CHAPTER  6
 

THE COHESION, COHERENCE AND COMPREHENSION OF ASPECTS OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH

In Three Parts with Fourth Overview

Part III
 
 

EXCERPT FROM Answers to Questions Ch. 9
with reference to Isaiah 4, 32, 49, 52-55, 60-61, 66
 

EXCURSION NOTES

*1
THE DELIGHT OF DETAIL
Let us Make an Excursion!
Some Glances at Wonder

SOME LITTLE LIGHTS THAT SHOWER WITH DILIGENCE BUT GLEAM WITH MODESTY

Some of the refulgences in the crystal of truth, are met in strange places. Thus in John 7:37, we see that Christ is the one who gives water which will well up and spring out from one, meaning the Spirit. In Isaiah 44, we see at the threshold, the combination of water poured out UPON the people who believe, who are seen in the light of the surroundings plenitude of water, like reeds, whose thirst is quenched, whose action springs up, like happily moist plants near the watercourses. They have exuberance of devotional life, we there read, one calling himself by the name of Jacob, but others more direct  - and perhaps Gentiles are here meant - may write THE LORD'S upon the hand. Moreover it is personal and individual, for ONE shall write upon his hand...

Again, in Joel 2, we find the reference cited by Peter at Pentecost, where the Spirit will be poured out on many, who will respond, and out from them in turn goes the prophecy, like waters from the water, metaphorically, power from the power, in energic sympathy and symphony, good tidings from their purveyor as the Spirit of God - sent by the Son from the Father - appoints, anoints; and in such ways the refreshing realities of Christ, the fragrance of His Person, the facts of His Gospel and the fervour of His love proceed.

Further, this BASIS of the wonder is shown clearly in Ezekiel 47, where this extended allegory puts the water coming from the altar, hence from the sacrificial centre, so that the whole of Hebrews 8-10, and indeed 1-2, is brought in, the Christ from God, taking post as man, to do as God in manhood, what man needed, dying for sin, and rising in rejoicing over death, to appoint life everlasting not to some aristocracy, but to those who receive Him for who He is, in terms of what He has done (Ephesians 2:1-10). Here, in the allegory in Ezekiel,  the rivers flow on from the altar to the banks where fishermen fish for fish ("I will make you fishers of men!" said Christ to His disciples), where refreshing life comes to the areas swept through with this surge of life, while some marshes remain, where the life was not desired, they being too wet with their own dampness to need any refreshing, and hence like the self-righteous, left alone to their inadequacies, never to be redeemed. As Christ said, "I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance" (Matthew 9:12-13).

So do these reserves and reinforcements of glory adduce themselves, the one to the other, and resound with rejoicing. It reminds one of wisdom rejoicing daily before the Father as One brought up before Him (Proverbs 8) in the foundations of the earth (for which see Barbs, Arrows and Balms 27).

Again, in another genre, this time not verbal but conceptual, we see Daniel in Ch. 6 in something rather more detailed than a type of Christ. It is almost a stage presentation of it. Thus he is to be betrayed ONLY by the envious opposition camp finding some way in which the State or established authority (with its religious aspect prominent, if not dominant)  will turn to crush him, so that those in other places of power can perpetuate their profiles on earth, or what they like to do with them. So with Christ and the out of hand religious structure of superb insolence against the Almighty, but in fact shameless and shabby, envious and willing ... to murder judicially, like those with Daniel, to gain their form of prestige, influence, perspective, power or whatever item or combination variously appealed.

Again, the King made a law which could not be changed, in this episode of Daniel. So with Christ, the law of God could not be changed which brought sentence on false prophets. In fact, Christ was true, His judges false, but the law was applied by the false; just as false hearts USED the law of the king against Daniel. Further, the King was upset and troubled all night, like the disciples when Christ was arraigned and set for death, and the authorities swirled about in their monstrous pontifications and uncomely personas of unrelished religion. Again, it was EARLY in the morning the King came, just as did the women to the tomb. It was to enquire, IS your God whom you serve continually able to deliver you ? So the disciples RAN to see if it were indeed true that the body was gone, the Saviour risen! The lion's den was even SEALED to see that the King's command was carried out; just as - and indeed for the same purpose, but for King read governor - was Christ's tomb uselessly but in hope, sealed. It needs to be realised that the King relished Daniel, but had been snared by trickery in his courtiers, to make a law which forbad prayer to any but to the king, a touchingly close prelude to what is to come soon now, when the powers that be will once again REQUIRE worship of the beast (Revelation 13), that simple symbol for worldly power with political and forceful clout, and religious inhibitions and prohibitions which require people to default whenever the glory of the flesh should think fit.

Death was overcome with Christ; the lions did not overcome with the teeth of death, with Daniel. And so it goes on and on.

Again in the case of David and his rebellious son, Absolam (II Samuel 14 and on). The son is UNGRATEFUL for the grace of his father, as the devil is for his being created originally so fine. The son USES his privileges to seduce many to attack the father (David). The father allows himself to be removed from Jerusalem, so that the son has a temporary occupation of Jerusalem, as the devil  ... 'the whole world lies in the wicked one' says John (I John 5:19) or is under his sway. The son when in Jerusalem with temporary power, goes wild, abuses the concubines of his father on the roof: so even an Anglican primate can say that it is too late now to have Christ only: it is public and the Biblical figure has been explained in detail earlier, in this physiological representation on of the spiritual in such matters (cf. Answers to Questions  2).

The father leaves and is hidden away, moving in the woods and to another place. There is a lull, as the son, Absolam is seduced into waiting, by a strategy of the defence of the king. Then battle. It may be it lasted for two days, for the events seem widespread. David is then found sitting in the gathering of the people in the distant town, and then returns to Jerusalem in triumph and power, but very kind and forgiving. So Christ being removed from Jerusalem, and not using FORCE (just as David retired, barefoot and weeping, rather than have immediate war), on the third day returned, very forgiving as we see, to Peter (in some detail expressed in John 21, but there was a much earlier meeting!).

Moreover, David went on the way OUT of Jerusalem, weeping up the Mount of OLIVES. He loved his son, and would have died for him, in his heart's desire. So Christ in major agony in the Mount of Olives (Hebrews 5:7) bore what he had to bear, and proceeded, crying, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me! Nevertheless, not My will, but Thy will be done! So in the figure, the allegory, the historical itemisation in advance, did David in profound sorrow leave those whom he loved, hoping and seeking and paying as needed, if by any means any might be delivered, the city kept. So Christ wept over the city (Luke 19:42ff.). It goes on and on, and this is the sort of shelter for the light that strikes out now modesty, now more brightly, like sparkles in a jewel.

We could speak of Joshua a type of Christ, in Zechariah 6, but not before he has earlier been portrayed in the garments of sin, and these removed in the pantomime of exegesis; the olive trees in Zechariah and the witnesses in  Revelation 11, subtly for those who love the word, and discreetly shown in their correlation (we must SEEK OUT sometimes, just as a good teacher ensures that his students must press to find, at times cf. Proverbs 25:2, 2:3-5,10 ). This is treated in Ch. 5 of Acme: Alpha and Omega.

