Isaiah the Prophet says more about the Millennium than anyone else in the Bible. (I realize that sounds like a mere opinion, but I guarantee you it’s a fact.)
Whole chapters of Isaiah’s Corpus … the “Millennium” from one end to the other! Including today’s Text, Isaiah chapter 4.
Do recall that the Millennium begins when Jesus next returns to earth, literally standing on the Mount of Olives. It is then that He interrupts the Battle of Armageddon, saves the Jews (what’s left of the little Nation of Israel), and defeats the Anti-Christ and his cohorts. Next comes the Judgment of the Nations (looks like partly based on how they’ve treated Israel during those last horrible few years), then Jesus assumes the Throne of David, to reign a thousand years as “Prince of Peace!”
It is in light of the deadly Tribulation period that Isaiah 4:1 begins: “And in that day SEVEN women shall take hold of ONE man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach. “
Wow!
So many Jewish men dead, both from Armageddon and at the murderous, anti-Semitic hands of Anti-Christ … that the Jewish population ratio is reduced to 1 man for every 7 women! And these ladies all wish to be married to some young Jewish gentleman! (Jewish girls through the centuries have had this godly longing.) But don’t worry … a thousand years of peace and prosperity lie ahead … the men will rebound! Yes, children will be born during that golden Kingdom Age.
Verse 2 adds to the picture: “In that day shall the BRANCH of the LORD be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel.”
“Branch,” one of Jesus’ wonderful Old Testament Names, Titles! Then two adjectives framing Jesus: “beautiful and glorious,” nearly self-defining. The “fruit?” Yes, the produce of earth, vegetables and sweets (milk and honey?) and nutrients of all kinds! Maybe even “righteousness!” (In the sense of Isaiah 62:11 … “For as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causeth the things that are sown in it to spring forth; so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to SPRING FORTH before all the nations.”)
But who will enjoy this bliss? “Them that are escaped of Israel,” clearly those (relatively few) who have survived the Tribulation! Who have endured to the end!
Isaiah 4, verse 3 still carries that theme of survival … “And it shall come to pass, that HE THAT IS LEFT in Zion, and HE THAT REMAINETH in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem.”
(Remember Jesus Himself said that if those days had not been shortened, no flesh would have been spared, Matthew 24:22.)
Preacher Bagwell, are you sure Israel will be saved? Well, Paul promised so in Romans 11: 26. But Isaiah “nails” it here, for sure: “When (the Millennium) the Lord shall have WASHED AWAY the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have PURGED the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof by the spirit of judgment, and by the spirit of burning.”
Excuse me, WOW again!
Now watch how the chapter ends, verses 5 and 6: “And the LORD will create upon every dwelling place of mount Zion, and upon her assemblies, a CLOUD and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night: for upon all the glory shall be a defence. And there shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a covert from storm and from rain.”
This will be a “new” truth to many of us, I suspect. God may be going to distribute the very Shekinah Glory Cloud upon the “assemblies” of Israel, maybe every home, every single dwelling!
Sounds so secure!
What wonderful says ahead … for those of us who are saved by the Grace of God!
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus … no wonder they call us Christians! HE is the Center of all our being! Like Paul correctly (and ideally) testified, “For us to live is Christ!”
— Dr. Mike Bagwell
Goodness, have I enjoyed writing this Lesson!
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