A VERSE BY VERSE COMMENTARY ON ISAIAH CHAPTER 50.

1. ISAIAH 50 COMMENTARY
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
Israel’s Sin and the Servant’s Obedience
1 This is what the Lord says: “Where is your mother’s
certificate of divorce with which I sent her away?
Or to which of my creditors did I sell you?
Because of your sins you were sold; because of your
transgressions your mother was sent away.
1.BARNES, “Thus saith the Lord - To the Jews in Babylon, who were suffering under his
hand, and who might be disposed to complain that God had dealt with them with as much
caprice and cruelty as a man did with his wife, when he gave her a writing of divorce, and put
her away without any just cause.
Where is the bill of your mother’s divorcement? - God here speaks of himself as the
husband of his people, as having married the church to himself, denoting the tender affection
which he had for his people. This figure is frequently used in the Bible. Thus in Isa_62:5 : ‘As the
bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee;’ ‘For thy Maker is thy
husband’ Isa_54:5; ‘Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord, for I am married unto you’
Jer_3:14. Thus in Rev_21:9, the church is called ‘the bride, the Lamb’s wife.’ Compare Ezek. 16:
See Lowth on Hebrew poetry, Lec. xxxi. The phrase, ‘bill of divorcement.’ refers to the writing or
instrument which a husband was by law obliged to give a wife when he chose to put her away.
This custom of divorce Moses found probably in existence among the Jews, and also in
surrounding nations, and as it was difficult if not impossible at once to remove it, he permitted it
on account of the hardness of the hearts of the Jews (Deu_24:1; compare Mat_19:8).
It originated probably from the erroneous views which then prevailed of the nature of the
marriage compact. It was extensively regarded as substantially like any other compact, in which
the wife became a purchase from her father, and of course as she had been purchased, the
husband claimed the right of dismissing her when he pleased. Moses nowhere defines the causes
for which a man might put away his wife, but left these to be judged of by the people themselves.
But he regulated the way in which it might be done. He ordained a law which was designed to
operate as a material check on the hasty feelings, the caprice, and the passions of the husband.
He designed that it should be with him, if exercised, not a matter of mere excited feeling, but
that he should take time to deliberate upon it; and hence, he ordained that in all cases a formal

2. instrument of writing should be executed releasing the wife from the marriage tie, and leaving
her at liberty to pursue her own inclinations in regard to future marriages Deu_24:2.
It is evident that this would operate very materially in favor of the wife, and in checking and
restraining the excited passions of the husband (see Jahn’s Bib. Antiq. Section 160; Michaelis’
Commentary on the Laws of Moses, vol. i. pp. 450-478; ii. 127-40. Ed. Lond. 1814, 8vo.) In the
passage before us, God says that he had not rejected his people. He had not been governed by
the caprice, sudden passion, or cruelty which husbands often evinced. There was a just cause
why he had treated them as he had, and he did not regard them as the children of a divorced
wife. The phrase, ‘your mother,’ Here is used to denote the ancestry from whom they were
descended. They were not regarded as the children of a disgraced mother.
Or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you - Among the Hebrews, a father
had the right, by the law of Moses, if he was oppressed with debt, to sell his children Exo_21:7;
Neh_5:5. In like manner, if a man had stolen anything, and had nothing to make restitution, he
might be sold for the theft Exo_22:3. If a man also was poor and unable to pay his debts, he
might be sold Lev_25:39; 2Ki_4:1; Mat_18:25. On the subject of slavery among the Hebrews,
and the Mosaic laws in regard to it, see Michaelis’ Commentary on the Laws of Moses, vol. ii. pp.
155, following In this passage, God says that he had not been governed by any such motives in
his dealings with his people. He had not dealt with them as a poor parent sometimes felt himself
under a necessity of doing, when he sold his children, or as a creditor did when a man was not
able to pay him. He had been governed by different motives, and he had punished them only on
account of their transgressions.
Ye have sold yourselves - That is, you have gone into captivity only on account of your
sins. It has been your own act, and you have thus become bondmen to a foreign power only by
your own choice.
Is your mother put away - Retaining the figure respecting divorce. The nation has been
rejected, and suffered to go into exile, only on account of its transgressions.
2.CLARKE, “Thus saith the Lord - This chapter has been understood of the prophet
himself; but it certainly speaks more clearly about Jesus of Nazareth than of Isaiah, the son of
Amos.
