Isaiah 41

This chapter of Isaiah demonstrates the writing technique of this great composer for God. Synonym Dictionaries were very popular in Isaiah’s day and some of them survived in the cuneiform tablets from Niniveh where the meaning of Sabbath was said to be rest of the heart. Isaiah thinks of a word and then lists all the words connected to this chosen word in his imagery. A technical worker (v. 7) is an artisan; refiner; uses a hammer; is soldiering; use nails. He chose the word agriculture (v. 15) and lists a threshing instrument; thresh; crush; chaff; winnow; scatter. He thinks of water (v. 18) and lists barren places; rivers; fountains; pool of water; springs of water. He mentions trees (v. 19) cedar; acacia; myrtle; oil tree; fir; elm; boxwood. But the chapter is not about synonym words. They are the imagery that colors the message. The Lord is asking for an Investigative Judgment (v. 1d). It is not an executive judgment since the Lord is inviting them to come “let us come together for judgment”. It is His people that are the “people gain[ing] new strength” (v. 1b). Isaiah then opened a panel of the Second Coming Christ the King from the East and asks, who authorized Christ to come from the East “who aroused One from the East”?(v. 2a). He is called in Righteousness [Christ our Righteousness but the Targum calls him Abraham] to God “to His feet” (v. 2b). The Trinity works together here. Christ delivers up nations before Him and subdues kings at His Second Coming (v. 2d). “Who has calling forth the generations from the beginning?” (v. 4b). It is God the Father. Christ is also Lord and the first and the last just like the Father here (v. 4c). For the Targum this means that He created the world from the beginning. The reaction of the ones converted in the remote islands of the world was during the Latter Rain experience that in that day they will be fear or the world are trembling by the Last Plaques of God (v. 5). “Each one helps his neighbor and says to his brother, ‘Be strong’” (v. 6) which will be the reaction of the righteous in that day. He used the Thesaurus of craftsmen to indicate how various professions will support each other in that day and put competition aside (v. 7). In comparison, spiritual Israel, the remnant of the Lord, the church of Laodicea, spiritual descendants of Abraham “My friend, You whom I have taken from the ends of the earth and called from its remotest parts and said to you, ‘You are My servant’” (v. 8-9) received the same message as the newcomers in the Latter Rain but their reaction were different: “Behold, you are of no account” (v. 24). We have run ahead to get the result since God unwinds His case very carefully in a court-case “present your case” (v. 21) and also “let us come together for judgment” (v. 1d). God is serious about the condition of the remnant, His servant here. What God did on His side is a long list of kindness: He is with them (v. 10a); He will strengthen the remnant and help them (v. 10b); who angered the remnant will be ashamed (v. 11a); those contending will perish (v. 11b); quarrelsome ones and warmongers will become nothing (v. 12a-b). God promise to be with the remnant and hold their hand. Interestingly, God’s right Hand holds the remnant right hand which means that either God is standing in front of the remnant slightly on the right side and looking back or God is standing on the right side of the remnant bringing His hand over Himself to hold the hand of the remnant (vv. 10c and 13). With God on the right side of the remnant, the chosen Jacob (v. 8b); the worm Jacob [during the Time of Jacob’s Trouble] (v. 14a); the King [Christ] of Jacob [at the Second Coming] (v. 21c), God is the “Holy One of [spiritual] Israel” “your Redeemer” (v. 14b). Isaiah mentions that God invented a new threshing sledge for spiritual Israel and they will harvest the righteous on the mountains (v. 15b) and hills (v. 15c) and they will rejoice in the Lord (v. 16c) but [the evil] “the storm will scatter them” (v. 16b). Those who enter the plaques of God during the Time of Jacob’s Trouble will afflicted and in need of water for there is none (v. 17a) but the outcome is God’s promised provision for the remnant and Isaiah is using a Thesaurus again to collect the synonyms from a Synonym Dictionary about water: rivers; springs; pool of water; fountains of water. The result is green in the desert and Isaiah used his Thesaurus of trees: cedar (v. 19a); acacia (v. 19b); myrtle (v. 19b); olive tree (v. 19b); juniper (v. 19c); box tree (v. 19d); cypress (v. 19d). The remnant will learn through this that God creates things for them (v. 20). However, God is asking for an Investigative Judgment: Christ the King of Jacob says that the remnant must say if they can “declare to us what is going to take place” (v. 22a). They are unable to predict the future without God “that We may know that you are gods” (v. 23b) with the result that they are not. “Your work amounts to nothing” (v. 24b). “He who chooses you is an abomination” (v. 24c). What it appears to be here is that the remnant of the church of Laodicea has become secular “they are rich and has become rich and has no need of anything”. There is no difference in some of their actions and that of the Little Horn who is also an abomination during the same time. Christ Second Coming will make the difference. “I have aroused one from the north, and He will come from the rising of the sun He will call on My name” (v. 25a-b). Christ will come upon rulers as King of Kings interrupting the Time of Jacob’s Trouble (v. 25c). This was only declared by the Revelation of God (v. 26) and this was declared from the beginning, also to Adam and other generations. End time doctrines are as old as man. “Who has declared from the beginning that we might know?” (v. 26a). God formerly promised a messenger of good news [Elijah] to proclaim His First coming. He also promised to give the Third Elijah in 1844 and the remnant disappointment or Laodicea condition of the final church is no different that when Christ cried on the Mount of Olives “I wanted to gather you like a hen her chickens but you did not want it”. “And when I  [Christ] look, there was no one and there is no counselor among them [the remnant]” (v. 28b). “Behold, all of them are false” (v. 29a); their works are worthless; their molten images are wind and emptiness (v. 29c). Indeed the weeds are growing together with the good seedlings in the same bedding. Objects of our modern focus are the “molten images” of our imagination that are wind and emptiness.

Dear God

We are the remnant and we are the church of Laodicea and we are what You say we are. But not all of us wish to be weed for most of us want to be seedlings for You. Help us to fulfill the divine role of messenger of Good news during the Third Elijah message and enlarging it during the Fourth Elijah message of the Latter Rain. Amen.

Koot van Wyk, (DLitt et Phil; ThD) Kyungpook National University, Department of Liberal Education, Sangju, South Korea; conjoint lecturer of Avondale College, Australia