In Isaiah 50:4 a remarkable fact is shared with us, something about our Lord Jesus, once He became incarnate. Once He came to earth to die for our sins.

“The Lord GOD hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary: he wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned.” He (Jesus) is testifying that His Father (“the Lord GOD”) woke Him every morning … and taught Him! (Mark 1:35 … “And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he (Jesus) went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.” One of those “Classes!”)

The Father … taught Him what?

“How to speak a word in season to him (or her) that is weary.” Jesus as Encourager!

Wow!

Then, just six verses later … we have the Lord Jesus doing what he has (theoretically) been taught, encouraging the “weary!”

Watch … “Who is among you that feareth the LORD, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of the LORD, and stay upon his God.” Isaiah 50:10

Based on this verse … YES, you can be saved (fearing the Lord and obeying His Voice) and still “walk in darkness,” go through some very hard times!

You can, child of God, experience days or hours (maybe even weeks or months) of “no light!”

Now … here comes the Encourager!

Pre-incarnate Jesus! (Just meaning “before” the Virgin Birth.)

The rest of verse 10, Jesus’ Word to the weary … “Let him trust in the name of the LORD, and stay upon his God.”

Keep on trusting (with “not a care” in the world, the total absence of worry, “batach” in Hebrew) the Lord!

Then the verb “stay” (in Hebrew “shaan”) means “to lean upon” Someone! Three times in the King James Version, “to rest” upon Him!

“A Word in season to the weary,” indeed!

The Bible, what a practical Book!

And our great God … how supremely Sufficient He is … and then some!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

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Isaiah 50 begins another of the Prophet’s well-known “Servant” Texts. And perhaps this Unit is the clearest of them all … so far!

No doubt, Jesus is in view!

Let me share a couple of verses. See if you agree that our Lord is the Speaker, via the miracle of Bible Prophecy.

“The Lord GOD hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting.” Isaiah 50:5-6

The word picture about the “opened ear” indicates “voluntary servanthood.” Jesus was not FORCED to come to earth and die on the Cross! Rather, He (gladly) did it out of Love. Primarily (I think) love for His Father … then also love for us lost sinners! (See Exodus 21:6 and Deuteronomy 15:7, for the servant’s “pierced” ear concept.)

Then … “I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting.” Is this not certainly our Lord Jesus Christ, at the Cross? Notice please … He “gave” Himself!

John 10:17-18 … Jesus preaching … “Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.”

Wow!

Then one more verse today, pure dynamite!

“For the Lord GOD will help me; therefore shall I not be confounded: therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed.” Isaiah 50:7

Jesus was that DETERMINED to go to Calvary! He adamantly set His Face … like a flint!

And though He was (in the estimation of the men and women on the Scene) shamed and disgraced and belittled … in His Own Heart and Mind … He was the Victor!

“Not confounded!”

“Not ashamed!”

How so, in the face of all apparent data?

Because … of the Reward that awaited Him, at the Right Hand of His father in Heaven!

Here’s my proof Text … “Jesus , Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2

Luke 12:50 adds to our discussion as well. Did Jesus “shrink” from the Cross, even at Gethsemane?

No!

He welcomed it!

“But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!”

Wow, almost “I can’t wait until it (the Cross) be accomplished!” The verb here is “teleo,” as in “It is finished!”

The more I learn about Jesus, the more I admire and adore and worship Him!

The Darling Son of God!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

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If you recall, the second “Section” of Isaiah (chapters 40-66 in distinction to chapters 1-39) began with these words: “Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God.”Isaiah 40:1

And that, dear students, sets the overarching Theme to Isaiah’s Prophecies in these final (27) chapters … “COMFORT!”

Including today’s Text, our last meditation from Isaiah chapter 49. (And what a thrilling chapter it has been!)

Again, God is speaking to His people, to the Jews: “And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh; and they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I the LORD am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob.” Isaiah 49:26 … a Victory so pronounced that it may not occur until the days of the Tribulation, its very climax!

God overcoming (or promising to overcome) all Israel’s “oppressors!” The verb “oppress” here is “yanah” in Hebrew. It is used only 21 times in the entire Old Testament! It means (in part) “to treat violently!” In the King James Version it is translated “to thrust out” once! And “to destroy” once as well.

Those who so hate Israel (and act upon that hate) God will literally kill! In a particularly graphic manner! He will “feed them with their own flesh.”

What does that mean?

I think it may be a case where these enemies (who bitterly say of Israel, quoting Psalm 83:4, “Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance”) are sent strong confusion from the Lord, so much so that they attack themselves! Mistakenly kill each other in a massive case of “friendly fire!” (Called “strong delusion” by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:11.)

Or perhaps … they themselves are put under such a long siege from a more formidable enemy … that they become so hungry and so thirsty … that they eat their own children and drink the blood of the recently dead! (A common result of extremely long sieges!)

Yes … “They shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine.” Thus saith the Lord!

And what will be the result of this great Victory God provides Judah/Israel? “And all flesh shall know that I the LORD am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob.” The last clause of Isaiah 49:26, today’s Text.

Wow!

“All flesh!”

