5 You meet him who rejoices and works righteousness, those who remember you in your ways: behold, you were angry, and we sinned: in them [have we been] of long time; and shall we be saved?
For we are consumed in your anger. We are troubled in your wrath. You have set our iniquities before you, Our secret sins in the light of your presence. For all our days have passed away in your wrath. We bring our years to an end as a sigh.
You shall make an altar of earth for me, and shall sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and your peace-offerings, your sheep and your oxen. In every place where I record my name I will come to you and I will bless you.
I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself [thus], You have chastised me, and I was chastised, as a calf unaccustomed [to the yoke]: turn you me, and I shall be turned; for you are Yahweh my God. Surely after that I was turned, I repented; and after that I was instructed, I struck on my thigh: I was ashamed, yes, even confounded, because I did bear the reproach of my youth. Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a darling child? for as often as I speak against him, I do earnestly remember him still: therefore my heart yearns for him; I will surely have mercy on him, says Yahweh.
Let us therefore draw near with boldness to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy, and may find grace for help in time of need.
Brothers, I don't regard myself as yet having taken hold, but one thing I do. Forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, think this way. If in anything you think otherwise, God will also reveal that to you.
a devout man, and one who feared God with all his house, who gave gifts for the needy generously to the people, and always prayed to God. At about the ninth hour of the day{3:00 PM}, he clearly saw in a vision an angel of God coming to him, and saying to him, "Cornelius!" He, fastening his eyes on him, and being frightened, said, "What is it, Lord?" He said to him, "Your prayers and your gifts to the needy have gone up for a memorial before God.
"For I, Yahweh, don't change; therefore you, sons of Jacob, are not consumed.
Let us acknowledge Yahweh. Let us press on to know Yahweh. As surely as the sun rises, Yahweh will appear. He will come to us like the rain, Like the spring rain that waters the earth."
There I will meet with you, and I will tell you from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are on the ark of the testimony, all that I command you for the children of Israel.
Thus says Yahweh, Keep you justice, and do righteousness; for my salvation is near to come, and my righteousness to be revealed. Blessed is the man who does this, and the son of man who holds it fast; who keeps the Sabbath from profaning it, and keeps his hand from doing any evil. Neither let the foreigner, who has joined himself to Yahweh, speak, saying, Yahweh will surely separate me from his people; neither let the eunuch say, Behold, I am a dry tree. For thus says Yahweh of the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and hold fast my covenant: To them will I give in my house and within my walls a memorial and a name better than of sons and of daughters; I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off. Also the foreigners who join themselves to Yahweh, to minister to him, and to love the name of Yahweh, to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath from profaning it, and holds fast my covenant; even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.
Yes, in the way of your judgments, Yahweh, have we waited for you; to your name, even to your memorial [name], is the desire of our soul. With my soul have I desired you in the night; yes, with my spirit within me will I seek you earnestly: for when your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.
But Yahweh's loving kindness is from everlasting to everlasting with those who fear him, His righteousness to children's children;
Also delight yourself in Yahweh, And he will give you the desires of your heart.
You shall put it before the veil that is by the ark of the testimony, before the mercy seat that is over the testimony, where I will meet with you.
It shall be a continual burnt offering throughout your generations at the door of the tent of meeting before Yahweh, where I will meet with you, to speak there to you. There I will meet with the children of Israel; and the place shall be sanctified by my glory.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Isaiah 64
Commentary on Isaiah 64 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 64
Isa 64:1-12. Transition from Complaint to Prayer.
1. rend … heavens—bursting forth to execute vengeance, suddenly descending on Thy people's foe (Ps 18:9; 144:5; Hab 3:5, 6).
flow down—(Jud 5:5; Mic 1:4).
2. Oh, that Thy wrath would consume Thy foes as the fire. Rather, "as the fire burneth the dry brushwood" [Gesenius].
3. When—Supply from Isa 64:2, "As when."
terrible things—(Ps 65:5).
we looked not for—far exceeding the expectation of any of our nation; unparalleled before (Ex 34:10; Ps 68:8).
camest down—on Mount Sinai.
mountains flowed—Repeated from Isa 64:1; they pray God to do the very same things for Israel now as in former ages. Gesenius, instead of "flowed" here, and "flow" in Isa 64:1, translates from a different Hebrew root, "quake … quaked"; but "fire" melts and causes to flow, rather than to quake (Isa 64:2).
