Feast: Shouting Gleanings and Singing Olives (Part Two)

#FT20-06
Charles Whitaker (1944-2021)
Given 08-Oct-20; 82 minutes

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Please turn to Isaiah 25. The Sabbath before the Feast of Trumpets, I focused on Isaiah 24, the first of four chapters which make up what commentators call Isaiah's Apocalypse. And since a number of you were not present on that particular occasion, I do need to offer at least a bit of a review before the sequel today where we will focus on Isaiah 25 and Isaiah 26.

Commentators agree that the prophecies contained in Isaiah 24 through 27 bear rhetorical and thematic similarities to the book of Revelation and hence the moniker Isaiah's Apocalypse. Isaiah's Apocalypse focuses on the world as a whole, on the Day of the Lord and its aftermath. And therein lies its thematic similarity to the book of Revelation, the Apocalypse as it is called, which also focuses on the Lord's day, as it says in Revelation 1:10, and it focuses on the earth at large during that particular time rather than on one particular nation. And so much of the book of Isaiah focuses just on one nation.

But in Revelation there is but one reference to Egypt, there is none to Syria, none to Assyria, none to Moab, none to the Amorites, of the Canaanites, or anything like that. And the only exception in the book of Revelation, basically, is Babylon, and of course it figures prominently, especially in chapter 17 and chapter 18. Further, most of us understand that Babylon in the book of Revelation refers not to a city and not even to a nation, but to a whole civilization, to a way of life based on the rejection of God's law; and likewise God in Isaiah's Apocalypse makes it plain that the city that He will destroy during the Day of the Lord is what I called (in the last time I spoke) the world-city.

Let us take a look then at Isaiah 25 where he describes that situation, that city.

Isaiah 25:2-3 For You have made a city a ruin, a fortified city a ruin, a palace of foreigners to be a city no more; it will never be rebuilt. Therefore the strong people will glorify You; the city of the terrible nations will fear You.

Here, God considers those nations which come up against His people, those terrible, those ruthless nations, you see, collectively to be "the city." Please turn then to Isaiah 24 and we were briefly revisit it just by way of review. One chapter earlier. We are focused on verses 13 through 16.

Isaiah 24:13-16 When it shall be thus in the midst of the land among the people, it shall be like the shaking of an olive tree, like the gleaning of grapes when the vintage is done. They shall lift up their voices, and they shall sing; for the majesty of the Lord they shall cry aloud from the sea. Therefore glorify the Lord in the dawning light, the name of the Lord God of Israel in the coastlands of the sea. From the ends of the earth we have heard songs: "Glory to the righteous!" But I said, "I am ruined, ruined! Woe to me! The treacherous dealers have dealt treacherously, indeed, the treacherous dealers have dealt very treacherously."

In the time of the dire events that transpired, and they are mentioned there in verses 1 through 12, where few men are left, it says in verse 6; it says in verse 1 that the earth is empty and waste; it is abandoned and plundered in verse 3, it is desolate in verse 6. Music and mirth having ceased, it says in verse 8; and in verse 10, that the city of confusion is broken down.

You see, in that state of affairs, Almighty God will preserve remnants here, figuratively connected to the harvest practices of leaving olives on the tree after shaking the bulk of them off during the harvest time. And secondly, leaving some grapes attached to the vines during the harvest. In Deuteronomy 24:20-21 (I mentioned it last time), God specifically mentions both olives and grapes in His command that reapers leave something in the field for the disadvantaged and for the disenfranchised.

In the prophetic contexts of Isaiah 17:4-6 and to that passage that we just read in Isaiah 24:13, God speaks of remnants left after the bulk of the Israelites have been killed, have been exiled. That is, after they have been figuratively harvested, they have been cut down. I looked at the remnant as made up of two distinct parts; one part being the church, grapes hanging onto Christ, the Vine, through thick and thin (and of course you can reference John 15:1-8), and the second part being physical Israelites, now part of the olive tree, a few scattered here, a few scattered there (and you can reference in terms of the olive tree, Romans 11).

Two remnants, grapes and olives. Isaiah 24:14-16 describes the members of these remnants singing for the majesty of the Lord, praising Him. God has preserved them, though they are scattered across the face of the earth and they are few in number. From the coastlands of the sea, it says in verse 15, to the ends of the earth they sing glory to the righteous One. Historically, God's people sing and shout in His presence. They did so at Sinai, and we will look at that later on, and they did so at Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem in 31 AD. And they will do so again when He returns to Jerusalem as the great King.

And I pointed out the linkage between God as reigning King in Israel. As reigning King and the singing at His triumphal entry, the people bless God, bless the coming King of Israel, it makes it plain there. And Zephaniah prophesized that Israel will sing because the King is in their midst. Hold onto that term, in their midst. We will be back there.

When we left Christ in Isaiah 24:23, gloriously reigning in Jerusalem and in Zion, His brilliance disgracing the moon, shaming the sun, dazzling. The chapter closes with Him seated before the elders or as it says, the ancient ones, who might be the patriarchs of old, they might be the 24 elders, or perhaps they are the disciples seated, enthroned and judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

With that, brethren, let us move on into some new territory and take a look at Isaiah 25. This is going to be home base for a few minutes. Thematically, there are two powerful links between Isaiah 24 (which we just talked about) and the remaining chapters of Isaiah's Apocalypse. One of those links is the worldwide scope of God's work, of Christ's work, both before and after His return. Christ performs a worldwide work during the Day of the Lord, that is, the year before His return, the year culminating in His return in power and great glory. And that work is the main topic of chapter 24. But Christ also continues performing a worldwide work after He returns during the Millennium, and of course, the White Throne period afterwards. And that work is the principal topic of chapters 25, 26, and 27.