Again, in Isaiah 4:6 we are provoked in imagination; in 32:1-3, satisfied concerning the puzzle, but at the same time briskly arrested and accosted: the TABERNACLE is to be a) a man b) a king and c) its refuge from the anger of God, and comfort for the believer, is to become the precise property in function, of ... a MAN. in 41-42, in the movement between chapters, we find the uselessness and futility of man for his own salvation (as in Psalm 49:7,15), but by utter contrast, one who is NEVERTHELESS a man in format, who is entirely useful, utterly efficacious and constitutes the very speech of God in His life! given as a covenant in Himself. In 49:6 we find the same meet for the Gentiles as well, the light of life for man; in 50, we find Him scarified, in 52-53 sacrificed, in 49:7 rejected, in 53, despised and reputed as a victim of divine wrath, not the Saviour from it; in 54 He assumes command, as in 11 He is illustrious in greatness with no stay or limit, His word effective without restraint; in 55 the freedom of His grace and the folly of trusting in one's own righteousness instead of in His (as in  Ezekiel 33:13 - a fatal error always, for it is never good enough to populate heaven, and leave it heavenly), the rebuke to littleness and the entreaty to partake of a gracious grandeur.

Meanwhile, 60 turns the gory to glory, 61 indicating practical passion for deliverance of His people, while 65 shuns formalistic ceremonialism and is caustic to this byway, and those who follow it, surveying new scenes of a new people for a new covenant, broaches the unspeakable and says it, stuns the mind, brings heavenly dimension to allegorical vision on earth.

It is, however,  always in HIM, by HIS WORK, His PERSONAL work, His SACRIFICIAL WORK, and in 66:1-3 we see the whole animal conundrum of picture-type sacrifices as a pageant to prepare for the efficacious work of Christ, removed. In the end, hell is touching the perimeters, a gross outlet for disbelieve in the spiritual necessities. So touch and light, blend and breeze, confluence and ricochet, resonance and overtone, they all accrue through many writers, from one Author, whose word programs like a play written first, and played to the end.

All of this is not merely without effort, pedantic processive grappling and sweaty literary toil, without panting for glimmers, as with the scholars, but sails like a schooner before impelling winds (Cf. II peer 1), hopeful, unvanquished, serene even in violent waters, majestic in pitch, lofty in sail, the flag of truth flying. Not as the scribes and Pharisees does the word of God speak (cf. John 7:45-47). Incarnate, this is the way of Jesus Christ, who commands just such a regard, and stirred it even from those who sought to arrest Him, in the course of their duties. He arrests those who would arrest; He liberates the possessive.

Nothing can arrest the word of God and succeed. Kill it, it arises. Murder the incarnate, He breaks death and presents eternal life as a gift. These things, in the written word, which is His, they illustrate; in the incarnate word, they are definitive of the ways of the Lord. Blessed are those who know Him, and rely on Him, in whom His grace lives, His beauty is found and His energy and freedom live, who take His paths and follow Him.

Whether verbally or conceptually, in pantomime or parable, there is such an integral alignment, and its depth does not spare or stay; there is a deft differentiation of differences as in the case of Joshua as a type of Christ (Ch. 6, that is the priest, Joshua in the restoration to Jerusalem in the 6th century B.C.), but only in purged parable, in refined symbolism, duly installed with care, in Ch. 3! There is a constant thrust and parry of example in communality on the one hand, and distinction from the ONLY ONE whose the right is, and to whom the glory is due, so that even the dull might be delighted, and none dazzled. Yet it is not pearls before swine, for their snouts are in other troughs.
 

The depths of humility of God in His excursion for salvation are thus shown in their unique splendour as well as the heights of glory which nevertheless have so come! It is never heavy-handed, always appealing, even in rebuke, the passion of tenderness, the glory of kindness and the sweetness of love appear; and if judgment sets in, then like those who insist on staying in Rhodesia when the government has lost its bearings of humanity, so be it. There is a time to warn, and a time for scorn; but in the end, what will scorn despite those who warn, finds that the warning is not for scorning, but for deliverance... and there is no other.
 
 

EXCERPT from The Biblical Workman Ch. 1,

concerning Isaiah 60, with reference also to Isaiah 42-65
 
 

EXCURSION INTO THE INTERSTICES OF THE END -
JEW AND GENTILE

(cf. Ch.3, and Appendix on Faith pp. 164ff. below)

Israel's restoration, so intensely stressed (Zechariah 12:6), is part of a divine undertaking through which the validity of the Lord's authority is illustrated (Genesis 17:7, Ezekiel 36:15,21-22). Not merely however will this be performed, and in most details this century, it already is so
(The Shadow of a Mighty Rock, Ch.9 - SMR), but so too is the predicted Messianic unity remorselessly and gloriously to be performed (Is. 65:13-16; 66 - pp. 136ff. infra; 53; 2:17; 49:6; 62:2; Jeremiah 3:16; 31:31ff.). Sooner no universe than that New Covenant fail (Jer. 31:31-37).

Each is prophetically assured. (Cf. Barbs, Arrows and Balms, 17, The Everlasting Gospel, With Heart and Soul, Mind and Strength Ch. 6, pp. 137ff..)

Moreover, the details of the restoration situation, for Israel, for what could be called the Stage 2 restoration: converted Israel (that is the spiritually restored remnant as in Zechariah 12:10ff., an event precisely predicted to occur following their physical return, cf. Ch. 3, esp. pp. 41-42 infra) are often dwelt on by the prophets, in the context of the

• Rejected Zion transformation into
• Accepted Zion.

(For example, see Zephaniah 3:1-4,13-19, where the judgments are on that which ALREADY IS ZION, fallen, to be restored in such a completeness as to show that it is a spiritual body, for all its particularity; and compare Ezekiel 36:24-26 with Isaiah 42:14-19, where it is a "blind" servant and messenger who is restored through the Messiah - 41:28-42:3, 53:1.)

Yet there is even more unity with the Christian Church to be demonstrated. We do not "rightly divide" the word of God by omitting what we reject, but by placing each portion where it is contextually fitting (cf. SMR Appendix A).

Thus the Lord, in Isaiah 60 we read, is going to "glorify the house of My glory" (Isaiah 60:7). A millenial wonder begins to appear (60:12) which is not outwardly applicable as yet (cf. 60:18, 65:22-23); and indeed, so pure and perfected is the wonder, as in Zephaniah 3, that we see that from a spiritual body, equipped with false prophets and in rebellion (3:1-4), we progress further, to those freed from sin (Zephaniah 3:13), who "shall see disaster no more". While it is undoubtedly based in Israel as a topic (Isaiah 60:10,15), for the differential from other peoples is shown, for them as a fallen, disciplined CITY,  with a notable name as the Lord's (cf. Isaiah 42:6-7, 18-19, SMR Ch.9): yet the subsequent merging into glory is patent, a glory which in Isaiah 61:1-3 is shown to be based on, and procured by the Messiah (cf. Faith Appendix, pp. 164 infra).

As the light grows on the scene, the very walls of the city become Salvation (Isaiah 60:18, cf. 60:19), that is their name, and the gates Praise. It is glowing with a glory which permits no more separation, and in which, as in Isaiah 66, Gentiles play an equal role, at the most sensitive levels. (See Isaiah 66:18-21, and cf. the case of Amos 9 - SMR pp. 1108ff., where the base in Christ is first shown - Amos 9:11-12, then, in 13-15, the re-grafted Jews as a milling people - see pp. 47ff. below).

