Expositions of Holy Scripture: Isaiah and Jeremiah Part 28

And the revelation of the divine righteousness reaches its greatest brightness, as that of all the divine Nature does, in the Person and work of Jesus. Very significantly the idea of G.o.d's righteousness is fully developed in the immediately subsequent context. There we find that attribute linked in close and harmonious conjunction with what shallower thought is apt to regard as being in antagonism to it. He declares Himself to be 'a just (righteous) G.o.d and a Saviour.' So then, if we would rightly conceive of His righteousness, we must give it a wider extension than that of retributive justice or cold, inflexible aloofness from sinners. It impels G.o.d to be man's saviour. And with similar enlarging of popular conceptions there follows: 'In the Lord is righteousness and strength,' and therefore, 'In the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified (declared and made righteous) and shall glory'--then, the divine Righteousness is communicative.

All these thoughts, germinal in the prophet's words, are set in fullest light, and certified by the most heart-moving facts, in the Person and work of Jesus Christ. He 'declares at this time His righteousness, that He might Himself be righteous and the maker righteous of them that have faith in Jesus.' Whatever is dark, this is clear, that 'Jehovah our Righteousness' has come to us in His Son, in whom seeking Him we shall never seek in vain, but 'be found in Him, not having a righteousness of our own, even that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is of G.o.d by faith.'

If the great purpose of revelation is to make us know that G.o.d loves us, and has given us His Son that in Him we may know Him and possess His Righteousness, difficulties and obscurities in its form or in its substance take a very different aspect. What need we more than that knowledge and possession? Be not robbed of them.

Many things are not written in the book of the divine Revelation, whether it be that of Nature, of human history, or of our own spirits, or even of the Gospel, but these are written that we may believe that Jesus is the Son of G.o.d, and believing, may have life in His name.

A RIGHTEOUSNESS NEAR AND A SWIFT SALVATION

'Hearken unto Me, ye stout-hearted, that are far from righteousness: I bring near My righteousness; it shall not be far off, and My salvation shall not tarry.'--ISAIAH xlvi. 12,13.

G.o.d has promised that He will dwell with him that is humble and of a contrite heart. Jesus has shed the oil of His benediction on the poor in spirit. It is the men who form the exact ant.i.thesis to these characters who are addressed here. The 'stout-hearted' are those who, being untouched in conscience and ignorant of their sin, are self-reliant and almost defiant before G.o.d. That temper is branded here, though, of course, there is a sense in which a stout heart is a priceless possession, but that sort of stoutness of heart is best secured by the contrite of heart. Those who are far from righteousness are those who are not only sinful in act, but do not desire to be otherwise, having no approximation or drawing towards a n.o.bler life, by aspiration or effort.

To such men G.o.d speaks, as in the tone of a royal proclamation; and what should we expect to hear pealing from His lips? Words of rebuke, warning, condemnation? No; His voice is gentle and wooing, and does not threaten blows, but proffers blessings: 'I will bring near My righteousness. It shall not be far off,' though the stout-hearted maybe 'far from' it. Here we have a divine proclamation of a divine Love that will not let us away from its presence; of a divine Work for us that is finished without us; of an all-sufficient Gift to us.

I. A divine proclamation of a divine Love that will not let us away from its presence.

There is a great contest between G.o.d and man: man seeking to withdraw from G.o.d, and G.o.d following in patient, persistent love.

1. In general terms G.o.d keeps near us, however far away we go from Him.

Think of our forgetfulness of Him and His continual thought of us.

Think of our alienated hearts and His unchanging love.

We cannot turn away His care, we cannot exhaust His compa.s.sion, we cannot alienate His heart. All men everywhere are objects of these, as in every corner of the world the sky is overhead, and all lands have sunshine.

What a picture of divine patience and placability that truth points for us! It shows the Father coming after His prodigal son, and so surpa.s.ses even the pearl of the parables.

2. The special reference to Christ's work.

That work is the exhibition in manhood and to men of a perfect righteousness.

It is the implanting in the corrupt world of a new beginning. It is the clothing us with Christ's righteousness, for which we are forgiven and in which we are sanctified.

So Christ's work is G.o.d's coming to bring near His righteousness, and now 'it is nigh thee in thy mouth and in thy heart.'

II. A divine proclamation of a divine Work which is finished without us.

The divine righteousness and its consequence are here represented as being brought near while men are still 'stout-hearted.' We must feel the emphasis laid on '_I_ will bring near _My_ righteousness,' and the impression of merciful speed given by 'My salvation shall not tarry.'

