Devotional Commentary on Isaiah 42

 

There is something in Isaiah that is coming to the front clearer in these chapters: God chose a remnant to be His messenger or servant but humanity failed in this task in every generation in this way that they had the Laodicea Church attitude: they had ears but did not hear, they had eyes but did not see, and became the blind and deaf servant.

 

For that reason God sent His chosen One, His Divine Servant, Jesus Christ as the solution to succeed where the remnant and church fell short. Christ the Chosen One is divinely intertwined with the Trinity since God does not share His glory with any (v. 8b). It is definitely Christ and His mission, purpose and role outlined here as the Servant sent by God the Father.

 

M. L. Andreasen in his Sabbath School Quarterly of 1928 on Isaiah page 8, exactly repeated in the 1956 Sabbath School Quarterly on Isaiah pages 29-30 also understood it to be Christ. “The work of Christ is definitely set forth in this chapter. He is the elect of God, a term which occurs six times in this portion of Isaiah. He is gentle, quiet, compassionate. He does not come to crush life, but to develop it; not to despise the weak, but to help them. If there is but a dimly burning wick, He does not give up hope. He will not stop until the work is accomplished. Many of the blind shall see the light, and the whole earth shall praise the Lord.” In his 2004 dealing with this verse, R. Gane said in the Sabbath School Quarterly page 74: “The servant in Isaiah 42 is, obviously, the Messiah.”

 

On the New Testament support that it is Christ the Messiah, R. Gane said the following in 2004: 74: “Matthew 12 quotes from Isaiah 42 and applies it to the quiet healing ministry of Jesus, God's beloved Son, in whom He delights (Isa. 42:1; Matt. 3:16, 17; 17:5). It is He whose ministry reestablishes God's covenant connection with His people (Isa. 42:6, Dan. 9:27).” He commented on verses 1-4 and moved on to chapter 44.

 

The preterist F. Delitzsch could not but admit the same as Ellen White, Andreasen and Gane here in historicist manner: “But the Servant of Jehovah here set before us has too pronounced individual characteristics to allow it to be taken as a personified collective. Nor can it be the author of these prophecies; for what is said of this Servant of Jehovah goes far beyond all within the range of a prophet's call or man's power. It is therefore an ideal picture of the future—the future Christ …” (Delitzsch Volume II 1890: 165 [English translation]). The Targum Jonathan to the Prophets translated the opening of verse one as: “Behold my servant the Messiah…”.

 

The style of phraseology of Isaiah catch our eyes.

He loves to employ synonyms and park them in parallel sentences almost repeating in the second line the same thought as in the first line. In this way, we learn a lot about the meaning of a word since it is repeated and elaborated upon in the next pair. The pair words, pair thoughts and pair phrases help us understand faithful living better:

the Father’s Servant is His Chosen One and the Spirit is upon Him (v. 1);

cry is to make the voice heard in the street (v. 2);

disheartened is crushed (v. 4);

created means stretching out the heavens and spreading the earth (v. 5);

to give breath to people is to give a spirit to them (v. 5c-d);

to be appointed as covenant to people is to be a light to the nations (v. 6c-d); prisoner is one who dwells in darkness (v. 7b-c);

God’s glory means God’s praise (v. 8b-c);

new song is His praise (v. 10a-b);

end of the earth is to go down to the sea (v. 10b-c);

sing aloud is to shout for joy from the tops of the mountains (v. 11c-d) [not in the temple or church though];

give glory to the Lord is to declare His praise (v. 12a-b);

a warrior is a man of war (v. 13a-b);

utter a shout is to raise a war cry (v. 13c);

utter a shout is to prevail against his enemies (v. 13c-d);

keep silent is to keep still (v. 14a-b);

to groan is to gasp (v. 14c-d);

to lay waste mountains is to wither the vegetation (v. 15a-b);

to make coastlands of rivers is to dry up ponds (v. 15c-d);

by a way and in paths are the same (v. 16a-b);

to be turned back by the Lord means to be utterly put to shame (v. 16e-f);

idols are molten images (v. 17b-c);

he that is at peace with God is a servant of the Lord (v. 19c-d);

not to observe the things of the Lord is to not hear His instructions (v. 20); plundered is to be despoiled (v. 22a);

trapped is to be hidden (v. 22b-c);

to be a prey is to be a spoil (v. 22d-e);

to deliver is to give back (v. 22d-e);

to give ear is to give heed (v. 23a-b);

[remnant] Jacob is the same as [remnant] Israel (v. 24a);

to sin against the Lord is to not be willing to walk in His ways (v. 24b-c) and to not obey His law (v. 24d);

heat of His anger is the same as fierceness of battle and aflame (v. 25a-c); recognize is to pay attention (v. 25d-e).