Now the second link is quite different. It is Zion. That word Zion is so important and it is just the opposite of worldwide. It is rather a particular geographic point on the face of the earth, but it is a pivotal point indeed. I mentioned earlier how how Isaiah 24 concludes with Christ reigning, as it says there, on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem. The juxtaposition of the two, Zion and Jerusalem, is important. Christ does not rule from the Zion which is in Utah or any other place that anybody might fancy. No, He rules in Jerusalem, and from Jerusalem He rules the earth. We will see that Isaiah 25 thrice makes reference to "on this mountain" to "in this mountain," which is a reference to Mount Zion. And indeed, Isaiah's Apocalypse concludes in Isaiah 27:13, "the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem" is reigning. That is how the apocalypse actually closes.

Jerusalem is key to Isaiah's Apocalypse. Just as John calls it in Revelation 21:10, he calls Jerusalem the Holy City, the Holy Jerusalem. Both cities are key in Revelation and in Isaiah's Apocalypse.

Now, in spite of these two very strong linkages, Isaiah 25 remains quite different from Isaiah 24 and as I read the first two verses in Isaiah 25 again, please listen to the difference in tone, to the difference in tenor from the previous chapter.

Isaiah 25:1-2 O Lord, You are my God. I will exalt You, I will praise Your name, for you have done wonderful things; Your counsels of old are faithfulness and truth. For you have made the city a ruin, a fortified city a ruin, a palace of foreigners to be a city no more; it will never be rebuilt.

Chapter 25 is not an extended prophecy about what God will do, but rather it is a quiet, it is a studied recitation of the wonderful works that He has done. The writer praises God for His faithfulness and His truth, as it says in verse 1, and the reference to the destroyed city as something that will never be rebuilt (and that is at the end of the second verse) is more of a reflection on the thoroughness of God's judgment, on the comprehensiveness of His salvation that He has just wrought. It is more of that reflection than it is a prophecy.

One major dissimilarity between the book of Revelation and Isaiah's Apocalypse is just this: The book of Revelation lacks extended sections of praise for what God has done. Long sections of thanksgiving, and in fact, in the New King James version, the word praise, the word thanksgiving, both of those words appear only once in the book of Revelation. Consider the only reference to thanksgiving in the book of Revelation and it is where angels said, not men, not people, but angels.

Revelation 7:12 "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom, thanksgiving and honor and power and might, be to our God forever and ever. Amen."

There are other examples of giving glory and giving praise and thanksgiving to God in the book of Revelation, of course there are, but they are usually quite short for the model. There is prophecy interspersed with occasional praise. However, Isaiah's Apocalypse, especially in these last three chapters, is just the opposite. It is praise interspersed with occasional prophecy. Isaiah 25—27 is in fact an extended poem of praise to God, interspersed with major prophetic statements.

Speaking in terms of the big picture, what is the effect of that kind of format in Isaiah's Apocalypse? When we consider the praise and the prophecy as a package in the apocalypse, we come away with the feeling that the prophet is saying, "Let's praise God for what He has done for us, while at the same time, we look forward to the great things that He will do for us in the next 1,000 years and beyond." That is the spirit, which at least to my reading, breathes in the last three chapters of Isaiah's Apocalypse. And a good example of this underlining tenor, this underlining tone of Isaiah's Apocalypse might be the next couple of verses.

Isaiah 25:4 For you have been [I want you to notice the tense there] a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat; for the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall.

Now, the noun "wall" there is reminiscent of the prophet Ezekiel's use of the untempered mortar metaphor. You remember it very well. It is in Ezekiel 13 and there is also mention of it in Ezekiel 22. But, you see, God's wall is not made with untempered mortar, but it will stand in the end and will protect people when He builds a wall around His people.

In Isaiah 25:4 the prophet recognizes God's strength and His commitment to protect. You see, he has experienced both. But at verse 5, the narrative shifts from history, it shifts from what God has done, and it turns to prophecy, what He will do. The prophet here refers to the ongoing work of Christ, the work that He will do in other parts of the world, among the Gentiles. Take a look at that as we notice the verb change here.

Isaiah 25:5 You will reduce the noise of the aliens, as heat in a dry place; as heat in the shadow of a cloud, the song of the terrible ones will be diminished.

The prophecy that the godless will change their tune, if you will allow me to put it that way, can be understood has emphasis: You can count on it. God will make the godless eventually sing a different song.

Verse 5 stresses that Christ's work is not complete upon His return, you see, but that His work is ongoing. His return only sets the stage for future accomplishment—His future accomplishment. We will not turn to Isaiah 62, but there it is all about the restored Jerusalem, it is all about Zion, and it makes it clear that when Christ's feet touch the Mount of Olives, His work of reconciling all of creation will have only begun.

Isaiah 62:11 Indeed the Lord has proclaimed to the end of the earth [and I do believe that "the end of the earth" there is a reference, a geographical reference, referring to geography, not to to the last time. It is not a temporal reference in Hebrew. This particular idiom can refer to both, but I think it is geographical here.] to the end of the world: "Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Surely your salvation is coming; behold, His reward is with Him, and His work is before Him.'"

And we know that Christ will first set Himself to the task of regathering Israel to the Promised Land and in time He will work to prepare the world for the great influx, a huge influx of people at the second resurrection. And that work will involve, by the way, Gentiles as God will be resurrecting them all over the face of the earth, and among where the Gentiles live.

In Isaiah 2 it touches upon the thrust of Christ's millennial work and I want you to notice here the opposition of Zion on the one hand, and the world on the other hand.

Isaiah 2:3 [you know it well] For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and rebuke many people.