4. perceived by the ear—Paul (1Co 2:9) has for this, "nor have entered into the heart of man"; the virtual sense, sanctioned by his inspired authority; men might hear with the outward ear, but they could only by the Spirit "perceive" with the "heart" the spiritual significancy of God's acts, both those in relation to Israel, primarily referred to here, and those relating to the Gospel secondarily, which Paul refers to.
O God … what he … prepared—rather, "nor hath eye seen a god beside thee who doeth such things." They refer to God's past marvellous acts in behalf of Israel as a plea for His now interposing for His people; but the Spirit, as Paul by inspiration shows, contemplated further God's revelation in the Gospel, which abounds in marvellous paradoxes never before heard of by carnal ear, not to be understood by mere human sagacity, and when foretold by the prophets not fully perceived or credited; and even after the manifestation of Christ not to be understood save through the inward teaching of the Holy Ghost. These are partly past and present, and partly future; therefore Paul substitutes "prepared" for "doeth," though his context shows he includes all three. For "waiteth" he has "love Him"; godly waiting on Him must flow from love, and not mere fear.
5. meetest—that is, Thou makest peace, or enterest into covenant with him (see on Isa 47:3).
rejoiceth and worketh—that is, who with joyful willingness worketh [Gesenius] (Ac 10:35; Joh 7:17).
those—Thou meetest "those," in apposition to "him" who represents a class whose characteristics "those that," &c., more fully describes.
remember thee in thy ways—(Isa 26:8).
sinned—literally, "tripped," carrying on the figure in "ways."
in those is continuance—a plea to deprecate the continuance of God's wrath; it is not in Thy wrath that there is continuance (Isa 54:7, 8; Ps 30:5; 103:9), but in Thy ways ("those"), namely, of covenant mercy to Thy people (Mic 7:18-20; Mal 3:6); on the strength of the everlasting continuance of His covenant they infer by faith, "we shall be saved." God "remembered" for them His covenant (Ps 106:45), though they often "remembered not" Him (Ps 78:42). Castellio translates, "we have sinned for long in them ('thy ways'), and could we then be saved?" But they hardly would use such a plea when their very object was to be saved.
6. unclean thing—legally unclean, as a leper. True of Israel, everywhere now cut off by unbelief and by God's judgments from the congregation of the saints.
righteousness—plural, "uncleanness" extended to every particular act of theirs, even to their prayers and praises. True of the best doings of the unregenerate (Php 3:6-8; Tit 1:15; Heb 11:6).
filthy rags—literally, a "menstruous rag" (Le 15:33; 20:18; La 1:17).
fade … leaf—(Ps 90:5, 6).
7. stirreth—rouseth himself from spiritual drowsiness.
take hold—(Isa 27:5).
8. father—(Isa 63:16).
clay … potter—(Isa 29:16; 45:9). Unable to mould themselves aright, they beg the sovereign will of God to mould them unto salvation, even as He made them at the first, and is their "Father."
9. (Ps 74:1, 2).
we are … thy people—(Jer 14:9, 21).
10. holy cities—No city but Jerusalem is called "the holy city" (Isa 48:2; 52:1); the plural, therefore, refers to the upper and the lower parts of the same city Jerusalem [Vitringa]; or all Judea was holy to God, so its cities were deemed "holy" [Maurer]. But the parallelism favors Vitringa. Zion and Jerusalem (the one city) answering to "holy cities."
11. house—the temple.
beautiful—includes the idea of glorious (Mr 13:1; Ac 3:2).
burned—(Ps 74:7; La 2:7; 2Ch 36:19). Its destruction under Nebuchadnezzar prefigured that under Titus.
pleasant things—Hebrew, "objects of desire"; our homes, our city, and all its dear associations.
12. for these things—Wilt Thou, notwithstanding these calamities of Thy people, still refuse Thy aid (Isa 42:14)?