Where is the bill “Where is this bill” - Husbands, through moroseness or levity of
temper, often sent bills of divorcement to their wives on slight occasions, as they were permitted
to do by the law of Moses, Deu_24:1. And fathers, being oppressed with debt, often sold their
children, which they might do for a time, till the year of release, Exo_21:7. That this was
frequently practiced, appears from many passages of Scripture, and that the persons and the
liberty of the children were answerable for the debts of the father. The widow, 2Ki_4:1,
complains “that the creditor is come to take unto him her two sons to be bondmen.” And in the
parable, Mat_18:25 : “The lord, forasmuch as his servant had not to pay, commands him to be
sold, and his wife and children, and all that he had, and payment to be made.” Sir John
Chardin’s MS. note on this place of Isaiah is as follows: En Orient on paye ses dettes avec ses
esclaves, car ils sont des principaux meubles; et en plusieurs lieux on les paye aussi de ses
enfans. “In the east they pay their debts by giving up their slaves, for these are their chief
property of a disposable kind; and in many places they give their children to their creditors.” But
this, saith God, cannot be my case, I am not governed by any such motives, neither am I urged
by any such necessity. Your captivity therefore and your afflictions are to be imputed to
yourselves, and to your own folly and wickedness.

3. 3. GILL, “Thus saith the Lord,.... Here begins a new discourse or prophecy, and therefore
thus prefaced, and is continued in the following chapter:
where is the bill of your mother's divorcement, whom I have put away? these words
are directed to the Jews, who stood in the same relation to the Jewish church, or synagogue, as
children to a mother; and so the Targum interprets "your mother" by "your congregation", or
synagogue; who were rejected from being a church and people; had a "loammi" written upon
them, which became very manifest when their city and temple were destroyed by the Romans;
and this is signified by a divorce, alluding to the law of divorce among the Jews, Deu_24:1, when
a man put away his wife, he gave her a bill of divorce, assigning the causes of his putting her
away. Now, the Lord, either as denying that he had put away their mother, the Jewish church,
she having departed from him herself, and therefore challenges them to produce any such bill; a
bill of divorce being always put into the woman's hands, and so capable of being produced by
her; or if there was such an one, see Jer_3:8, he requires it might be looked into, and seen
whether the fault was his, or the cause in themselves, which latter would appear:
or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? referring to a practice used, that
when men were in debt, and could not pay their debts, they sold their children for the payment
of them; see Exo_21:7, but this could not be the case here; the Lord has no creditors, not any to
whom he is indebted, nor could any advantage possibly accrue to him by the sale of them; it is
true they were sold to the Romans, or delivered into their hands, which, though a loss to them,
was no gain to him; nor was it he that sold them, but they themselves; he was not the cause of it,
but their own sins, as follows:
behold, for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves; or, "are sold" (w); they were sold for
them, or delivered up into the hands of their enemies on account of them; they had sold
themselves to work wickedness, and therefore it was but just that they should be sold, and
become slaves:
and for your transgressions is your mother put away; and they her children along with
her, out of their own land, and from being the church and people of God.
4. HENRY, “Those who have professed to be the people of God, and yet seem to be dealt
severely with, are apt to complain of God, and to lay the fault upon him, as if he had been hard
with them. But, in answer to their murmurings, we have here,
I. A challenge given them to prove, or produce any evidence, that the quarrel began on God's
side, Isa_50:1. They could not say that he had done them any wrong or had acted arbitrarily. 1.
He had been a husband to them; and husbands were then allowed a power to put away their
wives upon any little disgust: if their wives found not favour in their eyes, they made nothing of
giving them a bill of divorce, Deu_24:1; Mat_19:7. But they could not say that God had dealt so
with them. It is true they were now separated from him, and had abode many days without
ephod, altar, or sacrifice; but whose fault was that? They could not say that God had given their
mother a bill of divorce; let them produce it if they can, for a bill of divorce was given into the
hand of her that was divorced. 2. He had been a father to them; and fathers had then a power to
sell their children for slaves to their creditors, in satisfaction for the debts they were not
otherwise able to pay. Now it is true the Jews were sold to the Babylonians then, and afterwards
to the Romans; but did God sell them for payment of his debts? No, he was not indebted to any

4. of those to whom they were sold, or, if he had sold them, he did not increase his wealth by their
price, Psa_44:12. When God chastens his children, it is neither for his pleasure (Heb_12:10) nor
for his profit. All that are saved are saved by a prerogative of grace, but those that perish are cut
off by an act of divine holiness and justice, not of absolute sovereignty.
