Page:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 4.djvu/51

Rh of the Jewish church and nation. When the word of God, especially the word of the gospel, has been thus abused by them, they shall be unchurched, and, consequently, undone. Their cities shall be uninhabited, and their country-houses too; the land shall be untilled, desolate with desolation, as it is in the margin; the people who should replenish the houses and cultivate the ground, being all cut off by sword, famine, or pestilence, and those who escape with their lives being removed far away into captivity, so that there shall be a great and general forsaking in the midst of the land; that populous country shall become desert, and that glory of all lands shall be abandoned. Note, Spiritual judgments often bring temporal judgments along with them upon persons and places. This was in part fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans, when the land, being left desolate, enjoyed her sabbaths seventy years; but the foregoing predictions being so expressly applied in the New Testament to the Jews in our Saviour's time, doubtless this points at the destruction of that people by the Romans, in which it had a complete accomplishment; and the effects of it that people and that land remain under to this day.

4. That yet a remnant should be reserved to be the monuments of mercy, v. 13. There was so in the last destruction of the Jewish nation; (Rom. xi. 5.) At this present time there is a remnant; for so it was written here, But in it shall be a tenth, a certain number, but a very small number, in comparison with the multitude that shall perish in their unbelief; it is that which under the law, was God's proportion; they shall be consecrated to God as the tithes were, and shall be for his service and honour. Concerning this tithe, this saved remnant, we are here told, (1.) That they shall return, (ch. vii. 3.—x. 21.) shall return from sin to God and duty; shall return out of captivity to their own land. God will turn them and they shall be turned. (2.) That they shall be eaten, shall be accepted of God, as the tithe was, which was meat in God's house, Mal. iii. 10. The saving of this remnant shall be meat to the faith and hope of those that wish well to God's kingdom. (3.) That they shall be like a timber-tree in winter, which has life, though it has no leaves; as a teil-tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them, even then when they cast their leaves: so this remnant, though they may be stript of their outward prosperity, and share with others in common calamities, yet they shall recover themselves as a tree in the spring, and flourish again; though they fall, they shall not be utterly cast down: there is hope of a tree, though it be cut down, that it will sprout again, Job xiv. 7. (4.) That this distinguished remnant shall be the stay and support of the public interests: the holy seed in the soul is the substance of the man; a principle of grace, reigning in the heart, will keep life there; he that is born of God, has his seed remaining in him, 1 John iii. 9. So the holy seed in the land is the substance of the land, keeps it from being quite dissolved, and bears up the pillars of it, Ps. lxxv. 3. See ch. i. 9. Some read the foregoing clause with this, thus: As the support at Shallecheth is in the elms and the oaks, so the holy seed is the substance thereof; as the trees that grow on either side of the causey (the raised way, or terrace-walk, that leads from the king's palace to the temple, (1 Kings x. 5.) at the gate of Shallecheth, 1 Chron. xxvi. 16.) support the causey by keeping up the earth, which would otherwise be crumbling away; so the small residue of religious, serious, praying, people, are the support of the state, and help to keep things together, and save them from going to decay. Some make the holy seed to be Christ; the Jewish nation was therefore saved from utter ruin, because out of it, as concerning the flesh, Christ was to come, Rom. ix. 5. Destroy it not, for that Blessing is in it; (ch. lxv. 8.) and when that blessing was come, it was soon destroyed. Now the consideration of this is designed for the support of the prophet in his work. Though far the greater part should perish in their unbelief, yet to some his word should be a savour of life unto life. Ministers do not wholly lose their labour, if they be but instrumental to save one poor soul.

CHAP. VII.

This chapter is an occasional sermon, in which the prophet sings both of mercy and judgment to those that did not perceive or understand either; he piped unto them, but they danced not; mourned unto them, but they wept not. Here is, I. The consternation that Ahaz was in upon an attempt upon the confederate forces of Syria and Israel against Jerusalem, v. 1, 2. II. The assurance which God, by the prophet, sent him for his encouragement, that the attempt should be defeated, and Jerusalem should be preserved, v. 3..9. III. The confirmation of this by a sign which God gave to Ahaz, when he refused to ask one, referring to Christ, and our redemption by him, v. 10..16. IV. A threatening of the great desolation that God would bring upon Ahaz and his kingdom by the Assyrians, notwithstanding their escape from this present storm, because they went on still in their wickedness, v. 17..25. And this is written both for our comfort and for our admonition.

ND it came to pass in the days of Ahaz, the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah king of Judah, that Rezin the king of Syria, and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up towards Jerusalem to war against it, but could not prevail against it. 2. And it was told the house of David, saying, Syria is confederatedconfederate, as in 1811 London edition and current KJV [sic] with Ephraim: and his heart was moved, and the heart of his people, as the trees of the wood are moved with the wind. 3. Then said the unto Isaiah, Go forth now to meet Ahaz, thou and Shear-jashub thy son, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool, in the highway of the fuller's field; 4. And say unto him, Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be faint-hearted, for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah. 5. Because Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Remaliah, have taken evil counsel against thee, saying, 6. Let us go up against Judah and vex it, and let us make a breach therein for us, and set a king in the midst of it, even the son of Tabeal: 7. Thus saith the God, It shall not stand, neither shall it come to pass. 8. For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin; and within threescore and five years shall Ephraim be broken, that it be not a people. 9. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is Remaliah's son. If ye will not believe, surely ye shall not be established.

The prophet Isaiah had his commission renewed in the year that king Uzziah died, ch. vi. 1. Jotham his son reigned, and reigned well sixteen years; all