As Ezekiel 38 and 39 compellingly indicate all of this is not going to come easily. But gradually, over the decades, the strident song of the terrible ones will turn to the sacrifice of praise to God, as we read in Hebrews 13:15. As more and more people are going to be individually called by God, whether they are Gentile, whether the Israelites, as they come under the New Covenant and they make sanctification their major priority in their lives.

Please turn back to Isaiah 25, and we will take a look at verses 6 and 7, where two of the chapter's three references to that term that I mentioned before—on this mountain or in this mountain—appear. That is the same mountain where Christ is enthroned before His elders at the very end of chapter 24, verse 23. The thrust of these verses is not what Christ has just accomplished through His return through the Day of the Lord, but rather the work that He will do that is before Him upon His return, a work involving the Gentiles living all around the world. But it is a work which is initialized and it is a work which is controlled and supervised by Christ in Zion.

Isaiah 25:6-8 And in this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all people a feast of choice pieces, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of well-refined wines on the lees. And He will destroy on this mountain [the second use] the surface of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death forever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces; the rebuke of His people He will take away from all the earth.

Here is the confluence, brethren, the emerging in fact of the two themes that I talked about earlier. One, the theme of ubiquity, or if I can use the term worldwideness, and I can coin that term if you will permit me to do so. It is the convergence of the theme of worldwideness with the theme of Zion as the focal point. The world becomes the stage, Zion becomes the director's chair. Just as in Isaiah 24 during the Day of the Lord, all the earth faces God's wrath.

Now in the regeneration, all the earth looks forward to the healing which can only come from God. Christ's work of reconciliation continues to emanate from Israel, but it becomes gradually worldwide in scope. And New Covenant Israel comes to play an increasingly important role in the outworking of that work and the performance of that work among the Gentiles, as Israel becomes exactly what God wanted Israel to be in the first place: to be a witness, to be an example, to be a light to the Gentiles.

Reading through chapter 25, as you just read it, you know, time becomes a blur at times. It just comes, it moves very fast as if it really did not matter. And of course it does. Of course it does very much. But notice how fast the prophet moves through time and how far into the future he eventually sees. He starts out in verse 2 praising God for destroying the city of the terrible ones. Now, that is, of course, the system that we call Babylon.

But by verse 8, he has leaped whole centuries. He has leaped all the way to the point where God will swallow up death evermore, swallow it up forever. And that is certainly a reference to the end. I will not ask you to turn there, but Paul, writing in,

I Corinthians 15:22-26 [talking about this particular time of the end] For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, afterwards those who are Christ's at His coming. Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom [of God] to the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign until He has put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy which will be destroyed is death.

By Isaiah 25:8 the prophet has bounded through time all the way to the time that God will wipe tears from all faces, as he says there. And of course it is reflected in another slightly different way at the end of the Book in Revelation 21:4, "God will wipe every tear from their eyes."

Remember that there were three appearances of that term "on this mountain" "in this mountain" in Isaiah 25. Let us take a look at the third one. It is in verse 10.

Isaiah 25:10 For on this mountain the hand of the Lord will rest, and Moab shall be trampled down under Him.

Now here the setting is still different and it is not the end time as we know it, you know, not the end of time. It is not when God is ready to create the New Heaven and a New Earth. It is still about 1,100 years earlier than that, around the start of the Millennium, when Christ takes care of some unfinished business concerning Moab. In this case, in Zion Christ settles in to begin His rule of the earth from Jerusalem in their midst, as it says. I did not read verse 11, but I will go ahead and point out to you that there the prophet uses the formula "in their midst" to refer to the Christ and to the fact that Christ is on the earth. He has returned to the earth, He is in Jerusalem, He is reigning, He is King.

It is not that the prophet is incoherent at all. He just does not see time in a linear way like we are prone to do. Under God's inspiration, he comes to look at time like God does. He skips centuries. He zips forward in time, backward in time, and that makes perfect sense, for the King of kings, the Lord of lords is is not time bound as we are. The point that Isaiah is trying to make is simply this: whatever time frame we happen to consider, Christ is leading a worldwide work from His base of operations in Zion.

Now, I want to add here reading Isaiah's Apocalypse, just reading it from beginning to end, those chapters, I could not stop my mind from wandering to a passage that we all know so well and we know it so well that you do not need to turn to it. But it is in Psalm 74.

Psalm 74:12 For God is my King from of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth.

And that is what Christ has done in the past. It is what He is doing now and it is what He will continue to do: work salvation.

Please turn to Isaiah 26. We will begin talking for a little bit about Isaiah 26. Remember how in Isaiah 24:16 (I read it earlier), that God asserts that members of the remnant hear songs from the ends of the earth. Well, what were the words of those songs, those songs that they sing when Christ returns? Well, I submit to you that Isaiah 26 contains, in essence, the words of the song the remnant will sing and most specifically those individuals who are in Jerusalem or who are, you know, right around the surroundings of Jerusalem. Notice what it says:

Isaiah 26:1-4 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah [specifically this is the land of Judah]: "We have a strong city [that is another reference to Jerusalem]; God will appoint salvation for walls and bulwarks. Open the gates, that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in. You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You. Trust the Lord forever, for in YAH, the Lord, is everlasting strength."

Now that term "everlasting strength" here is literally the "Rock of ages" and we are going to dwell on verse 4 just a little bit, because in it there are at least three elements which thematically link it to the Song of Moses which of course you know to be another song of praise to God.

Please turn to Exodus 15, that is, the Song of Moses. And as you do so, I am going to mention what those three linkages are from Isaiah 26:4. The first linkage is Yah, Y-a-h is its spelling. It is mentioned there in verse 4. It is the name of God linked to salvation and to deliverance. And it first appears in Exodus 15, verse 2. And that is very near the beginning of the Song of Moses.