II. A charge exhibited against them, showing them that they were themselves the authors of
their own ruin: “Behold, for your iniquities, for the pleasure of them and the gratification of
your own base lusts, you have sold yourselves, for your iniquities you are sold; not as children
are sold by their parents, to pay their debts, but as malefactors are sold by the judges, to punish
them for their crimes. You sold yourselves to work wickedness, and therefore God justly sold you
into the hands of your enemies, 2Ch_12:5, 2Ch_12:8. It is for your transgressions that your
mother is put away, for her whoredoms and adulteries,” which were always allowed to be a just
cause of divorce. The Jews were sent into Babylon for their idolatry, a sin which broke the
marriage covenant, and were at last rejected for crucifying the Lord of glory; these were the
iniquities for which they were sold and put away.
5. JAMISON, “Isa_50:1-11. The judgments on Israel were provoked by their crimes, yet
they are not finally cast off by God.
Where ... mothers divorcement — Zion is “the mother”; the Jews are the children; and
God the Husband and Father (Isa_54:5; Isa_62:5; Jer_3:14). Gesenius thinks that God means
by the question to deny that He had given “a bill of divorcement” to her, as was often done on
slight pretexts by a husband (Deu_24:1), or that He had “sold” His and her “children,” as a poor
parent sometimes did (Exo_21:7; 2Ki_4:1; Neh_5:5) under pressure of his “creditors”; that it
was they who sold themselves through their own sins. Maurer explains, “Show the bill of your
mother’s divorcement, whom ... ; produce the creditors to whom ye have been sold; so it will be
seen that it was not from any caprice of Mine, but through your own fault, your mother has been
put away, and you sold” (Isa_52:3). Horsley best explains (as the antithesis between “I” and
“yourselves” shows, though Lowth translates, “Ye are sold”) I have never given your mother a
regular bill of divorcement; I have merely “put her away” for a time, and can, therefore, by right
as her husband still take her back on her submission; I have not made you, the children, over to
any “creditor” to satisfy a debt; I therefore still have the right of a father over you, and can take
you back on repentance, though as rebellious children you have sold yourselves to sin and its
penalty (1Ki_21:25).
bill ... whom — rather, “the bill with which I have put her away” [Maurer].
6. K&D, “The words are no longer addressed to Zion, but to her children. “Thus saith
Jehovah, Where is your mother's bill of divorce, with which I put her away? Or where is one of
my creditors, to whom I sold you? Behold, for your iniquities are ye sold, and for your
transgressions is your mother put away.” It was not He who had broken off the relation in
which He stood to Zion; for the mother of Israel, whom Jehovah had betrothed to Himself, had
no bill of divorce to show, with which Jehovah had put her away and thus renounced for ever the
possibility of receiving her again (according to Deu_24:1-4), provided she should in the
meantime have married another. Moreover, He had not yielded to outward constraint, and
therefore given her up to a foreign power; for where was there on of His creditors (there is not
any one) to whom He would have been obliged to relinquish His sons, because unable to pay His
debts, and in this way to discharge them? - a harsh demand, which was frequently made by
unfelling creditors of insolvent debtors (Exo_21:7; 2Ki_4:1; Mat_18:25). On nosheh, a creditor,

5. see at Isa_24:2. Their present condition was indeed that of being sold and put away; but this
was not the effect of despotic caprice, or the result of compulsion on the part of Jehovah. It was
Israel itself that had broken off the relation in which it stood to Jehovah; they had been sold
through their own faults, and “for your transgressions is your mother put away.” Instead of
ָ‫יה‬ ֶ‫ע‬ ָ‫שׁ‬ ְ‫פ‬ ִ‫וּב‬ we have ‫ם‬ ֶ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ע‬ ְ‫שׁ‬ ִ‫פ‬ ְ‫.וּב‬ This may be because the church, although on the one hand standing
higher and being older than her children (i.e., her members at any particular time), is yet, on the
other hand, orally affected by those to whom she has given birth, who have been trained by her,
and recognised by her as her own.
7. CALVIN, “1.Where is that bill of divorcement? There are various interpretations of this passage, but
very few of the commentators have understood the Prophet’ meaning. In order to have a general
understanding of it, we must observe that union by which the Lord everywhere testifies that his people are
bound to him; that is, that he occupies the place of a husband, and that we occupy the place of a wife. It
is a spiritual marriage, which has been consecrated by his eternal doctrine and sealed by the blood of
Christ. In the same manner, therefore, as he takes us under his protection as a early beloved wife, on
condition that we preserve our fidelity to him by chastity; so when we have been false to him, he rejects
us; and then he is said to issue a lawful divorce against us, as when a husband banished from his house
an adulterous wife.
