Nevertheless the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when at the first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations.
The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.
Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest, and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil.
For thou hast broken the yoke of his burden, and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian.
For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood; but this shall be with burning and fuel of fire.
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
HOPE
‘Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given.’
Isaiah 9:6
I. Here, in this Son of His, is an offer made by God, by which He pledges Himself to justify all suffering, retrieve all failure, redeem all fault.—He gives us an end for which to live, a purpose to which to consecrate ourselves. Here is His mind, here is His plan, for us—for us, not in our small individual worries and troubles only, but for us in the mass, as a race, as a society, as a civilisation. God has a scheme, an issue prepared—for which he worketh hitherto; and that issue is to be ‘His own Son.’ In Him all will be gathered in and fulfilled. ‘And the government shall be upon His shoulder; and of His kingdom there shall be no end; and His Name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Prince of Peace.’ Therefore we may not faint or fear. All, we may be sure, is in hand; nothing is wasted; nothing is lost; nothing is in vain. Towards that Divine event all is ever moving. A city is being built which God shall inhabit. A temple is rising which shall be the House of God among men. Humanity is in pain, even as a woman in travail; but at last the anguish will be all forgotten, for joy that ‘this Child is born, that this Son is given.’
II. God has not only planned, He has also spoken.—He has broken that silence in which He worked His great work. And the Sound which He lets loose—the Word which He utters, the Cry which he sends forth, lo! it is His Son—that same Son Who is Himself the Eternal Purpose in which, and for which, all things were made. The Child Who is the consummation towards which all this vast movement draws is also the Hand reached out by the Father to touch us—the Arm by which He embraces us.
His whole Being speaks to us, carries a message, brings us good news of God. This Child is Himself the Revelation. See Him and you see the Father. Know Him, love Him, and it is God Almighty whom you know and love. Obey Him, and you are loved of God. Abide in Him, and lo! it is the Father Who enters in and sups with you. Everything in Him is a word from God.
And more. He pledges Himself, pledges His life, to the truth of that Eternal Purpose of God, which He is—pledges Himself just at the point where our faith wavers and lapses. Just where that purpose seemed to languish, to fail, to break; just in the thick of that misery, suffering, pain, death, which confused and distressed our apprehension of God’s truth—just there He places Himself. He offers Himself to the worst defeat; He is stamped with the brand of our shame—nails, thorns, spear, contempt, hate, torture. All these He takes, that He may certify to us, by His own blood, that the purpose of God still holds good; that the love of God, in Him, is even yet working out its consummation in glory; that nothing is lost, wasted, forgotten, despised; that all is still directed and moved by a compassion that cannot fail, by a will that cannot break, towards an end that is worthy, towards a far and Divine rest that yet remaineth open to receive the people of God who by faith shall endure until they enter in.
—Canon Scott Holland.
Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this.
The Lord sent a word into Jacob, and it hath lighted upon Israel.
And all the people shall know, even Ephraim and the inhabitant of Samaria, that say in the pride and stoutness of heart,
The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones: the sycomores are cut down, but we will change them into cedars.
PRESUMPTUOUS SELF-DECEIVERS
‘The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones.’
Isaiah 9:10
I. It was difficult to convince these Israelites that they were sinners.—Driven from one refuge, they took shelter in another. ‘ The bricks are fallen,’ they said, ‘ but we will build with hewn stones.’
So I have many subterfuges and coverings for my guilt. Convicted on one indictment, I shape for myself another plea. The customs and fashions of the day blind me to my peril, as there were mourners in the Middle Ages who concealed their grief under a dress of purple and gold. The whirl of business dulls the tumults within me, as in the midst of battle the soldier forgets his mortal wound. The round of pleasure absorbs me, as sometimes a plague-stricken city gives itself up to recklessness and riot. My blameless creed and my religious observances hinder me from seeing the leprosy that is eating into my life.
II. Thus, when the bricks are fallen, I build with hewn stone; and when the sycamores are cut down, I change them into cedars. But from all my false refuges may God, with loving severity, drive me—drive me into true self-knowledge, and lowly penitence, and His own everlasting arms.
Therefore the LORD shall set up the adversaries of Rezin against him, and join his enemies together;
The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind; and they shall devour Israel with open mouth. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
For the people turneth not unto him that smiteth them, neither do they seek the LORD of hosts.
Therefore the LORD will cut off from Israel head and tail, branch and rush, in one day.
The ancient and honourable, he is the head; and the prophet that teacheth lies, he is the tail.
For the leaders of this people cause them to err; and they that are led of them are destroyed.
Therefore the Lord shall have no joy in their young men, neither shall have mercy on their fatherless and widows: for every one is an hypocrite and an evildoer, and every mouth speaketh folly. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
For wickedness burneth as the fire: it shall devour the briers and thorns, and shall kindle in the thickets of the forest, and they shall mount up like the lifting up of smoke.
Through the wrath of the LORD of hosts is the land darkened, and the people shall be as the fuel of the fire: no man shall spare his brother.
And he shall snatch on the right hand, and be hungry; and he shall eat on the left hand, and they shall not be satisfied: they shall eat every man the flesh of his own arm:
Manasseh, Ephraim; and Ephraim, Manasseh: and they together shall be against Judah. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