Another song of praise, a great song of praise to God is located at Isaiah 12 makes very, very plain this linkage between Yah and salvation, deliverance.

Isaiah 12:2 "Behold, God is my salvation, I will trust and not be afraid; for Yah, the Lord, is my strength and song; and He has become my salvation."

The word "become" there has the force of manifest or visible. Salvation is now no longer a matter of faith, something that is unseen, something that we look forward to, something that we hope for. But rather now we have experienced God's salvation. We have, as it were, witnessed it with our own eyes. And so we praise Yah, the God of our deliverance and of our salvation.

The second link is the word "forever." That also appears in Isaiah 26:4, and that Hebrew word first appears in Isaiah 15:18. And that is at the conclusion of the song of Moses.

And the third point is related to it. It is a little bit more involved but I will go ahead and give you that. The Hebrew words underlying "forever" and "everlasting," both of those words you will recognize if you take a look at Isaiah 25:4. The Hebrew words for them are discrete words, two separate words, different words, and if you put them in a pot all together and add them up, they will appear about 300 times separately in the Old Testament. But they appear together, that is, in the same context, they appear in the same verse 18 times in God's Word and the combination is usually, it is not always, but it is usually translated, "forever and ever." And as you see, there the word ever and ever, in English it is the same word, ever. But in in Hebrew, it is two different words most of the time. And that is just the way it works.

Importantly, the combination of those two words first appears in, you may have guessed it, Exodus 15:18. Maybe at the age of 76 I am becoming easily entertained. But this is the kind of thing that really interests me when I catch this kind of thing. All three points, all of these three points suggest an essential connection between God's Word—the song that they sang after they crossed the Red Sea, the Song of Moses—and the song that His people will sing, that the remnant will sing, that we will sing upon Christ's return.

Let us flesh out that a little bit. We will start at the top.

Exodus 15:1 Then Moses and the children of Israel sang this song to the Lord, and spoke, saying, "I will sing to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously!"

Hold on to that word triumphed. I am going to mention it a couple more times. It keeps popping up because it is important. Christ is triumphing as King.

Exodus 15:1-2 "The horse and his rider He has thrown into the sea! The Lord . . .

And that word there is Yah, and it is the first of 49 uses in the Old Testament. 49 is, for those of you who have trouble with this kind of thing, seven times seven.

Exodus 15:2 . . . is my strength and song, and has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will exalt Him, my father's God, and I will exalt Him."

Now, there is a lot of history in this song going all the way back to the patriarchs and that is probably what is referred to there in the word "father." But the history focuses on God's recent destruction of the Egyptian army in the sea there. And so we are going to bypass much of that history. Let us skip down to verses 11 and 12.

Exodus 15:11-12 "Who is like You, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like You, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders? [I want you to hold on to those plurals there, praises and wonders. We are going to come back to it.] You stretched out Your right hand, the earth swallowed them."

At verse 13, the commemoration of God's defeat of Egypt ends and prophecy begins. But I want you to pay very close attention to the verb tenses as we look at verse 13.

Exodus 15:13 "You and Your mercy have led forth the people whom You have redeemed; You have guided them through in Your strength to Your holy habitation."

Brethren, Moses, in saying this must have been looking forward, for the people singing this song were not yet in God's holy habitation and they really were not even close to it. They were still in Sinai, and they were not there actually at Sinai. They were not even there at the giving of the Ten Commandments at that particular moment. Indeed, the Tabernacle had not been built. They were in the wilderness.

We will not turn to to Psalm 78:54 but there is a definition of Mount Zion and it defines it as God's holy habitation. Canaan, you see, is His land and the people were not there yet. They had not reached Canaan. They had not reached Mount Zion, and further, the events in verses 14 and 15 have not yet taken place. And they have not indeed taken place to this very day!

Let us take a look there and as I do so notice the change tenses.

Exodus 15:14-15 "The people will hear and be afraid; sorrow will take hold of the inhabitants of Philistia. Then the chiefs of Eden will be dismayed; the mighty men of Moab, trembling will take hold of them; all the inhabitants of Canaan will melt away."

In point of fact, brethren, history shows as presented there in the Scriptures, that the Canaanites and the people of Philistia did not just melt away when Israel entered the land. Now, Joshua did experience some very real successes in driving them out. But, for instance, the Philistines were a huge thorn in the flesh, in Israel's flesh, at least until the time of David. Especially through the time of the judges, they oppressed the Israelites over and over and over again. Edom refused to grant the Israelites passage through their territory. They had to bypass it. Moab through Balaam, of course, repeatedly attempted to curse Israel.

So, you see, Moses is looking beyond the Israelites journey to Canaan and he is looking even beyond her entry into the Promised Land and even beyond the work of Joshua. Rather he is looking at a time and looking to a time into the future when those things will happen.

Exodus 15:16 "Fear and dread will fall on them; by the greatness of Your arm they will be as still as a stone, till your people pass over, O Lord, till the people pass over whom You have purchased [whom you have redeemed]."

That word redeemed is constantly used in reference to the re-gathering of Israel under Christ. They are redeemed and the Hebrew repeats that pass over there. Notice it is very similar to "Babylon is fallen, is fallen," which appears first in Isaiah 21:9 which is the first use of that term, "Babylon is fallen, is fallen." And of course, you know that it is repeated in Revelation 14:8.

Israel's enemies were not still as a stone the first time the people passed over it during the time of Joshua. They characteristically kicked, you see, the people did in those lands. They plotted, they rebelled, they oppressed. Moses is speaking prophetically of a second time, of a second exodus, a second passing over when Christ re-gathers Israel, successfully redeeming them from the lands of their slavery and planting them in peace in the Land of Promise.

And about this Moses is explicit. Take a look at verse 17.