Since the servants of the Lord at this peak time are called by "another name" (65:13-15), we realise, that just as Isaiah 66 shows hell in a geographical setting, so here the select vales of heavenly wonder are in view, glinting with glory. It is not, to be sure (Isaiah 65:20), yet in the absolute end when, as planned, "the former things shall not ... come to mind" (Isaiah 65:17), but yet it appears in crystal purity. Here there is a merging from the delight of the transforming repentance of much of Israel to Christ, to the millenium, to come after the return in power of Jesus Christ (Zechariah 14, Isaiah 65:21).
 
 

THE ASSAULT ON ISRAEL -         THE AWAKENING IN ISRAEL

The assault on Israel could not, incidentally, come DURING the millenium, for this ferociously provocative wallowing in the power of the flesh against the Lord and His promises, is precisely contrary to millenium depiction, uniformly in the Bible (cf. Isaiah 65:25). Nor could it, for that matter, come at the end of it, for then there is no time left on earth for the protracted peace in the fulness of blessing as the knowledge of the glory of the Lord covers the earth as the waters cover the sea. It must therefore necessarily precede the millenium, and thus, in the uninterrupted fabric of history as repeatedly presented in the prophets. Nor can it occur in the midst of horrific hatred of Christ, entrenched in the antichrist and his hour of (comparative but cruel) power, just prior to the return in power and victory, of Jesus Christ who with His saints "shall reign upon the earth" (Revelation 2:26-27, 19:7,14, Ephesians 5:28-33, John 3:29, Matthew 9:13, 25:6ff., Zechariah 14:5-9, cf. Revelation 5:10, 20:4-6; cf. Revelation 20:6 with II Thessalonians 2:8-12).

In other words, this grand awakening in Israel, it  appears before the bride, the whole beloved corpus of the people of God, not cut up into parts, but one, is taken to the marriage feast of the lamb (Revelation 19:7-8), so that "death is swallowed up in victory" (Isaiah 25:8) in every sense. This is the time of His recovery of that great segment of Israel, leading to such rejoicing among the nations. The bride is prepared. The sleepers do not awake. She is now in unity and completeness. Those awakened are ready (Matthew 25:1-10).

As to "the mark of the beast", the thralldom of Babylon, yes "mystery Babylon" (Revelation 17:5,20:4 and see The Kingdom of Heaven, Ch. 9, pp. 183ff., Biblical Blessings, Ch.2, pp. 19-26 and Barbs, Arrows and Balms 20. pp. 150-152): that great deception throughout the ages, brought to its pustular head in the great tribulation, has ever been rejected by His own, and in her is found "the blood of prophets and saints" (Revelation 19:24). Many are those who have rejected his mark, in many climes and times. Sore is the test at the end, but it is not different in kind, spiritually, from the challenges which went before. The crescendo nevertheless is reached.

War erupts (Zechariah 12, Ezekiel 39), Israel is challenged: though returned. Chastened (Ezekiel 36-37 cf. The Shadow of a Mighty Rock, Appendix A),  though many in it now embrace heartily the Lord, it is set for a profound change within the nation. Yet the tide of events, already militarily stupendous (Zechariah 12),  will turn far more. Then, complexity is replaced with simplicity.  History is fulfilled, its stubborn resistances subdued, its primal tests complete. The disjunction is past. Israel is delivered (Zechariah 12, Romans 11:25ff.) first in a vast mass of individuals by the Spirit of God (Zechariah 12:10), then in divine interposition of physical dimensions, on behalf of the nation (Ezekiel 39, Zechariah 12:9) - at a time in the very midst of this spiritual awakening of Zech. 12:10. One Gospel, as given in Isaiah 52-53, has one company.

Then will all the  preliminaries have yielded to the ultimates. The set time comes. The elect are removed (I Thessalonians 4, Matthew 24:29-31). The war against God becomes highly express and explicit. Subtlety is past (Revelation 19:19, cf. 16:14-16).

At that time, therefore, in this great awakening comes the cue for the trumpet call attesting the arrival of the Messiah, now drawing ever closer, the ground better and better prepared in all plan and detail. Soon the trumpet shall sound and the dead be raised incorruptible (I Cor. 15:50ff.).

What CAN be shaken, now WILL be! (Hebrews 12:25-28).

We have dealt above with the "bride of Christ". Now, to change the figure to another Biblical analogy (Romans 11 - see Ch. 3 below), let us become botanical. Thus now, Christian Jew and Christian Gentile in that wisely crafted, multiply grafted single "tree", are brought together with this specifically declared, new and sudden divine access to many in Israel (cf. Zechariah 12:10ff.):  gloriously unified, as the apostle exclaims in that chapter, marvelling in the wise combinations and the complexities which yield such unity (Romans 11:33ff.). The divisions of the ages have now in substantial measure been overcome: Gentiles not chosen to be the special people, while the Jews proclaimed the testimony, at first; Jews rejected, as many as rejected Christ, until they should be brought back
a) to their land and
b) to their Lord, while many Gentiles come to the Lord, with now
c) a large body of Jews in ISRAEL redeemed from their error,
joined by fellow Christians with rejoicing,
their eyes now opened from what Paul calls their 'blindness for a season":

ALL are there. The FAMILY is gathered. The HOUSEHOLD OF FAITH is complete.
It is this which is depicted in the prophetic scriptures, from some two and a half millenia back. God did not tarry in telling; but man has tarried in hearing.
 
 

THE UNITY IN TRUTH, THE TRUTH IN UNITY

In that great time, the features intrigue.

The "fulness of the Gentiles", the world of other nations, the period of its hegemony, its headship in Christ, its leadership during the partial blindness of Israel (Romans 11:25) is swept aside, while a new and sudden expansion, explosive and sure (cf. Zechariah 12:10) occurs in the overarching context of Christ, one and for all. It is almost like a birth. As Paul puts it:

"For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead!" (Romans 11:15).

One does not therefore exaggerate in regaling the expectant eyes with such a sight as this, at which the apostle exults -

"Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!" (Romans 11:33).
 

• Just as "you nations" are to REJOICE at the giant swath of Jews now converted to their own Christ (Deuteronomy 32:43):
• this being a work in the Gentiles, essentially indicative of the hearts of Christians in the nations, still therefore present on earth in number at this epochal change in the heart of Israel, rather than of a hostile, ruling antichrist (whose  hand is at his crisis, over the nations, who would be one appalled, together with his entourage, at the salvation scene, and far from able to 'rejoice' at such a development)  -
• SO shall this Jewish "receiving" , this Hebrew restoration SPIRITUALLY (Romans 11:25), be "life from the dead" (11:15) for the balmed eyes of their fellow Christians among the Gentiles, who are still leavening the world.

The interactive relationship first brings mercy to the Gentiles, scope for reconciliation, then superabundant joy as they return. "Out of Zion" is their Redeemer (Romans 11:26) who now saves them (exactly as in Zechariah 12:10) through the opening of their hearts by the Holy Spirit, as there attested in their epochal return to the Lord, leading to the opening of a "fountain ... for sin and for uncleanness" in Jerusalem (Zechariah 13:1), "in that day".