Thus, when the Jews were oppressed by calamities so many and so great, that it was easy to conclude
that God had rejected and divorced them, the cause of the divorce came to be the subject of inquiry.
Now, as men are usually eloquent in apologizing for themselves, and endeavor to throw back the blame
on God, the Jews also complained at that time about their condition, as if the Lord had done wrong in
divorcing them; because they were far from thinking that the promises had been made void, and the
covenant annulled, by their crimes. They even laid the blame on their ancestors, as if they were punished
for the sins of others. Hence those taunts and complaints which Ezekiel relates.
“ fathers ate a sour grape, and our teeth are set on edge.” (Eze_18:2.)
Speeches of this kind being universally current among them, the Lord demands that they shall produce
the “ of divorcement,” by means of which they may prove that they are free from blame and have been
rejected without cause.
Now, a “ of divorcement” was granted to wives who were unjustly divorced; for by it the husband was
constrained to testify that his wife had lived chastely and honorably, so that it was evident that there was
no other ground for the divorce than that she did not please the husband. Thus the woman was at liberty
to go away, and the blame rested solely on the husband, to whose sullenness and bad temper was
ascribed the cause of the divorce. (Deu_24:1.) This law of divorcement, as Ezekiel shews, (Mat_19:8,)
was given by Moses on account of the hard-heartedness of that nation. By a highly appropriate metaphor,
therefore, the Lord shews that he is not the author of the divorce, but that the people went away by their
own fault, and followed their lusts, so that they had utterly broken the bond of marriage. This is the reason
why he asks where is “ bill” of which they boasted; for there is emphasis in the demonstrative
pronoun, ‫זה‬ (zeh), that, by which he intended to expose their idle excuses; as if he had said, that they
throw off the accusation, and lay blame on God, as if they had been provided with a defense, whereas
they had violated the bond of marriage, and could produce nothing to make the divorce lawful.

6. Or who is the creditor to whom I sold you? By another metaphor he demonstrates the same thing. When
a man was overwhelmed by debt, so that he could not satisfy his creditors, he was compelled to give his
children in payment. The Lord therefore asks, “ he been constrained to do this? Has he sold them, or
given them in payment to another creditor? Is he like spendthrifts or bad managers, who allow
themselves to be overwhelmed by debt?” As if he had said, “ cannot bring this reproach against me; and
therefore it is evident that, on account of your transgressions, you have been sold and reduced to
slavery.”
Lo, for your iniquities ye have been sold. Thus the Lord defends his majesty from all slanders, and refutes
them by this second clause, in which he declares that it is by their own fault that the Jews have been
divorced and “” The same mode of expression is employed by Paul, when he says that we are “ under
sin,” (Rom_7:14,) but in a different sense; in the same manner as the Hebrew writers are wont to speak of
abandoned men, whose wickedness is desperate. But here the Prophet intended merely to charge the
Jews with guilt, because, by their own transgressions, they had brought upon themselves all the evils that
they endured.
If it be asked, “ the Lord divorce his heritage? Did he make void the covenant?” Certainly not; but the Lord
is said to “” as he is elsewhere said to profane, his heritage, (Psa_89:39; Eze_24:21,) because no other
conclusion can be drawn from present appearances; for, when he did not bestow upon them his wonted
favor, it was a kind of divorce or rejection. In a word, we ought to attend to these two contrasts, that the
wife is divorced, either by the husband’ fault, or because she is unchaste and adulterous; and likewise
that children are sold, either for their father’ poverty or by their own fault. And thus the course of argument
in this passage will be manifest.
8. PULPIT COMMENTARY, “Where is the bill of your mother's divorcement? On account of her
persistent "backsliding," God had "put away Israel," Judah's sister, and had "given her a bill of divorce"
(Isa_3:8). But he had not repudiated Judah; and her children were wrong to suppose themselves
altogether cast off (see Isa_49:14). They had, in fact, by their transgressions, especially their idolatries,
wilfully divorced themselves, or at any rate separated themselves, from God; but no sentence had gone
forth from him to bar reconciliation and return. Or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold
you! Neither has God exercised the right, regarded as inherent in a parent
(Exo_21:7; 2Ki_4:11; Neh_6:5, Neh_6:8), of selling his children to a creditor. They are not sold—he has
"taken no money for them" (Psa_44:12; Isa_52:3); and the Babylonians are thus not their rightful owners
(Isa_49:24)—they are still God's children, his property, and the objects of his care. For your iniquities
for your transgressions; rather, by your iniquities by your transgressions. The separation, such as it
was, between God and his people was caused by their sins, not by any act of his.