Exodus 15:17 "You will bring them in and plant them in the mountain of Your inheritance, in the place, O Lord, which You have made for Your own dwelling, the sanctuary, O Lord, which Your hands have established."

The final verse of the song, which is verse 18, is kind of a one liner. It is a clincher.

Exodus 15:18 "The Lord shall reign forever and ever."

Notice the stress on reign. And again, the Hebrew words underlying those two words "forever and ever" first appear right here. Those are the same two words that appear in Isaiah 26:4 translated there a bit differently, translated with the word "forever" and "everlasting."

Now as an incidental point but I think it is certainly worth mentioning here, I am just going to spend a moment mentioning it. The last occasion of the combination of those two words, those words are usually rendered forever and ever. That is Micah 4:7. And there it is translated a little bit differently. It is translated "from now on, even forever." Or sometimes you see it "from henceforth, even forever." What is really interesting to me is that Micah 4:7 and Exodus 15:8 are our bookends. It is the first and the last appearances of these combinations with their lookalikes. They are almost exactly the same. And here is the last part of Micah 4, verse 7.

Micah 4:7 So the Lord will reign over them in Mount Zion from now on, even forever.

The immediate context, by the way, in that particular passage, is Christ's efforts to re-gather Israel upon His return.

Let us briefly recapitulate, then, as we kind of put this whole thing together.

First, Isaiah's apocalypse covers two main topics: God's deliverance of remnants of people during the destruction of a worldwide civilization based on Satan's way of life. Now, we generally term that period of destruction the Day of Vengeance, the Day of the Lord, the day of the year of the Lord's vengeance, things like that. And we call the civilization Babylon. It is the worldwide city filled with the terrible ones that are mentioned in Isaiah 25:1-3.

Second, Isaiah's apocalypse is about the work of reconciliation that Christ the King performs during the Millennium and beyond. And likewise, the book of Exodus covers two main topics.

The first part of the book deals with God's deliverance of a people during His destruction in judgment of the most powerful nation in its day, Egypt. In fact, the word exodus means, the way out, the path out. It refers to deliverance. It refers to a place of safety, a place of escape. Note that Egypt, just like Babylon, is characterized by abject idolatry and in fact in Exodus it makes the point that God is judging the gods of Egypt, the fake gods of Egypt.

The second part of the book of Exodus deals with God's creation of a theocracy, a kingdom whose king is God. The book describes the people of that Kingdom, it describes its King, it describes in great detail its laws, and to a lesser extent its land. Exodus 15 is the pivot point. The narrative up to that point is of God's delivering His people from slavery, destroying the fortress of sin in its days in Egypt. And the rest of the book describes the government of God over the peoples of Israel in terms of a compact or we call it a covenant. The translator, Everette Fox, comments regarding the Song of Moses that, "It goes far beyond the celebration of a single military victory. The Song constitutes the founding of a theocratic people."

Exodus 15:18 most specifically tells of the founding of nothing less than an iteration of the government of God. Recognizing the importance of this song, Keil and Delitzsch go even further and despite some overstatement their comments deserve quotation. This is from page 353 Volume I of The Commentary on the Old Testament.

The Song commemorates the fact of the congregation of Israel's exaltation into the nation of God by the glorious deliverance from the slave house of Egypt. Jehovah had practically [now we do not use the word practically this way very much anymore. But it is an old use and it it means that God had effectively, He had in practice, He had in point of fact that Jehovah had practically, He had really] exalted the seed of Abraham into His own nation and hence not only does the keynote of the Song of Moses resound through all Israel songs in praise to the glorious works of Jehovah for the good of His people. But the Song of Moses will also be sung, along with the Song of the Lamb by the conquerors who stand on the Sea of Glass and have gained the victory over the beast and his image.

In that song, God announces that He is the people's salvation and that He is their King who will reign forever and ever. Likewise in Isaiah 20:26 there the remnants praise Yah for delivering His people and for the promise that He will continue to lead them, to bless them as their King without cessation.

Now, there are similarities between the historical account of the fall of Egypt and of course the prophesied fall of Jerusalem. The season of the year being one of them, they are six months apart. There are other differences. The plagues did not last for a year for instance, and yet they remain a type of the Day of the Lord when He punishes evildoers. In the typology, the children of Israel and the mixed multitude form two remnants which God frees from slavery. The Song of Moses celebrates their deliverance at the hand of their Almighty God. And it becomes clear, then, brethren, that God's deliverance of a remnant followed by their shouting, followed by their praising Him as their King is a pattern and that appears several times in the Scriptures.

We just looked at one, the singing of the people at the destruction of the armies of Egypt, the singing and the shouting that accompanied Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem as King. Or again the shouting of the Jews at the elevation of Mordecai and their deliverance in the days of Esther. I did not mention that here. I did mention when I spoke last time and you will find that reference to Esther 8:15-17.

Please turn to Isaiah 42. I am going to address here another aspect of the remnant's song in Isaiah 26. Although the prophet mentions Israel here, the spotlight is on the Gentiles. It is mentioned in Isaiah 42:1. It is also they also mentioned in verse 6. Christ will bring justice to them. He will be a light to them.

Isaiah 42:10-12 Sing to the Lord a new song, and His praise from the ends of the earth, you who go down to the sea, and all that is in it, you coastlands and you inhabitants of them! Let the wilderness and its cities lift up their voice, the villages that Kedar inhabits. Let the inhabitants of Sela sing, let them shout from the top of the mountains. Let them give glory to the Lord, and declare His praise in the coastlands.

