What would be more appropriate after a tremendous announcement of the previous passage than a great outburst of praise to God! Like the apostle Paul, Isaiah cannot contain himself when the glory of the gospel grips him. Isaiah calls on the whole world to join him in praising God (vv. 10-11), and why not, since He is the Creator of all and Lord of all? But the song of these verses has a higher theme than this, which emerges in verses 13-16 as the praise reaches its climax in two bold and dramatic pictures of the Lord as the Savor of His people. Redemption is accomplished with tremendous effort and at great cost. He is totally committed to the welfare of His people, however blind they may be and however dark their circumstances (v. 16). This new song anticipates the song of the saints in heaven.

It is the way of great preachers to shock their audiences at times in order to shake them out of their lethargy and gain their attention. Verses 18-25 are a “shocking” passage in that sense. The words “my servant” are now applied to the Lord’s people in the context of a stinging rebuke (v. 19). What a plunge this is from the anticipation of heaven in the previous song and praise. Israel has so given in to bitterness and unbelief that all they are capable of at present is complaint (40:27). They are deaf to God’s Word, and blind to His purposes (vv. 18-19). In this they are no better than their ancestors, whose stubborn rebelliousness led to the punishment of the exile (vv. 23-25). This blindness is doubly culpable since Israel had the benefit of special revelation: the Lord had made His Law great and glorious among them (v. 21).

Isaiah is quite unsparing of the feelings of his audience. Like a good pastor, he knows that they will never know the comfort of God and fulfill their mission to be His servant people until they have faced up to their sinfulness and repented of it. There is no self-righteousness here at all from Isaiah. Note the “we” in “against whom we have sinned” (v. 24). He has never forgotten that moment when he saw the exalted Lord and knew the he himself was unclean and undone as everyone else (6:5). He speaks as one, who has discovered the wonder of forgiveness himself and longs for others to know it too.

Of course, there is a paradox here. In a sense they have already been forgiven (40:2). But what Isaiah is trying to elicit from them is the response that is necessary is they are to appropriate that forgiveness and live in the good of it. So in case they are overwhelmed by his stern rebuke, he moves on quickly, (in our next study), to assure them again of God’s continued commitment to them.

Isaiah 42:10-25 Reflection Questions:

How often do you give praise to God; daily, hourly, weekly?

Have you ever felt like Isaiah; that you couldn’t contain yourself and had to praise God right then? Where does this praise come from?

What is the Scripture that is the “song of the saints” mentioned?

Do you long for others to know the gospel too? What are you doing about that?