9. BI, “Jehovah and unfaithful Israel
These Israelites went to the only kind of law with which they were familiar, and borrowed from
it two of its forms, which were not only suggested to them by the relations in which the nation
and the nation’s sons respectively stood to Jehovah, as wife and as children, but admirably
illustrated the ideas they wished to express.
(1) There was the form of divorce, so expressive of the ideas of absoluteness,
deliberateness and finality—of absoluteness, for throughout the East power of divorce
rests entirely with the husband; of deliberateness, for in order to prevent hasty divorce
the Hebrew law insisted that the husband must make a bill or writing of divorce instead

7. of only speaking dismissal; and of finality, for such a writing in contrast to the spoken
dismissal, set the divorce beyond recall.
(2) The other form which the doubters borrowed from their law, was one which, while it
also illustrated the irrevocableness of the act, emphasized the helplessness of the agent—
the act of the father who put his children away, not as the husband put his wife in his
anger, but in his necessity, selling them to pay his debts and because he was bankrupt.
(3) On such doubts God turns with their own language—“I have indeed put your mother
away, but where is the bill that makes her divorce final, beyond recall? You indeed were
sold, but was it because I was bankrupt! To which, then, of My creditors (note the scorn
of the plural) was it that I sold you? Nay, by means of your iniquities did ye sell
yourselves, and by means of your transgressions were ye put away. But I stand here,
ready as ever to save, I alone. If there is any difficulty about your restoration it lies in
this, that I am alone, with no response or assistance from men.” (Prof. G. A. Smith, D.D.)
The sinner’s responsibility
I. THE SINNER’S MISERABLE CONDITION.
1. Separated from God.
2. Sold under sin.
II. THE OCCASION OF IT. Not the will of God, but his own love of sin, and his consequent
disregard of God’s offers of deliverance from sin and sorrow. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
Israel self-ruined
Those who have professed to be the people of God, and yet seem to be severely dealt with, are
apt to complain of God, and to lay the fault upon Him, as if He had severely dealt with them. But
in answer to their murmurings, we have here—
I. A CHALLENGE TO PRODUCE ANY EVIDENCE THAT THE QUARREL BEGAN ON GOD’S
SIDE (Isa_50:1).
II. A CHARGE THAT THEY WERE THEMSELVES THE AUTHOR OF THEIR RUIN. “Behold,
for your iniquities,” etc.
III. A CONFIRMATION OF THIS CHALLENGE AND THIS CHARGE (Isa_50:2-3).
1. It Was plain that it was their own fault that they were cast off, for God came and offered
them His helping hand, either to prevent their trouble or to deliver them out of it, but they
slighted Him and all the tenders of His grace.
2. It was plain that it was not owing to any lack of power in God that they were led into the
misery of captivity, and remained in it, for He is almighty. They lacked faith in Him, and so
that power was not exerted on their behalf. So it is with sinners still. (M. Henry.)
Isaiah 50:2-6
Wherefore, when I came, was there no man?

8. The Mediator: Divine and human
These words could have been spoken only by the Mediator between God and man, the man
Christ Jesus They place before our thoughts—
I. His DIVINE POWER AND GLORY. Power is naturally calm. The power that sustains the
universe is, in fact, most wonderful when, unseen, unfelt, with its Divine silence and infinite
ease, it moves on in its ordinary course; but we are often most impressed by it when it strikes
against obstructions, and startles the senses by its violence. Knowing our frame, and dealing
with us as with children, our Teacher seeks to impress us with a sense of His Divine power, by
bidding us think of Him as working by inexorable force certain awful changes and displacements
in nature. “I dry up the sea,” etc.
II. HIS HUMAN LIFE AND EDUCATION. “The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the
learned,” etc. Gradually, it seems, the Divine Spirit, like a mysterious voice, woke up within Him
the consciousness of what He was, and of what He had come on earth to fulfil. Morning by
morning, through all the days of His childhood, the voice was ever awakening Him to higher
consciousness and more awful knowledge.
III. THE MEDIATORIAL TEACHING FOR WHICH HE HAD BEEN THUS PREPARED.
1. It is personal. If His own personal teaching had not been in view, there would have been
no need for all this personal preparation. “The Lord hath given Me the tongue of the learned,
that I should know how to speak.” This is His own testimony to the great fact that He
Himself personally teaches every soul that is saved.
2. It is suitable. Suitable to our weariness.
(1) While we are yet in a state of unregeneracy.
(2) When we are sinking under the burden of guilt.