Now the formula "new song" which appears there, it appears about nine times in God's Word and in various contexts. And I submit to you, brethren, that in context like we are dealing with today where God's people are praising Him after He has delivered them from some major difficulty, the song that they sing is always a "new song." The children of Israel had never sung the Song of Moses before because, you see, in Egypt, all that they had known was groaning (and you can find a reference to that in Exodus 2:23-24). The same can be said of the Jews in Esther's time. They had known they were in great danger, and it is true of the singing disciples in 31 AD when Christ triumphantly entered Jerusalem. Though the words and indeed the language itself may be different at different times in history, the sentiment is always the same and as such, it is always an old song. But the people who sing it, the particular singers at any given time in history, have never sung it before. It is new to them. And the situation is analogous to the old command and the new command that we find in the Scriptures.

I am not going to ask that you turn to these scriptures. I am going to go rather quickly through them.

John 13:34 "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you, that you love one another."

But this is really just a restatement of the second great commandment and that is stated in Matthew 22.

Matthew 22:39 "And the second command is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'"

But, brethren, that is a very old commandment. Indeed, it is first stated in the Pentateuch, in the formation of the theocracy, indeed in the Holiness Code, and you will find it at Leviticus 19:18.

Leviticus 19:18 "You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord."

In I John 2 the apostle John provides commentary on Christ's new commandment.

I John 2:7-8 (ESV) Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you have from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining.

Now the darkness is in process of passing away, brethren, passing away from the people to whom John writes, and hence it is a new commandment to them. John elaborates very briefly on this in his second letter over a page or two.

II John 5 (ESV) And now I ask you, dear lady—not as though I were writing you a new commandment, but the one that we have had from the beginning—that we love one another.

You see the old commandment and the new commandment are in fact the same.

Well, the ancients like righteous Noah, they kept the commandments. Genesis 26:5 tells us that Abraham kept the commandments. The commandments are that old and in fact much older than that. But the point is, they were new to them. In the case of Abraham, for instance, God's laws were not the laws that he followed when he was a young man, when he was a boy or a young man. He came out of that lifestyle, he left them, and he was taught by God what were to him new commandments. They were, of course, very old. He may have also learned them from Shem (that has been discussed).

And it is that way with many of us too. Those of us who are first generation Christians did not obey. Perhaps we did not even know about the Sabbath commandment as old as it is and it is old. When when God taught it to us, when we first started to to obey it, it was new to us. It was very different to us too, of course. So also for most of those who are going to be rising in the second resurrection. It is going to be a new commandment to them.

Well, by analogy, the same thing is true of the old song and the new song. It is ancient, but it is sung repeatedly in history with new singers and hints it is a new song each time. And I think, brethren, that that is why the pronouns praises and wonders are both plural. Remember I called those out to you when we were reading there in the Song of Moses.

Exodus 15:11 "Who is like You, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like You, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?"

The song of Moses is specifically about God's single action of delivering Israel from the destruction of Egypt and freeing them from slavery. But Moses, under God's inspiration, is fully aware that he is writing a song with wider application, and the point that he uses, the plural praises and wonders, indicates that he is very much aware of that. He is writing a song that will be relevant to God's people over the centuries as they sing praises to the King, having witnessed the various wonders that He has performed for them in their respective circumstances.

With that, let us go back to Isaiah 26 and pick up the concluding stanza of the remnant song. I am going to read here from the Revised Standard Version. I think it does a pretty good job with the verb tenses.

Isaiah 26:5 (RSV) "For he has brought low the inhabitants of the height, the lofty city. He lays it low, lays it low to the ground, casts it to the dust."

And I am going to interject here that the Hebrew repeats here, the verb "lays low." Again, very similar to what he did with the term "Babylon is fallen, is fallen." And we saw this earlier as a rhetorical device in Exodus 15:15, where it said, "till your people pass over." And in this case, it stresses the finality of God's judgment, that the city God's judgment is bringing to an end, the city of the terrible ones.

Isaiah 26:6 "The foot tramples it, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy."

The songwriter distinguishes between the city of God (and that was mentioned in verse), he is talking about the city of God and he is contrasting it with the doomed city of man. And the tense is present perfect, indicating that the work of God is in process. And in a spiritual sense, the work of destroying the city will continue through the Millennium and it will continue beyond the Millennium. Yes, I understand that governmentally the city will be destroyed, of course, when Christ comes, but it will continue as more and more people, having been called, turn in repentance and they become under the New Covenant. They shunned their old way of life and in effect, you see, they are trampling the evil lifestyle of the city. They are trampling the city down and the ones doing so would be the poor in spirit. And they are mentioned here, they are also mentioned by Christ, the same poor in spirit that He mentions Matthew 5:3, the beatitudes, the Sermon on the Mount.

I do want to say that it is not easy as we go on to find a unified thread of thought in verses 7 through 15. And I fancy for them to consider to be in fact three vignettes, as it were, just snatches of thought by three different individuals in the Millennium. These vignettes illustrate lessons learned by people living in the new iteration of God's government, living under Christ. And so we are going to take a look at those three vignettes just very quickly. And incidentally, I will say just to clear things up, they may not be contemporaries. Some of them may be living at the beginning of the Millennium. In one case one of them is living at the end, I think that at least. So let us take a look.

Vignette number one: Telling the End from the Beginning.

Isaiah 26:7-9 The way of the just is uprightness; O Most Upright, You weigh the path of the just. Yes, in the way of your judgments, O Lord, we have waited for You; the desire of our soul is for Your name and for the remembrance of You. With my soul I have desired You in the night [the word night there may not just refer to night, but it may may refer to the time of Jacob's trouble when Christ refers to the night when no one can work], yes, by my spirit within me I will seek You early; and for when Your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.

