Isaiah 66:5 - Meaning and Application

The prophet has just spoken against a hypocritical nation that made light of God’s word and refused to answer when he called. Now he turns to those who tremble at God’s word, to comfort and strengthen them. They will not be caught up in the judgments that are about to fall on their unbelieving nation. Ministers must make this kind of clear difference, so that when they warn the wicked, they do not also make the righteous heart sad.

The prophet has already promised these humble hearers a kind look from God (Isaiah 66:2). Now he brings them a gracious message from him. God’s word holds comfort for those who are truly humbled by sin and ready to receive it. Some people would not listen when God spoke, but others will. If the heart trembles at the word, the ear will be open to it.

God will defend the just cause of his people against those who persecute them (Isaiah 66:5). Their own brethren hated them and said, “Let the Lord be glorified.” But God will appear and turn it to their joy. This may point to some Jews after their return from captivity, but the history does not clearly show that. It fits much better with the first Jewish preachers and believers in the gospel.

See how God’s faithful servants were treated. Their brethren hated them. The apostles were Jews by birth, and yet the Jews they met, even in Gentile cities, were often their fiercest enemies. They stirred up the Gentiles against them. The church says in Song of Songs 1:6 that her mother’s children were angry with her. Pilate also rebuked Jesus by saying, “Your own nation has handed you over to me” (John 18:35). Their own people, who should have loved them, cast them out of their synagogues and treated them as disgrace, when in truth they were some of the greatest blessings to the nation and the church.

This came from the old hatred between the serpent’s seed and the woman’s seed. Those who hated Christ hated his disciples too, because they supported his kingdom and cause (John 15:18). They cast them out for his name’s sake, because they bore his name, called on his name, and worked to advance his name. It is nothing new for church discipline to be misused, and for the church’s weapons, meant for defense, to be turned against her best friends by false leaders.

Those who did this said, “Let the Lord be glorified.” They claimed conscience and zeal for God’s honor and the church, and they did it with all the forms of devotion. Jesus explains this kind of thing and seems to refer to it when he says, “They will put you out of the synagogues, and whoever kills you will think he is serving God” (John 16:2). In the name of the Lord, all kinds of evil begin. Or the words may be taken as spoken in open defiance of God. It is as if they said, “You say God will be glorified in your rescue. Then let him be glorified. Let him hurry and do it now” (Isaiah 5:19). Some take this as the talk of ungodly Jews in captivity, mocking their brethren who hoped for deliverance and ridiculing their confidence that God would soon be glorified in it. In this way they mocked the plans of the poor (Psalm 14:6).

Yet God encourages his people under persecution. “Hold on in faith and patience a little longer. Your enemies hate you and oppress you, and your brethren hate you and cast you out. But your Father in heaven loves you. He will act for you when no one else will or even dares.” His providence will arrange things for your comfort. He will appear for your joy and for the shame of those who abuse you and trample on you. They will be ashamed of their hatred toward you.

This was fulfilled when signs showed that Jerusalem was about to be destroyed. Then the Jews were filled with fear, but Christ’s disciples, whom they had hated and persecuted, lifted up their heads with joy, because their redemption was near (Luke 21:26, 28). Even when God seems to hide himself, he will in due time show himself.

God’s help will also make a loud noise in the world (Isaiah 66:6). There will be a voice of noise from the city and from the temple. Some understand this as the joyful and victorious sound of the church’s friends. Others take it as the fearful cry of her enemies, caught by surprise in the city and rushing to the temple for safety, though it will not help them. In either case, these voices are only the echo of the Lord’s voice as he repays his enemies. Those who would not hear him speaking terror will hear the frightful cries that come back from it.

We can imagine the confusion that filled the city and temple when Jerusalem was finally taken by the Romans after a long siege. Some think this prophecy was also fulfilled by the signs that came before that destruction, as Josephus reports in his history of the Jewish war. He says the temple doors suddenly flew open, the priests heard a sound of movement in the most holy place, and then a voice said, “Let us leave here.” Some time later, a man named Jesus, son of Ananus, went through the city during the feast of tabernacles, crying out, “A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds, a voice against Jerusalem and the temple, a voice against all this people.”