 

Indeed, Isaiah is a master in using a Hebrew Thesaurus or Synonym Dictionary to clarify the meanings of his thoughts or words to the reader.

 

About Christ’s manner of performance as listed in verse 2, M. L. Andreasen in his 1928 Sabbath School Quarterly page 9, cited Ellen White: “In marked contrast to all this [the manner of the Pharisees] was the life of Jesus. In that life no noisy disputation, no ostentatious worship, no act to gain applause, was ever witnessed. Christ was hid in God, and God was revealed in the character of His Son.” Ellen White, Desire of Ages page 261.

 

C. W. E. Nägelsbach (1878 English translation in the Lange series, all sources online available) in his commentary on Isaiah 1878 page 448, said the same as Ellen White on this verse: “The Servant of Jehovah supports Himself on Jehovah and Jehovah supports, holds and bears His Servant”.

 

When God the Father announced the coming of Christ as Savior and covenant to the people (v. 6c) He listed all the things we can find in the gospels identifying Christ as the promised Messiah.

 

Delitzsch noted the same connection to Christ here: “The mediator of this covenant with Israel cannot be Israel itself, nor (where is anything of the kind to be read?) the true Israel in relation to the mass, or, as Reuss thinks [another critical commentator on Isaiah], to the human race; on the contrary, the remnant left after the mass is destroyed is the object of this covenant; nor yet the body of prophets, or a collective of any sort, which is disproved by the strongly personal language and the more than prophetic work to be done. For the Servant of Jehovah is Himself the covenant of the peoples and light of the heathen; His person is the bond of a new communion between Israel and Jehovah, His person becomes the light enlightening the dark heathen world” (Delitzsch Volume II 1890 page 170-171).

 

The excellence of this Chosen One, described by Isaiah in vv. 1-8a stands in contrast to the performance of the humanity servants of the past “the former things have come to pass” and a need was seen to “declare new things” (v. 9).

 

Andreasen said on this verse 1928: 9: “The former things which God had foretold had all been fulfilled. He was now telling of new things. These would as surely come to pass.”

 

The insufficiency and inadequacy of the remnant servant led to Isaiah’s description of the sufficient One and adequate One, Christ the Messiah.

 

C. W. E. Nägelsbach said in 1878 page 461 in his Isaiah commentary about the connection of this Servant to the Messiah and the Messiah to Yahweh: “But since the Messiah is Himself God, and there is no God but Jehovah, He, too, may be name with the name Jehovah.”

 

The new song [or new covenant] means that Christ should be preached “to the end of the earth” (v. 10b).

 

At the End of Time Christ would come “like a warrior” and “prevail against His enemies” [in Hell after the millennium] (v. 13). God the Father and Christ will send plaques to earth before the Second Coming of Christ and it seems to be indicated in vv. 14-17.

 

On verses 13-15, M. L. Andreasen in his 1928 Sabbath School Quarterly on Isaiah noted on page 10: “The reason for singing the new song is given in these verses. God is about to manifest Himself. The second coming of Christ is here brought to view.” Is it not remarkable how two Adventists, one in 1928 and one in 1917 can work independent of each other on the same verse and come to the same conclusion?

 

The blind and deaf Laodicea church servant will be led by Christ “by a way they do not know in paths they do not know I will guide them” (v. 16a-b); “I will make darkness into light before them” (v. 16c).

 

M. L. Andreasen cited Ellen White here in verses 16-18 in his commentary on Isaiah in 1928 page 10: “The blind here must have reference to the spiritually blind. In [Ellen White] ‘Prophets and Kings,’ page 378, this text is applied to ‘all the honest in heart in heathen lands.’ There are many who are blind, but honest. That which seems to them to be darkness will then be made light, and the crooked things will be made straight. This should give us hope for many who apparently are rejecting light.”

The definition of the blind of Ellen White is exactly found also in F. Delitzsch Vol. II 1890: 174 “The blind are they whom transgression and wickedness have robbed of power of spiritual sight.” C. W. E. Nägelsbach (1878) said the same in his Isaiah commentary (Lange Series as English Translation) page 456: “It is, therefore, spiritual and not physical blindness that is meant.”