It is not gore from war, but rather the blood for washing (cf. Revelation 1:5), even that of Him who "washed us from our sins in His own blood";  for only later does the Christ, the Messiah come "with all the saints" (Zechariah 14:5) TO Zion, in a WHOLLY different environment of terms, deeds and impact!

There, in that final Armageddon, war seethes to an utter outcome amidst the peoples who are not collected by the Lord (I Thess.4); here, in the awakening of Israel,  peace and the means to it are the focus, peace in heart, cleansing of heart, not judgment of life. Moreover, the awakening Biblically comes in the midst of the multi-national assault on Israel (Zechariah 12:1ff., 12;10); WHILE on the other hand, the coming of the Lord IS, or involves devastating power on all those now assembled for war WITH HIM, WITH the result  destruction on almost an unimaginable scale (Revelation 19:11-21, 16:14, 19:19).
 

• In the first case, before Christ comes: it is a matter  of the Jewish awakening, local deliverance and spiritual life is the focus; and the land is to be attacked by a multi-national force (Ezekiel 38ff., cf. The Shadow of a Mighty Rock, Appendix A), one to be eradicated, while the world sagely considered God's deliverance of His people (Ezekiel 39:23ff.).

 

• In the second, it is an unawakened morass of unholy menace which en bloc makes war with God, with judgment the keynote. Not Israel but God is their anti-focus. Not salvation but devastation is the result, while everlasting damnation not sage thought, comes as  impelling consequence in the spiritual theatre of action. Nor is it a European based antichrist who is the focus in the assault on the Jews, but a team of nations to the North. All this has been explained in The Shadow of a Mighty Rock (SMR), but here it is for swift review. (Cf. SMR pp. 502-516, 755-836; and see also, Barbs, Arrows, Balms Items 13,17, together with The Biblical Workman Ch.3, esp. End-note 1, Biblical Blessings Appendix 1, and Ch.3 )

We were noting, then, that Christ comes with "ALL THE SAINTS", from the marriage feast, and then comes to Israel as in Zechariah 14, physically.

But HOW do all the saints relate to Him at His coming ? Like this, in the word of God: by being with Him. In what way, then, with Him ? by His coming, all the saints with Him, who had indeed as the bride of Christ just been congregated in heaven (Revelation 19).
 
 

THE INELUCTABLE, IMMUTABLE, INTRACTABLE AND GLORIOUS GOSPEL
(cf. Barbs, Arrows and Balms Item 17, The Everlasting Gospel)

So Paul rejoices in the unitary comprehensiveness of the divine action (Romans 11:17,24,31-33). It is not long division but addition; not severance but success; not strange new ways, but the one way of the Gospel, the ineluctable, unimpairable, indivisible, unimprovable, immovable, final and consummate Gospel which rules with one Lord, one faith, one sacrifice, one God and Father of all, over all in Christ (Ephesians 4:4, 3:9-10, Galatians 1:6-9, Colossians 1:19-23). That is the way it is; that is the way it is going to be; and neither hell, nor devil, nor power nor force, nor plan, nor presumption, nor New Age nor Old Age will be able to do anything, anything at all about it.

God is very deep; and His depths cannot be fathomed; but what He says, He does. That is one of the things which is MOST delightful about Him. He deals straight; He acts wisely and profoundly, and does what He says (Matthew 4:4, Isaiah 55:10-11, 42:11, 44:25-26, 45:23, 60:22, Jeremiah 1:12, II Chronicles 6:10, I Kings 8:56, Joel 2:23). The very root of the Hebrew word for truth indicates faithfulness, reliability, stability, soundness, and faithful is His name. He who sat, the Word of God incarnate in Revelation, ready to act in judgment. He has a name: "Faithful and True": - THAT is HIS name! So does this magnificent quality apply in His grace to the saints also (I Thessalonians 5:24, II Thess. 3:3).

THIS God, the ONLY true God, HE has said, in Romans 11, He has specified unity and a comprehensive assemblage in the faith, through the faith, with the faith, Jew and Gentile, delivered by One, re-united in One, offspring spiritually of One, starting from One, ending with One, in One gospel and in One grace. Many are left out of both Jew and Gentile; but those who are in, this is the interior into which they come.

Accordingly, to use this supreme integrative force of Romans 11:14ff, climaxing as the chapter ends, to separate what is statedly ONE olive tree, its parts constantly interactive, is like characterising  2+2=4 as a subtraction sum!

But HOW do all the saints relate to Him at His coming ? Like this, in the word of God: by being with Him. In what way, then, with Him ? by His coming, all the saints with Him (Zechariah 14:5, cf. Rev. 19:14, II Thessalonians 1:10), who had indeed as the bride of Christ just been congregated in heaven (Revelation 19). Maybe there will be more than those who had just been the bride of the Lamb, and  "the armies which are in heaven" who accompany Him on His return in power to earth, certainly allows for that (Revelation 14).

Nevertheless, for a work of symbolism, the thought that the fine linen which had just been the distinguishing and distinctive dress of the BRIDE (19:8), should not relate to the garb of the "armies of heaven" (cf. Colossians 1:20) would seem so remote as almost to be inconceivable. It is after all linked in Revelation 7:14. In other words, the linkage of marriage feast of the Lamb, to linen of the bride, to washing their clothes in the blood of the Lamb and making them white (Rev. 7); and the immediate sequence from marriage feast with garb of fine linen so fitting for the saints from former explanation in Rev. 7, to the return of Christ with all His saints (as in Zechariah), with the armies of heaven (as in Revelation) seems to exclude all thought of divorce of what God has put so intimately and closely together. The saints then, freshly equipped from their glorious homecoming when called, the dead in Christ arising first as in I Thessalonians 4, come with Christ.

As the twelve thrones for judging Israel for the apostles would seem no less to indicate, they will share with His rule (Matthew 19:28). Assuredly the form of this earth will pass away (Matthew 24:35, Isaiah 51:6), but the new heavens and new earth, the New Jerusalem, these things are all like everything else in the plan and will of God, in their place. Eternity swallows up time as victory swallows up death (Isaiah 25:8). Whatever the brilliance of the millenial vindication of Christ (cf. SMR pp. 504-515), the eternity of glory will surpass it, wherein those tents eternal in the heavens, prepared for those things as this current remarkable 'clothing' of flesh, has been created for these times, these will be the garb of glory. (II Cor. 5:1ff.).

But let us return to the restoration of the king, to the Return of the Lord, and "all the saints with Thee" (Zech. 14:5)

As to His people they follow Him wherever He goes! (cf. I Thessalonians 4:13,17 which also asserts the same in the context of His coming for His own, and their being with Him).

Who are these all, then ? Why not less than Jew and Gentile, for all are one in Christ Jesus.

So Paul rejoices in the unitary comprehensiveness of the divine action (Romans 11:17,24,11:31-33).

It is in that way then, its beauty and unity glorious in the wisdom of Him whose ways are 'past finding out' in their depth and wonder, but freely declared at His will, that the Gentiles can rejoice "WITH His people" (Deuteronomy 32:43). This, let us emphasise, they would be far from doing if His church, that which restrains through His resident and present power (II Thessalonians 2) in a hostile world alienated from the life of God (Ephesians 4:18-19), were gone. This Jewish awakening is statedly a spiritual event; His return statedly martial.