God will also set up a church for himself in the world, and it will quickly be filled with many people (Isaiah 66:7). “Before she travailed, she brought forth.” In its first sense, this points to the Jews’ return from Babylon, which came very easily and quietly. There was no pain or struggle like there was in the exodus from Egypt. That earlier rescue was done by mighty power (Deuteronomy 4:34), but this one was done by the Spirit of the Lord of hosts (Zechariah 4:6). The deliverance is welcomed like a newborn child, yet the mother had never gone into labor for it. Before her pain came, she was delivered.

This is astonishing, uncommon, and without example, except for the story told by the Egyptian midwives, who said the Hebrew women were so lively that they gave birth before the midwives arrived (Exodus 1:19). But can the earth bring forth its fruits in one day? No. It takes weeks of spring growth to renew the earth and cover it with fruit.

Some understand this in the same way as the next clause: “Shall a land be brought forth in one day? Or shall a nation be born at once?” Is it likely that a woman could give birth to enough children at one time to fill a country, and that those children would instantly grow up? No. Something like that happened in creation, but since then God has rested from such direct acts and lets ordinary causes work out their results slowly. He does nothing in a sudden, unnatural way.

Yet in this case, as soon as Zion was in labor, she brought forth. Cyrus’s proclamation had hardly gone out before the captives were gathered into a group and ready to return to their own land. The reason is given later, in Isaiah 66:9, because this is the Lord’s work. He completes what he begins. If he brings his people to the point of birth while preparing them for rescue, he will also bring them through when the rescue comes.

When everything is ready for release, and the time of their captivity is complete, would God leave the mother and child to perish together? That would not fit his mercy. Would he start a work and then fail to finish it? That would not fit his power or his perfection. “Am I the one who brings to the birth, and shall I not bring forth?” If God causes all living creatures to multiply and fill the earth, will he restrain Zion? Will he not make her fruitful with a blessed family to fill the church? Or, “Am I the one who caused the child to be born, and should I stop before the birth?”

God planned and promised this deliverance, and he would surely bring it to completion. But this also points forward to the setting up of the Christian church in the world, and to the growth of that family that would be named after Jesus Christ. When the Holy Spirit was poured out and the gospel went out from Zion, many people were converted in a very short time, with far less effort than the result might suggest. The apostles, even before they had fully labored, saw converts come forth, and the children born to Christ were so many, and came so suddenly and easily, that they were more like dew from the morning than like children from a mother’s womb (Psalm 110:3).

The success of the gospel was astonishing. That light, like the dawn, spread in a remarkable way until it reached even the ends of the earth. Cities and nations were born to Christ at once. On the very day the Spirit was poured out, 3,000 souls were added to the church. And once this glorious work began, it kept going in a wonderful way, beyond what anyone could have imagined, as the word of God grew mightily and prevailed.

He who brought people to the point of conviction for sin also brought them through to a full conversion to God.

They are also to know that their present sorrows will soon be turned into overflowing joy (Isaiah 66:10, Isaiah 66:11). Notice first how the church’s friends are described: they are those who love her, and who mourn with her and for her. All who love God love Jerusalem. They love God’s church, and they keep its good very near their hearts. They admire the church’s beauty, take delight in fellowship with it, and earnestly support its cause.

Those who truly care for the church also feel deep sympathy with her in all the troubles and sorrows of her present life in the world. They mourn for her. All her troubles become their grief. If Jerusalem is in distress, their harps are hung on the willow trees. They share in her sorrow.

But they are encouraged: “Rejoice with her, and again I say, rejoice.” This shows that Jerusalem will have good reason to rejoice. Her days of mourning will end, and she will be comforted in proportion to the time she suffered. It is God’s will that all her friends should join her in her joy, because they will share in the blessings that bring her joy. If we suffer with Christ and grieve with his church, we will reign with him and rejoice with her.

Here we are called to take our part in the church’s praises: “Come, rejoice with her, rejoice with joy with her, rejoice greatly, and know why you rejoice. Rejoice on the days set apart for public thanks.” You who mourned with her in her sorrow cannot help rejoicing with her in her joy, if the same spirit is in you.

