Isaiah 26:5 - Meaning and Application

Here the prophet encourages us further to trust in the Lord forever and keep waiting for him. He says that God will make humble people, who trust in him, triumph over proud enemies (Isaiah 26:5, Isaiah 26:6). Those who lift themselves up will be brought down. God brings low those who live on high, and wherever they act proudly, he rises above them. He can do this even to a city that seems well defended. He has done it many times before, and he will do it again, because he opposes the proud. It is also his glory to do this, because he shows that he is God by looking on the proud and humbling them (Job 40:12).

By contrast, those who humble themselves will be lifted up. The feet of the poor will trample the lofty cities (Isaiah 26:6). The prophet does not say that large armies will do it, but that when God chooses, even the feet of the poor will do it (Malachi 4:3). “You shall trample the wicked,” and even the strongest kings will be brought low. See also (Psalm 147:6; Romans 16:20).

God also notices the way of his people and takes pleasure in it (Isaiah 26:7). The way of the righteous is level, or straight. Their aim is to walk with God in a steady course of obedience and holy living. “My foot stands on level ground” means the same idea, that they walk in an even path (Psalm 26:12). It is also their joy that God makes their way plain before them. He levels the path of the righteous by keeping back or removing things that would trip them up, so that nothing will offend them or cause them to fall (Psalm 119:165). God weighs their path, meaning he considers it carefully and will give them enough grace to help them through every difficulty. In this way, God shows himself upright with the upright.

It is our duty, and our comfort, to wait for God and keep holy desires toward him, even in the darkest and most discouraging times (Isaiah 26:8, Isaiah 26:9). God’s people have always done this, even when he seemed to be against them. They keep depending on him alone. “In the way of your judgments we have waited for you” means that when God corrected them, they looked to no other hand for help than his, like a servant who keeps looking to his master’s hand until mercy comes (Psalm 123:2). We cannot appeal from God’s justice to anything but his mercy. If his judgments go on for a long time, we must not grow weary. We must keep waiting.

They also keep sending up holy desires to him. Trouble, no matter how heavy, must never make us hate our religion or turn away from God. Instead, the desire of our soul must still be for his name and the memory of him. Even in the night, the darkest and longest night of suffering, we must desire him with our souls. Our great concern must be for God’s name, that it would be honored, whatever becomes of us and our own names. That is what we must wait for and pray for, as when Jesus said, “Father, glorify your name,” and was satisfied. Our great comfort must also be in remembering that name, all that God has made known about himself. Remembering God must support us and delight us. Even if we are sometimes careless about him, our desire should still be toward remembering him, and we should work to keep him always in mind.

These desires toward God must be inward, strong, and sincere. We must desire him with our whole soul, pant after him (Psalm 42:1), and seek him with our deepest thoughts and closest attention. If we do not make religion a matter of the heart, then it is worth little, no matter what we say. Even in the darkest night of affliction, our desires must still be toward God as our sun and shield. Whatever way he chooses to deal with us, we must never think less of him or grow cold in our love for him. If our desires are truly toward God, we must show it by seeking him, and seeking him early, as people who want to find him and dread the thought of missing him. Those who would seek God and find him must seek him promptly and earnestly. And though we come very early, we will find him ready to receive us.

God’s gracious purpose in sending judgments is to bring people to seek him and serve him. When your judgments are on the earth, and everything is being laid waste, then we should expect not only God’s professing people, but even the people of the world, to learn righteousness. They should correct their errors and reform their lives. They should admit that God is right in punishing them, repent of their own wrongs against him, and begin to walk in the right way. That is what these judgments are meant to lead to. They have a natural tendency to produce that result, and though many remain stubborn, some even among the people of the world will benefit from this discipline and learn righteousness. Surely they will, unless they are strangely foolish. The purpose of affliction is to teach us righteousness, and blessed is the one whom God corrects and teaches in this way (Psalm 94:12).

Those are truly wicked who will not be moved by the gentle ways God uses to correct and reform them. It becomes necessary, then, for God to deal with them more severely through his judgments, which will at last humble those who would not otherwise be humbled. Notice how sinners act against God and refuse to respond to the means he uses for their reform (Isaiah 26:10). Favor is shown to them. They receive many mercies from God. He lets his sun shine and his rain fall on them. He prospers them and gives them plenty. They escape many of the judgments that have cut off others who were less guilty. In some cases, they seem especially favored above their neighbors. The purpose of all this is to lead them to love and serve the God who blesses them. Yet it is all wasted, because they will not learn righteousness. They will not be led to repentance by God’s kindness, and so it becomes necessary for God to send his judgments into the earth to deal with people who have misused his mercies.

They also live in a land of uprightness, where religion is openly professed and respected, where God’s word is preached, and where they have many good examples before them. It is a land of evenness, with fewer stumbling blocks than many other places. It is a land of correction, where vice and godlessness are discouraged and punished. Yet even there they deal unjustly and keep moving stubbornly in their evil ways.

Those who do wickedness act unjustly toward God, toward other people, and toward their own souls. If the justice of a nation does not reform them, they should expect God’s judgments. And they cannot expect a place in the future land of blessedness if they now refuse to live by the laws and good ways of the land of uprightness. Why do they refuse? Because they will not look at the majesty of the Lord. They will not believe or think seriously about what a God of terrible majesty he is, the God whose laws and justice they keep despising.

God’s majesty shows itself in all his acts of providence, his wise rule over the world. But they ignore it, and so they do not learn how to respond to what he is doing. Even when we receive God’s mercy, we must still look at the majesty of the Lord and his goodness. God raises his hand to warn them, so that they may repent and pray and make peace with him. But they pay no attention. They do not realize that God is angry with them or moving against them. They will not see, and none are so blind as those who refuse to see. They shut their eyes against the clearest proof of guilt and judgment. They blame chance or ordinary fate for what is clearly God’s rebuke. They ignore the warning signs of their own ruin, and they keep saying peace to themselves while the righteous God is making war against them.

In the end, God will be too strong for them, because when he judges, he wins. They will not see now, but they will see later, when they are forced to know that God is angry with them. Atheists, mockers, and the careless will soon feel what they now refuse to believe, that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. They will not see the evil of sin, especially the sin of hating and persecuting God’s people. But they will see, through the signs of God’s displeasure and through the deliverances by which God will defend his people, that what is done against them is taken by God as done against himself, and he will repay it.

They will see that they have done great wrong to God’s people, and they will be ashamed of their hatred, envy, and cruel treatment of people who deserved far better. Those who bear ill will toward God’s people have every reason to be ashamed, because their behavior is so foolish and unreasonable. And sooner or later they will be ashamed, and the memory of it will fill them with shame and confusion. Some read this as saying that they will see and be confounded because of the zeal shown for the people, that is, because of the zeal God will show for them. When they learn how jealous God is for the honor and welfare of his people, they will be ashamed that they might have belonged to that people but would not.

So their doom is this: because they despised the happiness of God’s friends, the fire of his enemies will devour them. That is the fire prepared for God’s enemies, the fire by which they will be destroyed, the fire meant for the devil and his angels. Those who are enemies of God’s people and who envy them are counted by God as his enemies, and he will deal with them as such.