The new faith (Ezekiel 37, as it is for the Jews concerned, released and now realised in the New Covenant - Ezekiel 11, Jeremiah 31:31) of so many in Israel (Romans 11:23), what of it ? It  would rather to the uttermost be oppressed in any antichrist period, if that were in operation at the time, following the removal of the church's restraint, the Lord being with it! Yet this is not so. No and indeed, it was to apostles in the Church setting (Matthew 18:15-19) where the apostles are to operate, that Christ spoke (Matthew 24:1-3), in designating the manner and movements to "the end" in answer to this, their question. These who had given up all and followed Him, the Christians, those who asked Him the question: they were told what was to be, and the pronoun "you" indicates clearly those to whom the Lord is referring as He develops the climax in His account of the end, leading to His own return in glory.

Concerning the church (Matthew 18:17), He gives current command for His will with His own; and concerning His people, He gives repeatedly, a coverage of what is to be (as in John 15:18-20, Matthew 24:23), right into the teeth of the rambunctious gale to blow in the tribulation.

In the Church, there is neither Jew nor Greek (Galatians 3:26-29), and it is to His Christian representatives, that He spoke in answer to their question concerning the last times of the church, on earth, that for which formulation and command was already given (Matthew 24:1-2). Thus His words use to them, the significant pronoun "your" , right up to verse 20. HE is telling HIS people with HIS chosen representatives for this HIS Church, HIS body (He is not equipped with two, for that would not be an incarnation but a multiplication, and He was made "like His brethren" in format - Hebrews 2:9-14). It was "fitting", says the word of God.

Indeed,  in verse 22, it is "the elect", not some of them, that category accordingly which is in view for whose sake the days of the great tribulation are to be shortened, but not annulled (Matthew 24:22) - that great tribulation JUST ANNOUNCED in verse 21!

In Matthew 24:26, past the announcement of the great tribulation, we even find "you " again is used, leading up to His magnificent, public, undisguisable appearing, His return itself, for His elect (Matthew 24:27-28). The kingdom is one, not two, and the church likewise, one body, one Lord, one baptism, one God and Creator of all (Ephesians 4:4). Accordingly, Christ is not describing something else, but the place of those represented by apostles, moving right up to His manifest appearing like lightning from East to West across the sky (24:26-27). This too is distinguished from any private performance, and is used as a basis for NOT BELIEVING anything such. Lightning across the sky from East to West is of course, and contextually this is emphasised, about as public an event as anyone could wish or describe, as undifferentiated and celestial occurrence as might be even imagined. For whom, then, is this: those summarily referred to as "the elect" - precisely as shown in the olive tree case (cf. End-note 1, in Chapter 3, below), a unified category in the presence of the Redeemer.

But let us return to Revelation 19, and watch the development as the Lord, who comes with all His saints (II Thessalonians 1:10, I Thessalonians 3:13, Zechariah 14:5 and Romans 11 as above), revisits with His now received bride, the earth which was the scene of His crucifixion. It is macabre, but realistic to the destinies to which men move, that the feast for the birds of prey is immediately subsequent to this blessed feast of the Lamb in heaven; for the abstraction, the removal of His own, Jew and Gentile, for there is no difference in Christ, removes "that which restrains", that is the power of the Lord present and resident in inhibition THROUGH His saints (II Thessalonians 2:7ff.).

There is a WORLD of difference upon their removal to THEIR feast, and there is a world in chaos, left to slug it out in its array, gathered (Rev. 16:14), "to the battle of that great day of God Almighty". It is then that they - "the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies" are "gathered together to make war on Him" who is "Lord of Lords and King of Kings" (Rev. 19:16), whose name is "the word of God" (Rev. 19:13).

Nor yet is His love the less, but rather shown to be the more; for if He KNEW what was the price of folly, then He ENDURED the follies that He might pre-emptively strike out the sin which condemns, and HE DID SO, for every one who believes... and He "would have all men come to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth" (I Timothy 2:3).

We have wound our way to the end of our era, and beyond, so now let us return to assess our journeys.
 
 

JOURNEY'S END

Looking through vista after vista of glory:

1) we see the restoration of the land to a fallen Israel; the conversion of this people in substantial numbers, to the same crucified Messiah (cf. Ch. 3 infra, SMR Ch.9); their institution within the church of Jesus Christ; the consolidation of Jew and Gentile in His name; the focus on the Lord's faithfulness in restoring and transforming a people so long spurned with their city - envisaged as the City of Truth (Zechariah 8:3), now to merge to the millenial case, where "your people shall be all righteous"
(Isaiah 60:21 cf. 4:3), "a meek and humble people", of whom He declares, "you shall see disaster no more" (Zephaniah 3:12,15);

2) even hearing the Creator's announcement of a new heavens and a new earth (Isaiah 51:6) past all decay, everlasting salvation readily outliving the mere astronomical surrounds, which fall like Autumn leaves, vanishing like smoke, worn like old clothing.

It remains to reflect, while the earth is still here, and we with it, on a great sadness which time will assuredly remedy. It is this, that so many dispensationalists have clung to the esoteric and unbiblical idea of some other gospel for Israel, past or future, or both, destroying the basic reality in Christ (cf. Biblical Blessings Ch.3, and Barbs, Arrows and Balms, Item 17, The Everlasting Gospel), while many amillenialists, justly prizing the spiritual beauties which Israel will share when so much of it becomes a part of the Church of Jesus Christ, with other believers, and which cannot be alienated from all Christians, yet ignore

a) the decisive scriptures contextually focussing on and requiring the way the Lord will honour His name in restoring meritless Israel to their land and later to the Lord, so joining them with other meritless converts, and

b) the details that vindicate the entire accuracy of the Lord, and illustrate His inimitable faithfulness (cf. SMR Appendix A, Biblical Blessings 3, SMR Ch.9, pp. 751ff.) to this needy and perilous generation.

As in so much, extremes often exist to attest a deficiency in each of the proponents (cf. Questions and Answers 11, pp. 137ff.), but the actualities require great care (cf. II Timothy 2:15), a constant obligation. To "rightly divide" the word of God is a matter of assiduity with ALL the word of God. When all is taken just as it stands, we focus on what is indisputably clear, and show caution in touching the realm of the merely probable inference, so that we may avoid either extending the word of God beyond what He has chosen to divulge, and cramping His revelation to our concepts. The wonder and beauty of the Lord is such that even unintentional befuddling of His word with our proclivities is like putting charcoal on snow.

For Excerpt on Isaiah 59, 63, 66 see end of this Chapter.

 

 

EXCERPT from The Kingdom of Heaven Ch. 9, pp. 167ff.
on Isaiah 64:4

17) Isaiah 64:4 is of great interest, the more since 64:5 is stated to have occasioned immense difficulty in interpretation. Obviously, how 64:4 is rendered will greatly affect the flow and sense of sequence to 64:5. What meets this need, if solving any puzzle, hence would be commendable for rigorous care.

 

a) THE THEMATIC ASPECT

The AV renders Isaiah 64:4 like this: "For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him." Certainly, 16th century English does not help. Why should it! Using former usages does not aid modern problems.

