Chapter 66
Last chapter of Isaiah...It has really been a journey this time through. It really opened up. (((Wrote the preceding sentence in 2019. It is even more true in 2020. Isaiah has so much, and this year, much more than last year, I could see the organization of the book, the continuity that it has. It is far more chronological than I have seen previously, but it is a chronology of the future. Occasionally Isaiah comes back and discusses his own current situation, but mostly this book unfolds the future. I believe it is very much more about Tribulation through eternity than it is about anything before that. 2024 - A agree with the 2020 assessment. The more times I read it, the more things there are that open up and begin to fit, especially with verses in Revelation. My understanding changes each time I read it, but the changes always tent toward less "present" - as in less about Isaiah's day - and more "future", both to Isaiah, and to us.)))
Opens with God still speaking directly, revealing His plans, revealing Himself, telling us what kind of God He is.
First two verses He reminds us of His magnificence. There is nothing we can offer Him, no way we can "build" something that is more than what He already has. And those He favors are those of a contrite heart. God is already so great that no one can come close. So He looks to the opposite of that, and honors the meek, the humble, and those who fear Him. This says a lot about who God is, and why He is as He is.
2024 - This one:
1 Thus says the LORD: "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest? [Isa 66:1 ESV]. There is a verse in Ezekiel where God calls the Temple his footstool...sort of. Here is that one spoken to Ezekiel as he tours Ezekiel's Temple: 7 and he said to me, "Son of man, this is the place of my throne and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the people of Israel forever. And the house of Israel shall no more defile my holy name, neither they, nor their kings, by their whoring and by the dead bodies of their kings at their high places, [Eze 43:7 ESV]. Surely these two verses tie together. Why is this here? Reading the following verses we find a description of Temple worship in Isaiah's day - completely unacceptable worship, EVEN THOUGH it is in the Temple. I think the tie to Ezekiel's Temple answers the question at the end of vs 1: "Where is a place...", and the answer is in that Millennial Temple that Ezekiel tells us about>
vs 3 is a very long verse, and is about those who, while they are sacrificing, are doing so with the same indifferent uncaring un-fearing attitude as a pagan sacrificing a child on the altar. Very descriptive verse saying that though outwardly some still sacrifice to Him, He sees no difference between them and pig sacrifices when He looks at the heart. It is the inside that God cares about, NOT the ritual. Maybe put this verse on Facebook? Maybe vs 4 also. Is this talking about sacrifices made during the Millennial? We know there will be yet one more battle at the end of the Millennial, and the people who are God's enemies at that time have to come from somewhere. Maybe this is about them.
Some verses about labor and childbirth again. Second time in Isaiah I believe. I had to look at MSB for an explanation. This verse:
9 Shall I bring to the point of birth and not cause to bring forth?" says the LORD; "shall I, who cause to bring forth, shut the womb?" says your God. [Isa 66:9 ESV]
MSB says the point is that there is no birth without labor pains, and once there are labor pains, there will be birth. So the suffering that Israel will go through comprise those labor pains, but God promises that there will be birth at the other end - He will fulfill His promises to those who seek Him and keep his commandments. Prior, in vss 7 and 8, it says a son was delivered without pain. Then asks how this can be? Is this about how God chose Israel and brought them out of Egypt without refining them first? No...Egypt was a bad place for them, as they labored in slavery. Maybe back to Abraham, who was chosen by God for His own reasons to turn into a nation? MSB seems to think it is about the punishment of Israel over the last several thousand years being the labor that brings them forth into the Millennial Reign and the New Heaven and New Earth. One other idea...but I need to put vs 7 in here:
7 "Before she was in labor she gave birth; before her pain came upon her she delivered a son. [Isa 66:7 ESV] I think I could make an argument that Israel is a woman - as we see pictured in Revelation - about to give birth. That son is Christ, delivered before 70 AD, before all Israel was scattered to the four corners. The true, ongoing wrath of God - the true labor pains - started in earnest in 70 AD, after the son was delivered. This wrath culminates in Trib and Great Trib as the 144,000 do their witnessing, as the Jews eyes are opened and they accept Christ and as they return to their homeland. Israel is in labor from 70 AD to the start of the Tribulation, and then those last, most intense, most frequent birth pangs bring forth the Millennial Kingdom, the light of the whole world, with pure justice reigning over all the earth. Why would it not mean this???
vss 10, 11 are like Psa 122:6-9. They call us to honor God's chosen people, distinct from the church, because:
10 "Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad for her, all you who love her; rejoice with her in joy, all you who mourn over her; 11 that you may nurse and be satisfied from her consoling breast; that you may drink deeply with delight from her glorious abundance." [Isa 66:10-11 ESV]
She brought us into the world by rejecting Christ, and opening the gospel to the Gentiles. Israel is our mother. This continues through vs 14.
Last section of last chapter. ESV titles it Final Judgment and Glory of the Lord.
vss 15, 16:
15 "For behold, the LORD will come in fire, and his chariots like the whirlwind, to render his anger in fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. 16 For by fire will the LORD enter into judgment, and by his sword, with all flesh; and those slain by the LORD shall be many. [Isa 66:15-16 ESV]
When the old heaven and earth pass away it will be with fire. I think this is after the Millennial.
vs 17 - pig eaters shall come to an end. This would worry me greatly were it not for Peter in the NT being shown that you can eat anything at all. Even here, vs 18 continues that it is the works and thoughts God judges, not the food we eat.
In the end, all peoples, all nations, all mankind will worship God in the new heaven's and the new earth. And those who worship will see those who despised God. The verse says it much more clearly than I can:
24 "And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh." [Isa 66:24 ESV]
We will see hell, full of the rebellious. They will never die, they will be abhorred - as in the way the old world looked on lepers - and never honored, never defended, never even pitied. We will see hell as God's justice, right beyond question. And this is the thought that Isaiah ends with...
2021, Because this is eternity. They are in hell forever, and the saved in heaven, and this will never change. So the last scene Isaiah paints is of eternity. Past the end of Revelation and on to eternity.
As I read these verses in 2020 (22-24) I am convinced that they are looking at a post-Millennial time, when only the truly faithful - all the saved in fact - are living eternally in God's presence. The saved of the whole world and from all times are in His presence. And the rebellious have been separated and can be seen in their eternal suffering. What a contrast laid bare for anyone to read in this last verse.
One last thought (2020)...notice that those in heaven won't go out and weep over those in hell. Those in hell are an abhorrence to those in heaven. It must be so, or there would be sadness in heaven.