(3) When fainting under the burden of care.
(4) When burdened under the intellectual mysteries of theology.
(5) When under the burden of mortal infirmity.
3. The teaching of Christ is minutely direct and particular. When I read that He is ordained
to speak “to him” that is weary, I understand that He does not speak in a general,
impersonal, unrecognizing way to the forlorn crowd of sufferers, but to every man in
particular, and to every man apart. (C. Stanford, D. D.)
The Redeemer described by Himself
In my opinion, these verses (2-6) run on without any break, so that you are not to separate
them, and ascribe one to the prophet, another to the Messiah, and another to Jehovah Himself;
but you must take the whole as the utterance of one Divine Person. That Jehovah-Jesus is the
One who is speaking here, is very clear from the last verse of the previous chapter: “I the Lord”
(“I, Jehovah,” it is,) “am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob.”
I. BEHOLD THE MESSIAH AS GOD. Link Isa_50:3; Isa_6:1-13: “I clothe the heavens with
blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering . . . I gave my back to the smiters,” etc. He, then,
who suffered thus, and whom we regard as redeeming us by His death, and as saving us by His
life, is no less than the Almighty God. I think the first reference, in these words, is to the
miracles which were wrought by the plagues in Egypt. It was Jehovah-Jesus who was then
plaguing His adversaries. In a later chapter, Isaiah says that “the Angel of His presence saved

9. them;” and who is that great Angel of His presence but the Angel of the covenant in whom we
delight, even Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour? But we must not restrict the text to that which
happened in the land of Egypt, for it has a far wider reference. All the great wonders of nature
are to be ascribed to Him upon whom we build all our hopes for time and for eternity. The last
miracle recorded here, namely, that of covering the heavens with sackcloth, was performed by
our Lord even when He was in His death agony. You are not depending for your salvation upon
a mere man. He is man, but He is just as truly Divine.
II. BEHOLD THE MESSIAH AS THE INSTRUCTED TEACHER (verse 4). I call your special
attention to the condescension of our Lord in coming here on purpose to care for the weak—to
speak consoling and sustaining words to them; and also to the fact that, before He performed
that service, He learned the sacred art from His Father. For thirty years was He learning much
in Joseph’s carpenter’s shop. Little do we know how much He learned there; but this much we
do know, “Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.” And
afterwards, when He entered upon His public work among men, He spake with the tongue of the
learned, saying to His disciples, “All things that I have heard of My Father I have made known
unto you.” All through His time of teaching, He was still listening and learning.
III. BEHOLD JESUS CHRIST AS THE SERVANT OF THE LORD (verse 5).
1. He speaks of Himself as being prepared by grace. “The Lord God hath opened Mine ear,”
as if there had been a work wrought upon Him to prepare Him for His service. And the same
Spirit, which rested upon Christ, must also open our ears.
2. Being thus prepared by grace, He was consecrated in due form, so that He could say to
Himself, “The Lord God hath opened Mine ear.” He heard the faintest whispers of His
Father’s voice.
3. He not only heard His Father’s voice, but He was obedient to it in all things. “I was not
rebellious.” From the day when, as a child, He said to His parents, “Wist ye not that I must
be about My Father’s business?” till the hour when, on the cross, He cried, “It is finished,”
He was always obedient to the will of God.
4. In that obedience, He was persevering through all trials. He says that He did not turn
away back. Having commenced the work of saving men, He went through with it.
IV. BEHOLD THE MESSIAH AS THE PEERLESS SUFFERER (verse 6). It has been asked, “Did
God really die?” No; for God cannot die, yet He who died was God; so, if there be a confusion in
your mind, it is the confusion of Holy Scripture itself, for we read, “Feed the Church of God,
which He hath purchased with His own blood.” In addition to the pain, we are asked, in this
verse, to notice particularly the contempt which the Saviour endured. The plucking of His hair
was a proof of the malicious contempt of His enemies, yet they went still further, and did spit in
His face. Spitting was regarded by Orientals, and, I suppose, by all of us, as the most
contemptuous thing which one man could do to another; yet the vile soldiers gathered round
Him, and spat upon Him. I must point out the beautiful touch of voluntariness here: “I hid not
my face.” Our Saviour did not turn away, or seek to escape. If He had wished to do so, He could
readily have done it. Conclusion: Notice three combinations which the verses of my text will
make.
(1) Verses 2 and 6. Those verses together show the full ability of Christ to save. Here we
have God and the Sufferer.