 

We know it is the End Time remnant spoken of here since this theme of the blind and deaf servant of the Lord (see v. 19) “Who is blind but My servant or so deaf as My messenger whom I send?” Humanity failed but Christ is Victorious on our behalf. Christ our Substitute.

 

Ellen White defined “Israel” and “servant” here: “The terms ‘My servant,’ Israel, ‘the servant of the Lord,’ mean anyone that the Lord may select and appoint to do a certain work. He makes them ministers of His will, though some who are selected may be as ignorant of His will as was Nebuchadnezzar.”— Ellen White, Testimonies,  Vol. 9, p. 138 cited on page 10 of M. L. Andreasen, Sabbath School Quarterly on Isaiah 1928.

 

Delitzsch have the same idea as Ellen White here in his commentary in 1890 Vol. II page 174: “the Servant of Jehovah is set forth as a messenger to the heathen. The Servant of Jehovah is everywhere Israel. But because Israel is viewed now in regard to the mass which ignores its calling, now in regard to the kernel which is faithful to it, now in regard to the One in whom Israel reaches the summit of its destiny, the most diverse things may be affirmed of the one homonymous subject.” It is also maximalist use of the term by Delitzsch just as Ellen White.

 

A book prescribed by some Adventist school as a good commentary on Isaiah, by J. Mortyer, 1993 page 319 is very depressing on this passage in the light of Ellen White’s statement and that of the preterist Delitzsch similar to her: “The title, my servant, says little about the person who bears it. It is mainly used of Messianophoric individuals like Moses and David, and this indicates its importance in the purposes of God. Its use with reference to Nebuchadnezzar shows that it can spotlight the function rather than the person.” In the whole chapter, the name Christ does not appear in Mortyer’s treatment of it. He is eschatologically evasive to the point of nihilism.

 

Ellen White said that to be blind and deaf for the world’s computer engines’ data is fine but a problem is blind and deaf of our own shortcomings to be, as M. L. Andreasen pointed out on these verses in 1928: 10: “God does not wish us to hear all that is to be heard, or to see all that is to be seen. It is a great blessing to close the ears, that we hear not, and the eyes, that we see not. The greatest anxiety should be to have clear eyesight to discern our own shortcomings, and a quick ear to catch all needed reproof and instruction, lest by our inattention and carelessness we let them slip, and become forgetful hearers, and not doers of the work.”— Ellen White, Testimonies, Vol. 1, pp. 707, 708.

 

With the bad news comes the good news. Despite the church of Laodicea condition of the End Time remnant “The Lord was pleased for His righteousness sake to make the law great and glorious” (v. 21).

 

Ellen White said that later in the writings of John the beloved disciple he said that the law existed long before Sinai: “The beloved disciple, who listened to the words of Jesus on the mount, writing long afterwards under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, speaks of the law as of perpetual obligation. He says that 'sin is the transgression of the law,' and that 'whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law.' He makes it plain that the law to which he refers is 'an old commandment which ye had from the beginning.' He is speaking of the law that existed at the creation, and was reiterated upon Mount Sinai.”—Ellen White, Thoughts from the Mount of Blessing, p. 77 cited by M. L. Andreasen in 1928 page 10.

 

Delitzsch (1890) also thought it is the Sinaitic Law meant here, just as Ellen White: “The Sinaitic law is first of all and chiefly meant, and the verbs relate, not to the solemnity of the promulgation, but to the wealth and loftiness of the contents” (Delitzsch Vol. II 1890: 177, English Translation).

 

Despite the difficult situation that the End Time remnant find themselves in, Isaiah in this verse, provided the pony to ride successfully out. This Laodicea condition is hectic though and described in vv. 22-25e.

 

Isaiah is describing this future condition but his description of the weeds that will be found in the remnant at the End Time did not preclude him from including himself “was it not the Lord against whom we have sinned?” (v. 24b).

 

Isaiah was not participating in the sinful acts of the weeds of the remnant otherwise the Bible would have said so. He is merely acknowledging a sinful conscientiousness because of historical sins in his unconverted life long ago which his flesh is daily experiencing when the Evil one around him bring up the memory chips to flash him into temptation again. He realized his sinful deteriorating aged flesh getting weaker and weaker as a condition that lacks perfection and eternity. But in God’s eyes, Isaiah is perfectly in Christ. Isaiah longs for heaven too.

 

Dear God

We are this Laodicea remnant and our condition includes ourselves just like Isaiah. We are in dire need of Christ our Righteousness, our Chosen One, our Savior and Lord, our Advocate in heaven on our behalf. Save us in Your glory. Amen.