We are also called to take our part in the church’s comfort. We must “suck and be satisfied with the breasts of her consolation.” God’s word, the covenant of grace, especially its promises, God’s ordinances, and all the opportunities to attend on him and fellowship with him, are the breasts of the church’s consolations. There her comfort is stored, and by faith and prayer it is received.

So we must draw from these breasts by applying God’s promises to ourselves and by faithfully attending his ordinances. And with the comfort we receive there, we must be satisfied, even if we have very little earthly comfort. The church’s glory is that the Lord is her God, and that to her belong adoption and the service of God. We should delight in the fullness of that glory. We should take more joy in our relationship with God and our fellowship with him than in all the pleasures of human life. Whatever belongs to the church’s glory must also be our glory and our joy, especially her purity, unity, and growth.

He who gives this call to rejoice will also give them both the reason and the heart to rejoice (Isaiah 66:12-14). First, he will give them the reason. They will enjoy a long, unbroken time of prosperity: “I will extend, or am extending, peace to her like a river.” That is, all good things will flow to her in a steady stream, increasing all the while until they are swallowed up in the ocean.

Wherever the gospel is received in its power, it brings this kind of peace. It keeps flowing like a river, supplying the soul with every good thing and making it fruitful, just as a river makes the land it passes through fruitful. It is a river of peace that the world’s comforts cannot produce, the world’s troubles cannot stop or drive back, and the world’s sand cannot block. It will carry us on to the ocean of endless, boundless blessedness.

There will also be large and helpful additions made to the church: “The glory of the Gentiles shall come to her like a flowing stream.” Gentile believers will come pouring into the church, adding to her peace and prosperity. They will bring their glory with them, their wealth and honor, their power and influence, all given over to the service of God and used for the good of the church. Then you shall suck from the breasts of her consolations.

When you see such crowds rushing in to share these comforts, you should be all the more eager and active to secure your own share. Do not fear that others coming to Christ will leave less for you. There is no danger of that, because he has enough for all and enough for each. Rather, their zeal should stir up a holy desire in you, and that is a good thing (Romans 11:14; 2 Corinthians 9:2).

God will be glorified in all of this, and that should be a greater joy to us than anything else (Isaiah 66:14). “The hand of the Lord” will be seen toward his servants, meaning his protecting, sustaining hand of power and his giving, rich hand of goodness. The help his servants receive from both will bring glory to him as well as good to them. To make this even more striking, he will also show his anger toward his enemies. His mercy and his justice will both be made plain and forever honored.

God will not only give them reasons to rejoice, he will speak comfort to them. He will speak it to their hearts, and only he can make it sink in and stay there. See what he does for the comfort of all the sons of Zion, that is, the people of Jerusalem and God’s people as a whole. Their country will be like a tender nurse. They will be carried on her sides, under her arms, like little children, and bounced gently on her knees like a darling child who needs comfort and sleep. Those who are joined to the church should be treated with that kind of affection. The great Shepherd gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart, and the under-shepherds should do the same, so the weak are not discouraged. New believers should be treated as special guests.

God himself will be their strong comforter. “As a mother comforts her child” when it is sick, hurt, or grieving, so he will comfort them. He will not only use the wise words a father might give, but also the tender care and deep pity of a loving mother, who mourns over her injured child and tries to calm it and ease its pain. Even after correction, her heart remains soft toward the child. So God says, “Since I spoke against him, I still feel deep pity for him; he is my dear son, my pleasant child” (Jeremiah 31:20). In this way, the mother comforts. In this way, they will be comforted in Jerusalem, through the blessings given to the church and the thanksgivings offered there, which they will share in.

They will also feel the blessed effects of this comfort in their own hearts (Isaiah 66:13). When they see how happily the church is restored, their tongues, their faces, and their hearts will rejoice. This was fulfilled in the deep joy Christ’s disciples felt when their ministry succeeded. Looking ahead to that, Christ told them, “Your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you” (John 16:22). Then their bones, which had been dried up and worn out, as if their strength were gone, will gain new life and vigor and grow like fresh grass. God’s comfort reaches the inner person. It refreshes and strengthens the whole being, like marrow and moisture for the bones (Proverbs 3:8). The bones are the body’s strength, and these comforts will make that strength flourish again. The joy of the Lord will be your strength (Nehemiah 8:10).