(2) Verses 4 and 5. Here you have the Teacher and the Servant, and the two together
make up this truth—that Christ teaches us, not with words only, but with His life. What a
wonderful Teacher He is, who Himself learned the lessons which He would have us
learn!

10. (3) Now put the whole text together, and I think the result will be—at least to God’s
people—that they will say, “This God shall be our God for ever and ever; and it shall be
our delight to do His bidding at all times.” It is a high honour to serve God; and Christ is
God. It is a great thing to be the servant of a wise teacher; and Christ has the tongue of
the learned. It is a very sweet thing to walk in the steps of a perfect Exemplar; and Christ
is that. And, last and best of all, it is delightful to live for Him who suffered and died on
our behalf. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
9. MEYER, “HELP FOR THOSE WHO TRUST IN HIM
Isa_50:1-11
It is impossible for God to put away the soul that clings to Him in penitence and faith. Heaven
and earth may be searched, but no bill of divorce can be found. See Deu_24:1. And He sends His
great servant, our Lord, of whom this chapter is full, to deliver and assure our trembling faith.
Notice the difference in Isa_50:4, between the Authorized Version and the Revised Version
which reads, Jehovah hath given me the tongue of them that are taught, that I may know how
to sustain with words him that is weary…. He wakeneth mine ear to hear as they that are
taught. This quality of teachableness was primarily true of Jesus. It was the habit of His human
life to listen to the secret teaching of the Father, breathed into His heart. See Joh_8:28;
Joh_8:40. So also must we allow ourselves to be wakened by Him, each morning, that we also
may know how to help men more efficiently and tenderly.
From the first, Jesus knew that He must die. See Mar_10:34. But He did not turn back. See
Heb_10:5, etc. Was not His choice abundantly vindicated? The Father who justified Him was
always near, Joh_8:29. See Joh_16:22. Let us who may be walking in darkness learn from our
King to stay ourselves on God.
2 When I came, why was there no one?
When I called, why was there no one to answer?
Was my arm too short to deliver you?
Do I lack the strength to rescue you?
By a mere rebuke I dry up the sea,
I turn rivers into a desert;

11. their fish rot for lack of water
and die of thirst.
1.BARNES, “Wherefore, when I came, was there no man? - That is, when I came to
call you to repentance, why was there no man of the nation to yield obedience? The sense is, that
they had not been punished without warning. He had called them to repentance, but no one
heard his voice. The Chaldee renders this, ‘Wherefore did I send my prophets, and they did not
turn? They prophesied, but they did not attend.’
When I called, was there none to answer? - None obeyed, or regarded my voice. It was
not, therefore, by his fault that they had been punished, but it was because they did not listen to
the messengers which he had sent unto them.
Is my hand shortened at all? - The meaning of this is, that it was not because God was
unable to save, that they had been thus punished. The hand, in the Scriptures, is an emblem of
strength, as it is the instrument by which we accomplish our purposes. To shorten the hand, that
is, to cut it off, is an emblem of diminishing, or destroying our ability to execute any purpose
(see Isa_59:1). So in Num_11:23 : ‘Is the Lord’s hand waxed short?’
That it cannot redeem? - That it cannot rescue or deliver you. The idea is, that it was not
because he was less able to save them than he had been in former times, that they were sold into
captivity, and sighed in bondage.
Behold, at my rebuke - At my chiding - as a father rebukes a disobedient child, or as a man
would rebuke an excited multitude. Similar language is used of the Saviour when he stilled the
tempest on the sea of Gennesareth: ‘Then he arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there
was a great calm’ Mat_8:26. The reference here is, undoubtedly, to the fact that God dried up
the Red Sea, or made a way for the children of Israel to pass through it. The idea is, that he who
had power to perform such a stupendous miracle as that, had power also to deliver his people at
any time, and that, therefore, it was for no want of power in him that the Jews were suffering in
exile.
I make the rivers a wilderness - I dry up streams at pleasure, and have power even to
make the bed of rivers, and all the country watered by them, a pathless, and an unfruitful desert.
Their fish stinketh - The waters leave them, and the fish die, and putrify. It is not
uncommon in the East for large streams and even rivers thus to be dried up by the intense heat
of the sun, and by being lost in the sand. Thus the river Barrady which flows through the fertile
plain on which Damascus is situated, and which is divided into innumerable streams and canals
to water the city and the gardens adjacent to it, after flowing to a short distance from the city is
wholly lost - partly absorbed in the sands, and partly dried up by the intense rays of the sun (see
Jones’ ‘Excursions to Jerusalem, Egypt, etc. ‘) The idea here is, that it was God who had power to
dry up those streams, and that he who could do that, could save and vindicate his people.