Now, the individual who imaged this vignette was probably not alive at Christ's return. He was not somebody who was born later on into the Millennium. And I get that feeling that he just recently arrived in Jerusalem. He was an individual re-gathered to the Land of Promise from his land of captivity, re-gathered by Christ's activity. The Christian Standard Bible renders verse 2, "The path of the righteous is level, You clear a straight path for the righteous." He remembers how Christ gently shepherded him back to the Land of Promise. Regarding His work of re-gathering His people, Christ says that He will make darkness light before them and crooked places straight. You will find that in Isaiah 42:16. So, this particular person probably has just recently arrived in Jerusalem, having been re-gathered there.

The first vignette then serves as a window into the spirit of one repentant, one who, like Simeon, faithfully and patiently waited for the Consolation of Israel, as you read in Luke 2:25. Reflecting at night on God's name, he understands that the end result of God's judgments on the earth, judgments on Israel, as painful as they were as they transpired, will eventually be that some people will learn righteousness, they will learn God's way of life. What this person reflects, incidentally, is the Psalms. He quotes a number of these in verse 8, I will not reference any, except I just will reference one.

Psalm 102:12 But you, O Lord, shall endure forever, and the remembrance of Your name to all generations.

One reflecting on the eternity of God's name will have eyes of faith. He will have the acuity to see the end from the beginning, just as God does. You will find that term "from the beginning" in Isaiah 46:10. This individual comes to share God's perspective on time. He shares His perspective of pain and distress as ultimately beneficial, even curative.

The second vignette: The Incorrigibly Wicked.

Isaiah 26:10-11 (RSV) If favor [that is, grace] is shown to the wicked, he does not learn righteousness; in the land of uprightness he deals perversely and does not see the majesty of the Lord. O Lord, thy hand is lifted up, but they see it not. Let them see thy zeal for thy people, and be ashamed. Let the fire of thy adversaries consume them.

Not everyone is going to learn righteousness. I said some people would, but some people will not. This person is impressed with the recalcitrance, he is impressed with the incorrigibility of the wicked, and perhaps he has experienced some of the extreme treachery that I spoke of last time. It is mentioned there in Isaiah 24:16. Some people simply will not repent even when they experience the overwhelming judgements of God all around them and then when they experience the fruits of His mercy every day, perhaps for year after year after year in the Millennium, but they will still not repent.

And this reality brings to mind an event which is going to take place later in time, not at the beginning of the Millennium, but at the end of it. And that is the rebellion under Satan. You can read about that in Revelation 20:7-10. How successful Satan will be once he gains release from the bottomless pit in gathering rebels to fight against God. If he found a ready audience in Adam and Eve, just a quick audience at the beginning, how much more pliable will he find the audience at the end? And apparently in no time at all, he is able to convince any number of people to rebel. These people were ones who apparently, I think if you allow this term, they apparently just "played church" for who knows how long in the Millennium. Perhaps for decades they just played church. They just went along. They were not overtly rebellious over those years and that is perhaps because they remember the fate of Magog and her allies centuries before. (Ezekiel 28 and 29)

These people nevertheless chafe at God's authority. They perhaps feel repressed by it. Oh, they are such victims, are they not? At any rate, they remain unconverted. Perhaps analogous to what we can consider tares, those who are among us, but not really of us. Though having lived in peace, lived in prosperity for years, they remain carnal. It is like some of the Corinthians in the church. Remember they were carnal, they remained carnal, and they quickly fall for Satan's deceptions, and as a result, they experienced the consuming fire of God's wrath because they never really feared God. And Christ may be speaking of these intractable people when He says in some of the very last words of His that appear in the Scriptures.

Revelation 22:11 (CEV) Evil people will keep on being evil, and everyone who is dirty- minded will still be dirty-minded. But good people will keep on doing right, and God's people will always be holy.

The person imaging this second vignette realizes that some people will not learn righteousness, even when in a righteous environment, even when around many godly people, even when governed by the very King of righteousness Himself. Grace simply does them no good at all, it seems, in the long run.

One millennial event might trigger this particular vignette. Maybe the person is reflecting on the failure of some nations to send delegates to the Feast of Tabernacles. Or perhaps maybe this particular person is not one who is alive at the beginning of the Millennium, but is alive at its end, and he is reflecting on the speed with which Satan deceives the wicked.

The third vignette: God Accomplishes Our Achievements.

Isaiah 26:12-14 (CEV) You will give us peace, Lord, because everything we have done was by your power. Others have ruled over us besides you, our Lord God, but we obey only you. Those enemies are now dead and can never live again. You have punished them—they are destroyed, completely forgotten.

This person obviously experienced slavery and perhaps having a number of masters during the time of Jacob's Trouble. But through it all, he recognized that God was in control, that He was the one who deserved honor and glory. If there is a single thread of all these vignettes, it is probably stated in verse 12. This comes from the paraphrase called The Voice. "In fact, everything we have accomplished has come from you." The International Standard Version has it this way, "For you have indeed accomplished all our achievements for us." I like that very much.

The apostle Paul broached this important concept when he asked the Corinthians, "What have you that you did not receive?" You will find that in the Revised Standard Version, I Corinthians 4:7. You know it very well.

The person framing this third vignette in humility indicates his understanding that what work he accomplished he accomplished by the power of God. His accomplishments were God's achievements. Isaiah 26, verses 16 through 21. It seems to me that these form a postscript to a letter or we could say an afterwards of a book, a coda to a piece of music. More than simply a summary, more than a recapitulation, they add information in the form of vitally important counsel.

Isaiah 26:16-19 Lord, in trouble they have visited You, they poured out a prayer when Your chastening was upon them. As a woman with child is in pain and cries out in her pangs, when she draws near the time of her delivery, so we have been in Your sight, O Lord. We have been with child, we have been in pain; we have, as it were, brought forth wind; we have not accomplished [or we have not achieved] any deliverance in the earth, nor have the inhabitants of the world fallen. Your dead shall live; together with my dead body they shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in the dust; for your dew is like the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.