The whole suggests such thoughts as these:--

The divine love is not drawn out by anything in us, but pours out on us, even while we are far off and indifferent to it. His bringing near of righteousness, and setting His salvation to run very swiftly side by side with it, originates in Himself. It is the self-impelled and self-fed flow of a fountain, and we need no pump or machinery to draw it forth.

The divine work is accomplished without man's co-operation.

'It is finished,' was Christ's dying cry. But what is finished?--Bringing the righteousness near. What still remains to be done?--Making it mine. And that is accomplished by faith.

It is mine if by faith I claim it as mine, and knit myself with Him who is righteousness and salvation for every man that they may be accessible to and possessed by any man.

A man may be far from righteousness though it is near him and all around him. Like Gideon's fleece, he may be dry when all is wet, or like some rock in a field, barren and sullen, while all around the corn is waving.

III. The proclamation of an all-sufficient Gift.

Righteousness, salvation, glory, are here brought together in significant sequence. They are but several names for the same divine gift, looked at from different angles. A diamond flashes varying prismatic hues from its different facets.

That encyclopaedical gift, which in regard to man considered as sinful brings pardon and a new nature 'in righteousness and holiness of truth,' brings deliverance from peril and from every form of evil and death, to him considered as exposed to consequences of sin both physical and moral, and a true though limited partic.i.p.ation in the divine glory, even now, with the hope of entering into the blaze of it hereafter, to him as considered as made in the divine image and having lost it.

And all this wonderful triple hope, rapturous and impossible as it seems when we think of man as he is, and of each of ourselves as we each feel ourselves to be, is for us a sober certainty and a fact sufficiently accomplished, to give firm ground for our largest expectations if we hold fast by Jesus who brings that all-sufficient gift of G.o.d within reach of each of us. The divine patience and love follow us in all our wild wanderings, praying us 'with much entreaty that we should receive the gift.' Jesus, who is G.o.d's righteousness and love incarnate, beseeches us to take Him, and in Him righteousness, salvation, and glory.

A RIVER OF PEACE AND WAVES OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

'Oh that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.'--ISAIAH xlviii. 18.

I. The Wonderful Thought of G.o.d here.

This is an exclamation of disappointment; of thwarted love. The good which He purposed has been missed by man's fault, and He regards the faulty Israel with sorrow and pity as a would-be benefactor balked of a kind intention might do. O Jerusalem! 'how often would I have gathered thee.' 'If thou hadst known ... the things that belong unto thy peace!'

II. Man's opposition to G.o.d's loving purpose for us.

To have hearkened to His commandments would have enabled Him to let His kindness have its way.

It is not only our act contrary to G.o.d's Law, but the source of that act in our antagonistic will, which fatally bars out the possibility of G.o.d's intended good from us. It is 'not hearkening' which is the root of not doing.

That possibility of lifting up our puny wills against the all-sovereign, Infinite Will is the mystery of mysteries.

The fact that the mysterious possibility becomes an actuality in us is still more mysterious. If we could solve those two mysteries, we should be far on the way to solve all the mysteries of man's relation to G.o.d, and G.o.d's to man.

A will absolutely submitted to Him is His great ideal of human nature.

And that ideal we all can thwart, and alas, alas! we all do. It is the deepest mystery; it is the blackest sin; it is the intensest folly.

Sin is negative as well as positive. Not to hearken is as bad as to act in dead opposition to.

III. The lost good.

The great purpose of the divine Commandment is to show us, for our own sakes, the path that leads to all blessedness.

Peace and Righteousness, or, in more modern words, all well-being and all goodness, are the sure results of taking G.o.d's expressed Will as the guide of life.

These two are inseparable. Indeed they are one and the same fact of human experience, looked at from two points of view.

The force of the metaphor in both clauses is substantially the same. It suggests in both--Abundance--Continuity--Uninterrupted Succession. But regarded separately each has its own fair promise. 'As a river'--flowing softly, not stagnant--that suggests the calm and gentle flow of a placid and untroubled stream refreshing and fertilising. 'As waves of the sea,' these suggest greater force than 'river.' The image speaks of a righteousness ma.s.sive and having power and a resistless swing in it. It is the more striking because the waves of the sea are the ordinary emblem of rebellious power. But here they stand as emblem of the strength of a submissive, not of a rebellious, will. In that obedience human nature rises to a higher type of strength than it ever attains while in opposition to the Source of all strength.