Isaiah 29:17 - Meaning and Application

Those who thought they could hide their plans from the Lord were said to turn things upside down (Isaiah 29:16). They meant to do it without God’s knowledge, but God says he will turn things upside down in his own way. Then let us see whose word will stand, theirs or his. They did not believe in providence, God’s wise rule over all things. God says, “Wait a little, and you will see clearly that there is a God who rules the world and orders every change in it for the good of his church.”

This great and surprising change may first point to the happy settling of Judah and Jerusalem after Sennacherib’s attack was defeated, and to the peace good people enjoyed then. They were delivered from the fear of war and persecution. But it may also point forward to the Jews being rejected when the gospel was first planted, because their hypocrisy and unbelief were foretold here (Isaiah 29:13), and to the Gentiles being brought into the church.

In general, this is a great and startling change, as Isaiah 29:17 says. Lebanon, once a forest, will become a fruitful field, and Carmel, once a fruitful field, will become a forest. It is a reversal. Great changes, for good or for bad, often happen very quickly. When Sennacherib was defeated, God gave them a sign by making the ground unusually fruitful (Isaiah 37:30). They would eat what grew by itself that year, food for people like food for animals, straight from the soil. Then Lebanon became so fruitful that what had once been called a fruitful field seemed like a forest beside it. When a great harvest of souls came to Christ from the Gentiles, the wilderness was turned into a fruitful field, and the Jewish church, which had long been a fruitful field, became a deserted forest (Isaiah 54:1).

More specifically, those who were ignorant will become understanding, as Isaiah 29:18 says. Those who did not understand this prophecy, because it was like a sealed book to them (Isaiah 29:11), will understand it when it is fulfilled. They will see not only God’s hand in the event, but God’s voice in the prophecy itself. The deaf will hear the words of the book. The fulfilling of prophecy is the best explanation of prophecy.

The poor Gentiles will then receive divine revelation, and those who sat in darkness will see a great light. Those who were blind will see out of darkness, because the gospel was sent to open their eyes (Acts 26:18). Notice that, if God is going to make people fruitful in good desires and actions, he first opens their understanding and makes them hear the words of his book.

Those who were wrong will become sound in the truth, as Isaiah 29:24 says. Those who were confused and had wrong ideas about the words of the book and their meaning will come to understanding, to a right grasp of things. The Spirit of truth will correct their mistakes and lead them into all truth. This should encourage us to pray for those who are mistaken and deceived, because God can, and often does, bring such people to understanding.

Those who complained that God’s truths were hard sayings and who liked to argue against them will learn the true meaning of these doctrines, and then they will be more at peace with them. Those who misunderstood God’s providence in public affairs, and grumbled at how he ordered things, will better understand it when they see the outcome. Then they will see what God was doing in all of it (Hosea 14:9).

Those who were sad will become joyful and glad, as Isaiah 29:19 says. “The meek also shall increase their joy in the Lord.” The meek are the poor in this world and the poor in spirit. When trouble comes, they accept it quietly and do not give way to passion. When they see God acting for them, they will add joy to the joy they already had in the Lord. This means they kept trusting and rejoicing in God even in distress, but now their joy grows. Those who can truly rejoice in God while in trouble will soon have even more reason to rejoice in him. As worldly joy fades, joy in God rises and grows stronger. This light keeps shining more and more, because the goal is full joy. Even the poor among people may rejoice in the Holy One of Israel, and poverty does not take that away from them (Habakkuk 3:17, Habakkuk 3:18). Meekness, humility, patience, and calmness all help holy joy grow.

The enemies, who had been so frightening, will become weak and worthless. Sennacherib, that terrifying man, and his great army, which had thrown the whole country into fear, will be brought to nothing (Isaiah 29:20). They will be completely unable to do any more harm. The power of Satan, who is truly terrible, will be broken by the power of Christ’s gospel, and those who lived in slavery because of fear of death’s power will be set free (Hebrews 2:14, Hebrews 2:15).

The persecutors, who had been so troubling, will be quieted, and then those they troubled will live without fear of them. To complete God’s people’s peace, the terrible enemy from outside will be brought to nothing, and the scoffers at home will also be dealt with by Hezekiah’s reform. Happy is the people, and likely to remain happy, who, when God gives them victory over frightening enemies outside, also work to stop vice, ungodliness, and the spirit of persecution, those more dangerous enemies at home. Or these scoffers may be consumed and cut off by God’s judgments, singled out as examples. Or they may waste away little by little, put to shame by the very events they had laughed at.