However, let us pass on from this. The beauty, dignity, perception often involved in the AV are genuine arguments for its high place in the arena of translations; its facility in our speech at the contemporary level, quite naturally and indeed necessarily, is not. But there is more here, much more. In this instance, it appears to be giving a quite indefensible translation. Before we consider this, let us note some other renderings of this verse. Thus the NASB has (to take the main area of divergence only): "neither has eye seen a God besides Thee, who acts in behalf of the one who waits for Him." Delitzsch in his magnificent and famed commentary set, has this here: " a God beside Thee, who acted on behalf of him that waiteth for Him." Literally the tense is present.

The Berkeley version: "seen a God besides Thee who works for him who waits for Him."
E.J. Young in his immense Isaiah commentary: "a God beside thee, he doeth to the one waiting for him." This gives, he states, in v.4 a reason for what was stated earlier in verse 3: thus God is in v.3 stated to have DONE wonderful, astonishing things for Israel in past times, and the principle is now enunciated: He DOES (acts) for the one who waits for Him. He is not an illusory, philosophical, clairvoyant's muse type of God. He acts. He has power. He used it before. He still does. THESE, the 'waiting' for HIM, are conditions (cf. Hebrews 11:6).

While the sense in all these is much the same, it is fascinating in the context to consider the very  literal translation: "seen GOD, besides Thee. He acts for the one who waits for Him." The last clause is from a participle, "the one who waits for Him", and the thrust preceding, 'GOD', is dropped into the scene like a vast, awesome wonder. Here is the ONLY ONE WHO as GOD is there; the rest are NOT GOD (Deuteronomy 32:17,18,21). The last has this: "They moved Me to anger with that which is NOT GOD" (last caps.added). Besides HIM, nothing intelligible, real at all. It is this God who IS, the I AM, who ACTS (being able) for those who wait.

Attention has been drawn to Deuteronomy 29:2 and Joshua 23:3 where quite the same emphasis is being made. Moses recapitulating, says to the people, "You have seen all that the Lord did before your eyes in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh, and to all his servants and to all his land; the great temptations which your eyes have seen..."  Here, it could readily have been part of this very  address in Isaiah, so close is the wording, the concept, the emphasis! It is a case of what the Lord DID, and indeed did BEFORE YOUR EYES, and further, the things which YOUR EYES HAVE SEEN. This moreover fits with the recurring emphasis in Isaiah 41-48, that God is the One who DOES IT, fulfils it, makes it happen, whether in general, as in Ch.48, or in particular, as for Cyrus the coming deliverer for the Jews, who would send them home from Babylon. (We shall emphasise the point below.)

In the latter case: "And you have seen all that the Lord your God has done to all these nations because of you: for the Lord your God is he who has fought for you." Again there is the relevant action, the rescuing action, the notable action. This is a frequent theme. In Psalm 78 it is the same; and there too, you see the additional challenge. THEY despite all this have sinned and provoked the Lord, in the very face of such repeated  and marvellous ACTIONS, wonders, things DONE!
In Joshua 23:14, we read a further strand in this theme: "... not one thing has failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spoke concerning you; all have come to pass to you, and not one thing has failed..." GOD reveals Himself as He will! The NOT-GOD crew are wholly deficient in evidence; God abounds in it.

b) THE GRAMMATICAL ASPECT

The AV adds here. It provides what the text does not state. The word 'what' is added. Hence and hence only, they get the  ... rendering, 'WHAT HE HAS PREPARED'. It is however the translators who have prepared that word 'what'.

To add a word, however, when the sense is both clear and straightforward, the sequence cogent, is indefensible. That way, anything can be made ambiguous, and things can be manufactured, rather than translated.

Poetry may require understanding that perceives words which are omitted from a necessary intended sense, for stylistic reasons; or dropped out because of the constraints of metre, etc., so that the alert reader, seeing there is no way of AVOIDING addition, is willing to see the implicit point and put it in.

However this is a part of the words of God which are 'all clear to him who understands', as Proverbs 8 expressly states. It is not a matter of strange oracles for powerful prophets to make sense of some way or other, to their own personal and highly individual satisfaction. It is intrinsically clear, not crabbed, contrived.

That is the point: the word  at times be difficult, challenging, profound indeed, and what more natural when it is God who speaks: but clear? THAT is  another question. The word before us is eminently clear, and unless some reader fashions on the mistaken idea that you can treat a clear statement as having optional extras which would profoundly change an already clear meaning, clear it stays.
The additional mode here would be to interpret the word of God contrary to its own claims and constraints, and for anyone, would be playing somewhat fast and loose with the words actually given. In other words, when what is present is both exceedingly clear and impressively direct, and flowing like one stream with other scripture and context, to add to this is to put the words of God into the hands of men - never a wise procedure, and NOT a divinely PERMITTED PROCEDURE.

c) CONTEXT

Verse 5 in this passage of Isaiah 64, at once keeps to the exact sequence given. God acts (verse 4), and God meets (v.5 - one form of ACTING, not being mere dream or thought or ideal or inclination, but personal, powerful and active in our affairs - in certain specified WAYS, as is the case in all the other contexts noted!). Whom does He meet ? The text tells us: "He meets the one who rejoices and works righteousness" - indeed, "those who remember Him in His ways".

What could be more straightforward, cogent, elicitive, impactive!

GOD HAS ACTED in spectacular fashion in the days of Moses and Pharaoh, for the people.  More generally, GOD ACTS for those who wait for Him. So far, that is the thrust or movement in verses 3 and 4, respectively. Indeed, GOD acts in a SPECIAL WAY for those who wait for Him, at the now individual level. After all (verses 5b-7), there is a massive movement AWAY from God before us in the context, so that God is acting differentially towards those who in fact WAIT for Him.

What is this special way noted so boldly in verse 5: "Thou meetest him who rejoices and works righteousness" - not merely some homogenised 'righteousness' but the sort which arises in those who remember Him in His ways, His words, His witness, His past dealings. Why however this: 'rejoices'? That is indeed a question for our own generation set so firmly in so many sad ways of degeneration (see "Generation of the Dispossessed" - Appendix 1, Barbs, Arrows and Balms).
It is not however a real question for the practising Christian. Christ told us in John 16 we find, that our joy should be full, that we should ask and obtain, and Peter in I Peter 1 tells of joy unspeakable and full of glory, while I Peter 4:13-14 tells of a transcendent joy as the spirit of God and glory rests on the persecuted servant of the Lord, and one has experienced just this. It is so. It is all the case, in life, just as it is prescribed in the word of God. As He says, so HE DOES! And there, that is the continual emphasis here. THIS too is something that HE DOES. It is HIS JOY - "that My joy may remain in you", Christ declared (John 16:22-24; 15:11).

However, it is here literally, "You met him who rejoices and works". This is the norm of the past, the principle which is contrasted with the contemporary, sad scene as depicted by the prophet.
Of vast interest is this point: it is the GOD WHO ACTS ON BEHALF OF THOSE WHO WAIT, and who in particular, has MET with those who ACT, or WORK RIGHTEOUSNESS. This is where E.J. Young's rather awkward sounding rendering has real merit. He says 'DOES': God DOES and the one who DOES righteousness, with the whole will of God and word in his heart (cf. John 15:7,
"If My words abide in you, and you abide in Me, you shall ask what you will, and it will be done to you") is seen in a refreshing rejoicing. Compare John 14:21-23!

