Spiritual Disciplines and Moral Behavior: Some Comments on Isaiah 58

 

Isaiah 58:1-14 (NKJV)
¹  "Cry aloud, spare not; Lift up your voice like a trumpet; Tell My people their transgression, And the house of Jacob their sins.
²  Yet they seek Me daily, And delight to know My ways, As a nation that did righteousness, And did not forsake the ordinance of their God. They ask of Me the ordinances of justice; They take delight in approaching God.
³  'Why have we fasted,' they say, 'and You have not seen? Why have we afflicted our souls, and You take no notice?' "In fact, in the day of your fast you find pleasure, And exploit all your laborers.
⁴  Indeed you fast for strife and debate, And to strike with the fist of wickedness. You will not fast as you do this day, To make your voice heard on high.

Note:  Behavior can make spiritual discipline useless, and we can fool ourselves into thinking that we are right with God without considering how we treat those vulnerable to us.  They love the Word, and love to pray, but still seek pleasure, exploit laborers, strive and debate each other and "strike with a fist of wickedness."

 

BK-Cf. Deuteronomy 24:14-15

"You shall not oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether one of your brethren or one of the aliens who is in you land within your gates.  Each day you shall give him his wages, and not let the sun go down on it, for he is poor and has set his heart on it; lest he cry out against you to the Lord, and it be sin to you."

           

Cf. also James 5:1-6

"Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are  coming upon you!  Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten.  You gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire.  You have heaped up treasure in the last days.  Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth (Lit. "the Lord of hosts")  You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter.  You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you."

Note:  Se we see this continued to be a problem in the days of the New Testament as well.

⁵  Is it a fast that I have chosen, A day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head like a bulrush, And to spread out sackcloth and ashes? Would you call this a fast, And an acceptable day to the LORD?
⁶  "Is this not the fast that I have chosen: To loose the bonds of wickedness, To undo the heavy burdens, To let the oppressed go free, And that you break every yoke?

JFB-to "dissolve every unjust bond", such as slavery, or fraudulent contracts.  Cf. Human trafficking and predatory loans.

 

⁷  Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, And that you bring to your house the poor who are cast out; When you see the naked, that you cover him, And not hide yourself from your own flesh?

K&D-“There is a bitter irony in these words, just as when the ancients said, “not eating is a natural fast, but abstaining from sin is a spiritual fast.” During the siege of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans a general emancipation of the slaves of Israelitish descent (who were to be set free, according to the law, every three years) was resolved upon and carried out; but as soon as the Chaldeans were gone, the masters fetched their liberated slaves back into servitude again (Jeremiah_34:8-22). And as Isaiah_58:6 shows, they carried the same selfish and despotic disposition with them into captivity.”

⁸  Then your light shall break forth like the morning, Your healing shall spring forth speedily, And your righteousness shall go before you; The glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.
⁹  Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; You shall cry, and He will say, 'Here I am.' "If you take away the yoke from your midst, The pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness,
¹⁰  If you extend your soul to the hungry And satisfy the afflicted soul, Then your light shall dawn in the darkness, And your darkness shall be as the noonday.
¹¹  The LORD will guide you continually, And satisfy your soul in drought, And strengthen your bones; You shall be like a watered garden, And like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.
¹²  Those from among you Shall build the old waste places; You shall raise up the foundations of many generations; And you shall be called the Repairer of the Breach, The Restorer of Streets to Dwell In.

Note:  People like this are like this not because they have charmed lives, but because they are living their best.  They are life-giving to others and are builders of people as well as places.

 

References:

BK-Bible Knowledge Commentary

K&D-Carl F. Keil and  Franz Delitzsch

Jesus and the Accursed Plant

 

Isaiah 53:2 (New King James Version of the Bible) 

For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, And as a root out of dry ground.  He has no form or comeliness; And when we see Him, There is no beauty that we should desire Him.

 

The description of Jesus as a shrub out in the desert

We're getting close to the end of Isaiah, and I had planned to move one past this chapter, but chapter 53 is famous in Christian theology for the multiple applications to the life of Jesus.  It seems that almost every verse in this ancient prophecy fits with the life of Jesus as recorded in the Gospels.  In this verse Isaiah describes the Servant-the Messiah-as someone who apparently looks very average.  He does not impress people, His background has nothing to it that is notable.  Even His future disciple Nathaniel, when hearing of Jesus from his brother Philip, replied that he doubted that anyone of note could come from Nazareth (John 1:43-46)  But note the opening phrase, in which the passage describes the Lord as a little bush growing out of dry ground.

 

The similar description of the accursed man in Jeremiah's prophecies

That, to me, is telling.  In Jeremiah 17 the Lord speaks to that frustrated prophet and tells him that, however unpopular, his dependence upon the Lord is correct.  The person who depends upon the Lord is like a tree planted by waters, who prospers in spite of the hot sun.  The person who depends upon people instead of God, is like a shrub in the desert, barely hanging on (Jeremiah 17:6).  I think the similarity in descriptions is deliberate.  Both are compared to little shrubs out in the desert; the irreligious man in Jeremiah and Jesus in Isaiah 53.  The irreligious man because it is an accurate description of him from God's vantage.  For Jesus He is described so, in part, because He takes his place in the wrath of God.  He who "knew no sin becomes sin" for us (2 Corinthians 5:21) and I think that is reflected in this description.  Jesus is accursed, though innocent.  We are justified, though guilty, and in Christ we have the destiny of the ages even though we deserve none of it.  Such is the value of the Cross and Resurrection of Jesus.

Belief is an Act of Power on the Part of the Holy Spirit

 Isaiah 53:1 (NKJV)

 

1          Who has believed our report?

 

            And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

 

This was fulfilled in John 12:37-38  “But though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him:  That the saying is Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spake, ‘Lord, who hath believed our report?  And to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?”  Isaiah was apparently warned that people would be like this in his day, as well as the Messiah’s, in Isaiah 6:9-10.  It may be surmised that such “fatness” of heart is still possible today.  The longer people refused to believe, the more they became set in unbelief.  This verse is also quoted in Romans 10:16

 

            On the other side of the coin, one of the early church fathers said that the salvation of the soul by faith in the Lord Jesus is a work of power, so by comparison we could surmise that Isaiah would agree.  If someone truly believes the Gospel, that is evidence that the arm of the Lord has been revealed.