Notice the wickedness of these scoffers, for which they were cut off. They had persecuted God’s people and his prophets, likely Isaiah himself, and he speaks with deep feeling about their crafty malice. Some acted as informers and persecutors, and others as judges. All they could do was try to take away his life, or at least his freedom. This fits very well with the chief priests and Pharisees, who persecuted Christ and his apostles, and for that sin they and their nation of scoffers were cut off and consumed.

They mocked the prophets and serious believers. They despised them and did all they could to make them look foolish. They were scoffers and sat in the seat of scoffers. They also waited for a chance to accuse them. Through their spies, they watched for wrongdoing, looking for anything said or done that they could call sin.

Or they may be watching for a chance to do harm, as Judas did when he betrayed our Lord Jesus. They took advantage of people for even the smallest slip of the tongue. If someone said something slightly wrong, they used it as a charge against him. They made a person, even a wise and good one, even a man of God, into an offender over a single word, a word that was misplaced or badly chosen, even when they knew it was meant well (Isaiah 29:21).

They argued against every word the prophets spoke to warn them, even when the words were harmless and had no intent to insult them. They twisted what was said, gave it the worst meaning, and made it sound guilty by forced hints. Anyone who thinks about how often we all speak carelessly, and how easily we misunderstand what we hear, will see how unfair it is to make a man guilty over a word.

They also did everything they could to bring trouble on those who dealt honestly with them and told them their faults. Those who rebuked people in the gates, reprovers by office, people bound by their calling, such as prophets, judges, and magistrates, to show people their sins, they hated these men and laid traps for them. That is what the Pharisees’ agents did when they were sent to watch Jesus so they could trap him in what he said (Matthew 22:15), and have something to accuse him of that would turn the people against him or put him in conflict with the government. So they persecuted the prophets.

It is almost impossible for the most careful person to speak so cautiously as to escape such traps. See how base wicked people are when they bear ill will toward those who, out of love, try to save their souls from death. And see how much reprovers need both courage to do their duty and wisdom to avoid being trapped.

They also twisted justice and would never let an honest man win an honest case. They pushed aside the righteous for nothing at all. They condemned him, or decided against his cause, without any evidence or real reason. They kept after a man and misrepresented him with every small trick they could invent, just as they did to our Savior. We should not think it strange when we see the best people treated this way. A disciple is not greater than his Master. But wait a little, and God will not only bring out their righteousness, he will also cut off and destroy these scorners.

Jacob, who had been made to blush by the insults and tremble by the threats of his enemies, will now be helped against both his shame and his fear. The insults will be rolled away, and the threats will fail (Isaiah 29:22). This is what the Lord says, the one who redeemed Abraham, that is, called him out of Ur of the Chaldees and rescued him from the idolatry of his fathers, pulling him out like a burning stick from the fire. The one who redeemed Abraham from his traps and troubles will redeem all who are truly his by faith from theirs.

The one who began his care for his church in the rescue of Abraham, when Abraham and the church’s Redeemer were still in his family line, will not now turn away from caring for it. Because the enemies of his people work so hard to discredit them and frighten them, he will appear for the house of Jacob. They will not be ashamed as they have been. They will have an answer for those who insult them, and their faces will no longer turn pale. They will gather courage and look their enemies in the face without fear, because they have the God of Abraham on their side.

Jacob, who feared that his family line would die out and that the line of true religion would be cut off, will have the joy of seeing many children devoted to God through future generations (Isaiah 29:23). He will see his children, many believers and praying people, the spiritual children of faithful Abraham and struggling Jacob. With his quiver full of these arrows, he will not be ashamed (Isaiah 29:22), but will speak with his enemy in the gate (Psalm 127:5). Christ will not be ashamed either (Isaiah 50:7), because he will see his offspring (Isaiah 53:10). He sees some now, and more ahead, gathering into the church and living there.

These children are the work of God’s hands. Since he formed them, he formed them for himself. They are his workmanship, created for good works. It is a comfort to parents to remember that their children are God’s creatures, the work of his gracious hands.

He and his children will honor God’s name as their God, as the Holy One of Jacob, and will fear and worship the God of Israel. This stands against shame and fear. When he is freed from insults and danger, he should not exalt himself, but should honor the Holy One of Jacob. If God makes our condition easier, we must try to make his name more glorious.

Parents and children are indeed a joy and a blessing to one another when they join in honoring God’s name. When parents give their children to God, and children give themselves to God, to be for him a name and a praise, then the forest will soon become a fruitful field.