my good things, says the Lord.
I am the bread of life. Your fathers took the manna in the waste land--and they are dead. The bread which comes from heaven is such bread that a man may take it for food and never see death. I am the living bread which has come from heaven: if any man takes this bread for food he will have life for ever: and more than this, the bread which I will give is my flesh which I will give for the life of the world. Then the Jews had an angry discussion among themselves, saying, How is it possible for this man to give us his flesh for food? Then Jesus said to them, Truly I say to you, If you do not take the flesh of the Son of man for food, and if you do not take his blood for drink, you have no life in you. He who takes my flesh for food and my blood for drink has eternal life: and I will take him up from the dead at the last day. My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. He who takes my flesh for food and my blood for drink is in me and I in him. As the living Father has sent me, and I have life because of the Father, even so he who takes me for his food will have life because of me. This is the bread which has come down from heaven. It is not like the food which your fathers had: they took of the manna, and are dead; but he who takes this bread for food will have life for ever.
For my people have done two evils; they have given up me, the fountain of living waters, and have made for themselves water-holes, cut out from the rock, broken water-holes, of no use for storing water.
The deceit of Ephraim and the false words of Israel are about me on every side. ...
But their worship is to no purpose, while they give as their teaching the rules of men.
And turning to the people again, he said to them, Give ear to me all of you, and let my words be clear to you:
And he went and put himself into the hands of one of the people of that country, and he sent him into his fields to give the pigs their food. And so great was his need that he would have been glad to take the pigs' food, and no one gave him anything.
But Israel, going after a law of righteousness, did not get it.
For I give witness of them that they have a strong desire for God, but not with knowledge. Because, not having knowledge of God's righteousness, and desiring to give effect to their righteousness, they have not put themselves under the righteousness of God.
Even though I myself might have faith in the flesh: if any other man has reason to have faith in the flesh, I have more: Being given circumcision on the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in relation to the law, a Pharisee: In bitter hate I was cruel to the church; I kept all the righteousness of the law to the last detail. But those things which were profit to me, I gave up for Christ.
Do not be turned away by different strange teachings, because it is good for your hearts to be made strong by grace, and not by meats, which were of no profit to those who took so much trouble over them.
And it will be that if you truly give ear to the orders which I put before you this day, loving the Lord your God and worshipping him with all your heart and all your soul,
Come, children, give attention to me; I will be your teacher in the fear of the Lord.
My soul will be comforted, as with good food; and my mouth will give you praise with songs of joy;
But whoever gives ear to me will take his rest safely, living in peace without fear of evil.
Give ear to me then, my sons: for happy are those who keep my ways.
Come, take of my bread, and of my wine which is mixed.
And he said, If with all your heart you will give attention to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in his eyes, giving ear to his orders and keeping his laws, I will not put on you any of the diseases which I put on the Egyptians: for I am the Lord your life-giver.
If you will give ear to my word and do it, the good things of the land will be yours;
And in this mountain will the Lord of armies make for all peoples a feast of good things, a feast of wines long stored, of good things sweet to the taste, of wines long kept and tested.
As for those who take gold out of a bag, and put silver in the scales, they give payment to a gold-worker, to make it into a god; they go down on their faces and give it worship.
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.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Isaiah 55
Commentary on Isaiah 55 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 55
As we had much of Christ in the 53rd chapter, and much of the church of Christ in the 54th chapter, so in this chapter we have much of the covenant of grace made with us in Christ. The "sure mercies of David,' which are promised here (v. 3), are applied by the apostle to the benefits which flow to us from the resurrection of Christ (Acts 13:34), which may serve as a key to this chapter; not but that it was intended for the comfort of the people of God that lived then, especially of the captives in Babylon, and others of the dispersed of Israel; but unto us was this gospel preached as well as unto them, and much more clearly and fully in the New Testament. Here is,
Isa 55:1-5
Here,
Isa 55:6-13
We have here a further account of that covenant of grace which is made with us in Jesus Christ, both what is required and what is promised in the covenant, and of those considerations that are sufficient abundantly to confirm our believing compliance with and reliance on that covenant. This gracious discovery of God's good-will to the children of men is not to be confined either to the Jew or to the Gentile, to the Old Testament or to the New, much less to the captives in Babylon. No, both the precepts and the promises are here given to all, to every one that thirsts after happiness, v. 1. And who does not? Hear this, and live.