The pronoun "they" in verse 16 certainly refers to God's people and the noun "prayer" there is not the usual word for prayer. It is not the word that appears most often for prayer, but in fact it is a noun which refers to the quiet, very quiet incantations, the chants of pagans. Very interesting word that it would appear here. The best meaning in this particular context may be a whispered prayer. You see, God's people in this time, in the time of the Day of the Lord, will perhaps have to whisper their prayers, probably because the atheistic forces which are ruling the world at that time will actually outlaw prayer. And brethren, there are modern and there are ancient precedents that that will happen.

Already that A-team of deconstructionists, the United States Supreme Court, has banned prayer in the public schools and other public venues. They have already done this. It is only a matter of time before Daniel's fourth beast, the one that tramples everything under its feet—it tramples traditions, it tramples statues, it tramples history, it tramples everything under its feet—and it is only a matter of time before it will trample prayer under its feet and all religious practices under its feet, baptism, circumcision, singing. It would be perhaps probably very, very difficult for God's people to sing. And we already have intimations of this beginning now, and people will not in God's church be able to sing! No wonder they will be so glad and so happy, so ecstatically singing upon His return.

There is also an ancient example of this and that is the example of Daniel, who found himself very late in his life arrested for praying. You can read it in Daniel 6, I believe. It is a wonderful, wonderful chapter and he is arrested for praying and he ends up in the lion's den. What is very interesting about that, brethren, is it happens after the fall of Babylon when we are under a new iteration of Babylon at that time, one that is an inferior one of the Medes and Persians. That deserves a lot of studies. Very, very interesting but I am not going to be able to go into it.

The metaphor of the pregnant woman seems to me to expand the meaning to include God's people whoever they are and wherever they may be in time and in space. You see, chapter 26, then, is not just for God's people at the end of time—although it is for them—but it is for God's people throughout time. Keil and Delitzsch point out that the metaphor is one of waiting and expectation. And in this particular application in this passage, the pregnancy was a species of what is called pseudocyesis. That is, it is a phantom, a false pregnancy, one that produces no fruit whatsoever, only disappointment.

And I suspect that God's people throughout the centuries have always thought that Christ was coming soon. They just knew that He was coming in their lifetimes, but He did not. Many of us have experienced a depression like that in the 1970s, and some of us remember it. Some of those people who stood up after having been 40 and 50 years, 30 years in the church. And I suspect that God's people have always felt this way.

Verse 18 expresses that disappointment. A child of the light may experience discouragement. He may be frustrated at the evil inhabitants of the world, that they just seem to continue, they seem to continue, they seem to continue. They do not stop, they get worse and they get worse and they get worse! Century after century after century. When there were people way back when in the Illuminati, in the days of the Illuminati in the 1700s, 1600s, 1800s, today. They still continue. They do not stop, they just keep going on and on. God's people preach and they pray and they teach, but it is as if they accomplish nothing. The inhabitants of the world have not fallen, as it says in verse 18. We mistakenly might come to feel that Christ delays His coming, as asked in Revelation 6:10, "How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?"

Well, verse 19 provides God's perspective in this matter, His solution to our impatience and to our frustration. The coming King has the keys of Hades and the keys of death. You will find that in Revelation 1:18. In what surely is a clear Old Testament reference to the first revelation, God assures His people throughout the ages that the dead shall live. Awake and sing, He says, as He assures them and as He assures us that your dead shall live. Awake and sing, He says, the earth shall cast out her dead. And in saying this God distinguishes between His own people and their oppressors. Those who enslaved Israel and those who are mentioned up there in verse 14. They will not live to see His day.

Well, brethren, in light of all of this then, what should we do? We who are on the cusp of the coming of this Consolation of Israel that is coming? This new iteration of the government of God, but it is just not quite here yet. Well God provides an important answer.

Isaiah 26:20-21 Come, My people, into your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourself, as it were, for a little moment, until the indignation is past. For behold, the Lord comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; the earth will also disclose her blood, and will no more cover her slain.

We are keying in on such phrases as "until the indignation has past" or "the Lord comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth." We often apply this particular passage to the end time, most specifically to the Day of the Lord, and I think we are quite right in doing that. But God may be providing instruction for all of His people throughout all of history: "Shut the door behind you and stay put," that is, stay in the house as the children of Israel did on the night of the Passover. You will read about that in Exodus 12:22. And I do recommend that you you take a look-see at John Ritenbaugh's sermon on the topic, I think it is called "Don't Leave The House." It was delivered in 1994.

Noah found safety in the ark in the midst of vast devastation, God having closed the door behind him; the children of Israel in the midst of a dying Egypt found safety in their homes; and the Israel of God today in decadent Babylon find safety in God's church. Paul wrote in Colossians 3:3 that the lives of God's people are hidden with Christ in God. Brethren, how can anyone experience more safety, how can anyone find more security than when hidden with Christ in God? The apostle continues in verse 4. He says, "When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory."

The little moment referenced there in Isaiah 26:20 may be referring to the relatively brief period of Christ's anger, of God's anger, in the Day of the Lord, the year of His wrath. But it may also refer to the times of our converted lives, maybe 30 years, 40 years, 50 years. But it is always short in terms of the scheme of things.

While you remain alive, God counsels, do not ever leave the church of God. He never leaves us, we must not leave Him. God assures us in the final verse that He will eventually rouse Himself to action, that He will leave His place in heaven and take vengeance on all evildoers all over the face of the earth. The earth, He assures us, will no longer cover her slain. God will resurrect those who have been beheaded for the witness to Christ and for the Word of God, as it says in Revelation 20:4.

Brethren, let us patiently endure until that day, hiding in Christ.

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