Hear again from the text just given: "DONE" to you. GOD is the GOD WHO ACTS, and those who expect and wait and abide will find it so, not in some mere principled fashion (though God does not change and is faithful to the uttermost part), but in a way which IN ADDITION, has the personal splendour of His joy-creating presence. If a great painting has produce delight in the artistic, what does THE GREAT GOD produce in the one WHOM HE MEETS, did meet, does meet, and will meet when the faith and abiding is present! "BESIDES THEE, GOD…"

The rendering of the AV may have been intended consciously or more probably unconsciously, to reflect  the wording of the reference in I Corinthians 2, where Paul makes reference to this passage; but Paul is not limited to one passage, any more than we are, when he refers to the scriptures: they are ALL WRITTEN! Psalm  31:has much of  the other element, with Psalm 16:11 and especially 17:15; with  Isaiah 65:16-17. Penetrating to much, and distilling in his inspiration, the apostle brings out the relevant feature with all its multi-faceted wonder.
It is unfortunate that the AV is in this case inferior to the accurate rendering procedures; but it helps people not to idolise it! It is so often very dependable, but we cannot rest on others, for it is ONLY ON THE LORD that one must rest.

We must collect all we can from every source and be glad of all that the Lord over time has done for His people, without idolising theologian or translator or any other  thing (cf. I Cor. 3:3ff., and 3:21-22, and the camp mentality - see Repent or Perish, Ch.1, Endnote1). Let us be thankful for the CARE of the AV and the scope of the whole, and yet  acknowledge that, not only from our barracked-for team, we must be prepared to learn, but from other translation sites, where the word of the Lord is actually honoured. At times, too, some phase of a translation is marred; but not all..
 
 

EXCERPT from Biblical Blessings Ch. 3,
touching Isaiah 9, 13, 19, 32, 41-42, 52-53, 62, 65-66
 
 

The Old and the New

The OLD Covenant,

so drastically to be merged into the fulfilment of the New,

where CHRIST is the sacrifice (Isaiah 66:1-3, 52:12-53:13, Zechariah 12:10, Psalm 40:1-8, 22:1-8,22-30, 72:1-14, Ezekiel 16:60-63, Deuteronomy 18:15-19, Isaiah 19:20-25, 32:1-4, 42:1-7, Micah 5:1-3)

that the Ark will be forgotten and will not even be built, yes will not even COME TO MIND (Jeremiah 3:16)

in this New Covenant (Jeremiah 31:31ff., as often elsewhere):

OF WHAT KIND IS IT?

"NOT ACCORDING TO THE COVENANT THAT I MADE WITH THEIR FATHERS" is this atonement provision and application of the law of God (Jeremiah 31:32);

indeed it will be such (Isaiah 66:1-3) that if someone presumed to make an animal sacrifice, it would be as if he were killing a dog! It would be irrelevant, cruel, unauthorised, banal! The ark is forgotten and wholly out of mind.
 
 

The New Offering

What is NOT forgotten is SIN, and SACRIFICE, but the one who is to provide this sacrifice and atonement is one who will grow up as a root out of a dry ground (Isaiah 53:2). A "man of sorrows and acquainted with grief" is He, and He is to be "marred in His visage more than any man".

Yet it is He who will "sprinkle many nations".

He will be put to death (53:9) though truth is His only utterance (53:9),

and make atonement (53:11),

being righteous and without blemish, as required of atoning sacrifice ( Leviticus 4:3, Malachi 1:10-14, Psalm 49:7),

and this in contradistinction to all mere mortals, who are neither sinless nor, like Christ, deity in human form (Psalm 45, Isaiah 48:16, Psalm 2); nor is it other than blasphemy for SUCH AS THESE to be trusted in, for cursed are such (Psalm 2:12, Jeremiah 17:5ff.). Yet the Messiah MUST be so trusted to the utmost for the ultimate (Psalm 2:12).

True, Messiah is to suffer affliction and be murdered (Psalm 22, Daniel 9:24, Zechariah 3:9, 13:6, Isaiah 52:13-53:12), This is focussed and featured at length and in depth (cf. Luke 24:25). Yet despite this, in the power of deity from whom and as whom He comes (Isaiah 9:1-6, Psalm 2, 45, 72, Micah 5:1-3, Isaiah 48:16, Zechariah 2:8), He shall be there to find satisfaction in the reality and effectiveness of His own work (53:11) as was prophesied likewise for this regal victim of Psalm 22, who though killed with appalling atrocity as the Psalmist shows, can say, "I will declare your name to My brethren: in the midst of the assembly I will praise you... For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; nor has He hidden His face from Him; but when He cried to Him, He heard" - Psalm 22:22ff..

"A posterity will serve Him; it will be accounted to the Lord for a generation" (cf. 102:16-21, Isaiah 53:8-10, Psalm 110:3, ). And this? When the Lord "shall appear in His glory", and "regard the prayer of the destitute", and coming, "hear the groaning of the prisoner", acting to "release those appointed to death" (cf. Isaiah 61:1-3, Ezekiel 34), and to declare the name of the Lord in Zion. WHO? It is the Lord who searches out His sheep, who Himself comes as He says, and so conducts Himself in the grandeur of His compassion and the enormity of His truth, rising like a colossus, descending as glory.

THIS, then, shall be written for the generation to come (about 1000 years on from the Psalmist in fact), and as to Him, His glory is interminable (Psalm 72:12-14,17).
 
 

The Messiah has the Form of a Man

This Messiah of course is a man (Isaiah 32:1-4, Psalm 72:1-2, 2:7) as is appropriate for someone who is to have his face marred, his body whipped, to die, to have his clothes bartered for, and indeed to be called a man (Isaiah 32:2, Zechariah 4:12-13), to have His body pierced and His sinlessness entire. He is man, yet God with powers equally unlimited. Thus Isaiah chs.29,35 show the extent of the miraculous powers to accompany Him, as does Isaiah 11:1-10.

Indeed the wicked will be summoned and sentenced by His mouth, we there find! When His triumphant completion of His task proceeds, this Son of David as He is also called (cf. Jeremiah 23:5, Zechariah 4:12-13, and in Ezekiel 34:11-25, where God embarks on His own personal shepherding program)! Yet who is David's Lord! (Psalm 110:1ff). THOUGH (as in Psalm 2) we are left in no doubt that this Messiah of the Lord, like His Father, will be the object of rebellion and that indeed, the Messiah will be rejected entirely (cf. Isaiah 52-53), yet HE WILL RULE! (cf. Isaiah 9:6, 53:12, Ezekiel 34:23-24, Psalm 72:8,17). There is an undoubted sequence which is picturesquely but with the utmost gravity dramatised in Psalm 2 in particular. That rule will be total and certain, when the day of its revelation comes.

Now all this is covered in much detail in SMR, but aspects are summarily noted here for convenience.

