Isaiah 50

Isaiah 50

In my first blog post, I wrote a paraphrasing of Isaiah 49.  In this post I will continue that paraphrasing into chapters 50 and 51.

Isaiah’s narrative in chapter 50 continues on directly from chapter 49. In that chapter, the Lord promised that "even the captives" of Israel shall be saved from the terrible; "for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children." ‘I will restore My gospel, and thy children shall be saved because of the temple work that will be completed for them. I will save them. Do ye doubt this?’

"Thus saith the Lord [unto Israel]: Have I put thee away, or have I cast thee off forever?" Are you or your children lost forever? No!  "For thus saith the Lord: Where is the bill of your mother’s divorcement? To whom have I put thee away, or to which of my creditors have I sold you? Yea, to whom have I sold you?" ‘I have not cast thee off forever. What proof do you have to suggest such a thing?’

But "behold, for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, and for your transgressions is your mother put away." You did not keep the commandments. Because of this, you did not live worthy to receive eternal temple ordinances. Therefore, you lost your ancestry (i.e. your mother is put away).

Israel rejected Jesus.  “When I came, there was no man; when I called, yea, there was none to answer.”  In consequence of these things, “I [the Lord] clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.”  The Lord shut the heavens. There was no revelation.  There was a great apostasy.

Because Israel chose to not ‘fear the Lord’; because Israel chose to ‘content with the Lord’; because Israel chose to not ‘obey the voice of His servant’, the prophet, they were forced to ‘walk in darkness and have no light.’

The priesthood—the authority to perform eternal ordinances—was lost.  There were no longer any eternal families. Before the apostasy, the children of Israel were "as the sand of a sea; [and their] offspring… like the gravel of a river"; and the peace associated with their eternal families was "as a river, and... as the waves of the sea.”

But now that the priesthood and eternal families were removed from the earth, "behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea, I make their rivers a wilderness and their fish to stink because the waters are dried up, and they die because of thirst." Thy once fruitful river and sea—thy ancestors and posterity—are now a wilderness and a dried-up river that stinks of death! This is because your families are not eternal.  They will have an end, without the Lord’s help.

Again, symbolically, because your families are not eternal, “they shall wax old as a garment, and the moth shall eat them up.”  The forces of time that bring an end to all temporary things, symbolized by the moth, shall also cause your families to have an end.

Israel’s people did not place their hearts upon creating and perfecting an eternal family unit modeled after our Father in heaven's, but rather upon the vain philosophies of this world.  Is today any different?  Is marriage and family more than what we as a society are trying to make it?

But despite all this, if we will accept the Savior, He will still save us. "O house of Israel, is my hand shortened at all that it cannot redeem, or have I no power to deliver?”  ‘Do you not remember when I delivered thee from the Egyptians?’  "Behold, at my rebuke I dried up the sea," so you could walk through on dry ground. "I made their rivers a wilderness and their fish to stink because the waters were dried up." ‘I turned the river Nile into blood. Remember these things, and know that I have power to deliver!’

Verses 4-8 next highlight Christ's power and abilities in order to assure us that He has power to deliver.

The Lord again emphasizes His power in verse 10. “Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant [the prophet], [and] that [still] walketh in darkness and hath no light?”  There are none!

Despite all of this, there are still those that choose to not obey the prophet, and that consequently walk in darkness.  They must therefore create their own light.  “Behold all ye that kindle fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks, walk in the light of your fire and in the sparks which ye have kindled.”

Because men rejected God’s light—because there was an apostasy, men had to rely on their own error-prone logic to create doctrines; they had to kindle their own sparks, all of which leads to incorrect beliefs. Man is encompassed about by the kindling of the apostasy, and unless they abandon these false doctrines, they will not have eternal families (symbolized by burning, see Malachi 4:1).

Do not choose this path, the narrative continues into chapter 51. Instead, "Hearken unto me, ye that follow after righteousness. Look unto the rock from whence ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit from whence ye are digged.  Look unto Abraham, your father, and unto Sarah, she that bare you.” ‘I will redeem you; just as Abraham and Sarah had eternal temple covenants, so shall you.’

"For the Lord shall comfort Zion, he will comfort all her waste places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of melody.”

‘Your posterity was as a dried-up desert sea, and like an empty river of wilderness and death, but I will restore the gospel and bring eternal families back to the earth. I will make your wilderness like Eden, and your desert like the garden of the Lord. You shall have an eternal family.  Joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of melody.”

I will write the remainder of the commentary on chapter 51 in a later blog.

Thanks for reading.

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