As when “That unto me (God) every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear.” Also written by Isaiah the Prophet, in 45:23.

Which Paul adapted to say (under the Guidance of the Holy Spirit) … “That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Philippians 2:10-11

I sure would not want to be guilty of “oppressing” Israel, would you? Of “cursing” her? Genesis 12:1-3, notice especially the capitalized line: “Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee: and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: AND I WILL bless them that bless thee, and CURSE HIM THAT CURSETH THEE : and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”

Comfort indeed … for Israel!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

Isaiah the Prophet … what a writer!

And the Holy Spirit of God … What An Author!

And us Christians, looking on this Scene of Victory … thrilled that our God is receiving Honor and Glory eternally due his Name!

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Israel, the nation, is discouraged. “Hard times” have come her way. Largely, though, due to her own sin, truth be told!

So, in today’s Text, she laments: “But Zion said, The LORD hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me.” Isaiah 49:14a,b

“Hath forsaken” is “azab” in Hebrew … as if the Lord “has lost” Israel, had “misplaced” her! And “hath forgotten” translates “shakach,” meaning “to ignore!” Pretty strong charges!

But instead of retorting in anger … God lovingly responds with an apt illustration from everyday life: “Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.”Isaiah 49:14c-15

Can a young mother “forget” her little nursing baby? Or not love the little boy to whom she recently gave birth? RARELY that could happen, one guesses! (The implication is that GOD is a better Parent than any human! God is the Perfect One! God will not forget His children!)

That’s right! I can gladly proclaim: GOD FORGETS NOTHING! Except in regard to those who are saved, washed in the Blood of Jesus … “And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.” Hebrews 10:17, praise His Name!

Yes, revel and delight in this uplifting Truth for a minute! (“My sins are gone!”)

Then there’s even more … God gives Judah/Israel a reminder, a promise, a great fact to ponder!

“Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.” Isaiah 49:16

How could God forget His people? He has etched (cut) them (their names) into His very hands! “Have graven” (in Hebrew “chaqaq”) means just that, “to indelibly imprint, inscribe, mark!”

Did Jesus have this picture in Mind? As He preached in John 10:28 … “And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.”

And wonderfully so, “pluck” here means “to seize, to carry off!” Of course not, we’re safe … we are engraved there, in His Hands!

And that closing line, about Jerusalem’s “walls?”

The walls of any ancient city were their foremost means of protection. God is saying that He knows the condition of Judah’s citizenry! Even the details! (Like the number of hairs on our head! Luke 12:7)

He has His gracious, all-seeing “eyee” on every aspect of their lives, even their city walls and gates! Proverbs 15:3 is still true … “The eyes of the LORD are in every place!”

He is even watching us … right now

Hallelujah!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

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One day, in fact the very Day of His Resurrection, Jesus had a discussion with two (discouraged) believers who were walking away from Jerusalem toward Emmaus.

Of the many splendid things Jesus said to them, “speaking a word to the weary” (Isaiah 50:4), included was this marvelous fact: “Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.”Luke 24:46-47

Watch the capitalized words now, same verses … “And said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: AND THAT REPENTANCE AND REMISSION OF SINS SHOULD BE PREACHED IN HIS NAME AMONG ALL NATIONS, beginning at Jerusalem.”

When our Lord that victorious Day long ago used the specific words (the formula) “It is written”… He was indicating either a reference to or a direct quotation from some Old Testament Passage of Scripture.

Jesus (God’s Salvation) being preached to all nations! To the Gentiles! Literally, to the end of the earth! (What good news!)

But WHERE is Jesus’ Source (undoubtedly true) for this great Promise?

The Prophet Isaiah!

In today’s chapter, “number 49,” our Lord once again proves His familiarity with the Isaiah Corpus of the Bible.

Which verse?

Isaiah 49:6, I believe. “And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth.”

Now let me supply the Antecedents for the Pronouns here. “And He (God the Father) said, It is a light thing that Thou (Jesus) shouldest be My Servant (this being one of Isaiah’s four great SERVANT Paragraphs) to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will ALSO give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth.”

That’s the verse Jesus had in mind as He trekked toward Emmaus!

Wow!

Jesus and Isaiah, our Lord’s first recorded Sermon was even from Isaiah (Luke 4:16-21)! The scholars have found well over a dozen times Jesus quotes or alludes to this great Prophet! (An extremely worthy study within itself!)

But to the FACT itself!

Jesus preached to all nations! (Mark 16:15 … Jesus, post-Resurrection, talking: “Go ye into ALL THE WORLD, and preach the gospel to every creature.”)

And Jesus as Salvation to the end of the earth! (John 4:42 … “And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the WORLD.”)

I mean literally! (Philippians 2:9-11 … now Paul quoting Isaiah … “Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that EVERY TONGUE should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”)

Jesus literally had saturated His Mind in Scripture!

So should we.

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

One more thought about Isaiah 49:6. It is saying that it was comparatively “easy/light” for Jesus to restore Israel … and that He was even going to save souls “to the end of the earth!” Apparently a much more arduous Task!

Filthy Gentiles, born again!

Wow!

And that mass included me!

“Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.” Jesus preaching in John 5:24.

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