SO: we have a New Covenant, NOT like the old one. In that, animal sacrifice is ludicrous, contemptible, ridiculous; in this, the central figurative features of the Old Covenant, like the Ark, are gone, passed completely, precisely in accord with Hebrews 8. In the New Covenant, this we are told, in the Old it is predicted. Thus the concept that the Jews will engage in MORE Old Testament sacrifices in some way acceptable to God, though Christ has come, and the Leader and the Commander of the People is now HERE (Isaiah 54:3-4): this is a gross libel on the Lord. "Hear," it says of Him in 55:3, "and your soul shall live!"

"WHY?", it asks, "do you spend money for that which is not bread..." Rather, "Come! Buy wine and milk without money and without price!" (55:1). Free is the gift of God who provides (Genesis 22:8,14 - Jehovah Jireh sums it up in His name! and Isaiah 53:5,12). "My dead body will they arise," He declares (Isaiah 26:19) of those He called "my people", who shelter in His refuge which He provides; and hide in Him (cf. Isaiah 4:6, 32;1-3). "Come, " He says, "Hide yourself ... for a little moment until the indignation be past" - against sin (cf. Isaiah 64:1-65:1-2,13-16).
 
 

The Messiah is Ineradicable

Thus as to the Old Covenant,

in much specialised as a prototype, with its preliminary ways:

• it is no more to be understood as to come or as operative,
• in view of and in the light of Biblical principles shown in the New Covenant and prophesied expressly and abundantly in the Old,
• than that HELL has somehow come to earth, and that Israel is its placement!

These are figures such as all figures, to be understood in the light of principles made liberally clear, so that the imaginative thrust can be permitted, in order to shock the mind into awareness. Thus as God says in Hosea, did He multiply visions and figures, in the desire by all means to wake up His people (Hosea 12:10). Yet it is HE who will be the plagues of death, and it is HE PERSONALLY who says, "I will ransom them from the grave", HIMSELF CONSTITUTING the PLAGUES of death (Hosea 13:14, Isaiah 53:6, 10-12).

"O Israel, it hurls you to destruction that you are against ME, your help," He says in this context, in line with Isaiah 49:7, 42:6, where Israel is shown as a nation, to ABHOR the One given as a COVENANT, yes constituting and composing and COMPRISING it, a light to the Gentiles. THIS is the servant whose voice will not be lifted up (Isaiah 42:3, 52:7), who will care for the "bruised reed" as also shown in Psalm 72: the king, the son of David, and it is HE who is the ONE -unlike Israel, in whom God found none to hand - who is "Mine Elect in whom My soul delights" (Isaiah 41:27-42:3). It is He who coming, bears the glory, and who will not depart though His seasons for advent are His own.

There is only One who is King, son of David, tender, sinless, an adequate atonement, ultimate healer of deaf, dumb and blind, commander of the people, clear-cut and unequivocal witness (Isaiah 55:1-6); none but He has done these things, and only He has met the Biblical criteria of this GOSPEL (Isaiah 52-53) which is to be accepted in such bulk by the Gentiles that some of whom will be its "priests" (Isaiah 66). GOD HAS PROMISED to foretell what concerns His people (Amos 3:7); and having predicted this scenario, and allowed its advent into history, right to the death of the Messiah, and that at the predicted time (SMR pp. 889ff.), together with the Gospel inseparably annexed to Him: He faces the human race with fact! He has come; this is He; and HERE is the gospel predicted as moving to burrow deep into the Gentile world. It was to be; it was; and it is . With God, not only is nothing impossible; what He says is THEREBY both possible and assured.

THIS MESSIAH is it, the end. It is HE who is the criterion, the One whom we ALL must believe and follow, Jew or Gentile, or have for the blasphemous presumption of gratuitous negativity, something that God will REQUIRE of him! (Deuteronomy 18:15-19).

Thus the sacrifices of Zechariah 14, which follow the gospel message and close coverage of the Messiah in this prophet (3:9, where the sins of the people are absolved in one day, 9:6, where the King comes on an ass's colt, 11:10-12:10, where the treachery of His people against Him occurs, and their subsequent repentance in terms of Him whom they pierced is displayed, this and much more): these have nothing to do with the merely preparatory specifics which are included in the Old Covenant. The Messianic blessing is "not according to" this, we are instructed by the Lord, in Jeremiah 31; and its most intimate items are wholly irrelevant now, being fulfilled, as we are shown explicitly.

These Old Covenant-formatted terms of Zechariah 14:16ff. represent in Old Covenant shadows*², what is to be performed in a New Covenant setting. Hence the principles of the New Covenant in one phase as in another, and in particular with the return of the endlessly governing Prince (Isaiah 9:6) the son of David born of a virgin, are to apply. These principles make the symbolic forms which are used in terms of the Old Covenant setting of Zechariah, to have poignant and intensive force. Yet they require them to be understood in terms of the New Covenant, so that items of the Old do not even come to mind!

Further, like the showbread given to King David by the priest, to cover the leader's emergency, they are to be interpreted as to their significance: indeed the baked "bread" itself disappears, like the altar of Jeremiah 3; and ONLY the meaning now remains. The glory of it is this: THAT meaning now is LESS abstract than before, MORE concrete and utterly personal, moving from Christ, who proceeded from His Father to those of this race who receive Him. In all things, Christ has the pre-eminence, and all things are gathered up in one in Him (Colossians 1:18, Ephesians 1:10); and here is the resting point of all symbol for its nexus. This then is the situation in Zechariah 14.

As earlier noted, the same applies to the end of Isaiah 66, where the SPIRITUAL realities of hell are depicted as if they were occurring on earth, and as if people went to some physical place to observe them. We all use symbols of former times, or other things to represent something with vital force and impact at times; it is part of the value of having capacity both imagination and for symbolic thought within our construction as in the image of God.

In these places, the principles securely in place, we are to understand the teaching implicit in the patterns, and not to imagine that God has become divided in mind: but rather this, that if we do not accept it, we are "foolish and slow in heart", as Christ indicated when He chided His disciples. And for what did He chide them? for not seeing His place in its regal and overall setting, commanding and commandeering all else, in the suffering phase as likewise in the phase of His glory.

Thus, to revert to the text of Zechariah 14, even the pots "shall be holiness to the Lord", just as the "walls" predicted for Isaiah 60's presentation of Jerusalem, are t be "salvation" and its gates "praise"! It is no part of holiness to be obtuse to what is so written that to fail to understand is to be embroiled in the ludicrous, and to understand is to be deepened in the fundamental realities God reveals so often, in so many ways and with such final authority. Now at last, the "shadows" of material emblems are replaced with the spiritual substance itself (cf. Hebrews 10:1-13), as soon again, will the structure itself (Isaiah 65:17, when God shakes the unshakeable and demonstrates His magnificence with prodigious directness, in Christ - Revelation 5:12-13).

As Hebrews 8 tells us of the Old Covenant, it is fading away, obsolete.
 
 

The Curse and the Shock

ANY other gospel is ACCURSED, as Paul says, and ANY idea that God would regress to an earlier teaching mode is as contrary to the Old Testament as to the New. THOSE things are passed:HEAVEN IS MY THRONE, AND EARTH IS MY FOOTSTOOL. WHERE IS THE HOUSE THAT YOU WILL BUILD ME, AND WHERE IS THE