12. 2.CLARKE, “Their fish stinketh “Their fish is dried up” - For ‫תבאש‬ tibaosh, stinketh,
read ‫תיבש‬ tibash, is dried up; so it stands in the Bodl. MS., and it is confirmed by the Septuagint,
ξηρανθησονται, they shall be dried up.
3. GILL, “Wherefore, when I came, was there no man?.... The Targum is,
"why have I sent my prophets, and they are not converted?''
And so Aben Ezra and Kimchi interpret it of the prophets that prophesied unto them, to bring
them to repentance: the Lord might be said to come by his prophets, his messengers; but they
did not receive them, nor their messages, but despised and rejected them, and therefore were
carried captive, 2Ch_36:15, but it is best to understand it of the coming of Christ in the flesh;
when there were none that would receive, nor even come to him, but hid their faces from him,
nor suffer others to be gathered unto him, or attend his ministry; they would neither go in
themselves into the kingdom of the Messiah, nor let others go in that were entering, Joh_1:11,
when I called, was there none to answer? he called them to the marriage feast, to his word
and ordinances, but they made light of it, and went about their worldly business; many were
called externally in his ministry, but few were chosen, and effectually wrought upon; he called,
but there was no answer given; for there was no internal principle in them, no grace to answer to
the call; he stretched out his hands to a rebellious and gainsaying people, Mat_22:2,
is my hand shortened at all, that it cannot redeem? or have I no power to deliver?
they did not know him to be the mighty God; they took him to be a mere man; and being
descended from such mean parents, and making such a mean appearance, they could not think
he was able to be their Redeemer and Saviour; but that he had sufficient ability appears by what
follows:
behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea; he was able to do it, and did do it for the children of
Israel, and made a passage through the Red sea for them, as on dry land; which was done by a
strong east wind he caused to blow, here called his "rebuke", Exo_14:20, of Christ's rebuking the
sea, see Mat_8:26.
I make the rivers a wilderness; as dry as the wilderness, and parched ground; in which
persons may pass as on dry ground, and as travellers pass through a wilderness; so Jordan was
made for the Israelites, Jos_3:17, and may be here particularly meant; called "rivers" because of
the excellency of it, and the abundance of water in it, which sometimes overflowed its banks;
and because other rivers fall into it, as Kimchi observes:
their flesh stinketh because there is no water, and dieth for thirst; as they did when
the rivers of Egypt were turned into blood, Exo_7:21.
4. HENRY, “The confirmation of this challenge and this charge. 1. It is plain that it was
owing to themselves that they were cast off; for God came and offered them his favour, offered
them his helping hand, either to prevent their trouble or to deliver them out of it, but they
slighted him and all the tenders of his grace. “Do you lay it upon me?” (says God); “tell me, then,

13. wherefore, when I came, was there no man to meet me, when I called, was there none to
answer me?” Isa_50:2. God came to them by his servants the prophets, demanding the fruits of
his vineyard (Mat_21:34); he sent them his messengers, rising up betimes and sending them
(Jer_35:15); he called to them to leave their sins, and so prevent their own ruin: but was there
no man, or next to none, that had any regard to the warnings which the prophets gave them,
none that answered the calls of God, or complied with the messages he sent them; and this was
it for which they were sold and put away. Because they mocked the messengers of the Lord,
therefore, God brought upon them the king of the Chaldeans, 2Ch_36:16, 2Ch_36:17. Last of all
he sent unto them his Son. He came to his own, but his own received him not; he called them to
himself, but there were none that answered; he would have gathered Jerusalem's children
together, but they would not; they knew not, because they would not know, the things that
belonged to their peace, nor the day of their visitation, and for that transgression it was that they
were put away and their house was left desolate, Mat_21:41; Mat_23:37, Mat_23:38;
Luk_19:41, Luk_19:42. When God calls men to happiness, and they will not answer, they are
justly left to be miserable. 2. It is plain that it was not owing to a want of power in God, for he is
almighty, and could have recovered them from so great a death; nor was it owing to a want of
power in Christ, for he is able to save to the uttermost. The unbelieving Jews in Babylon thought
they were not delivered because their God was not able to deliver them; and those in Christ's
time were ready to ask, in scorn, Can this man save us? For himself he cannot save. “But” (says
God) “is my hand shortened at all, or is it weakened?” Can any limits be set to Omnipotence?
Cannot he redeem who is the great Redeemer? Has he no power to deliver whose all power is?
To put to silence, and for ever to put to shame, their doubts concerning his power, he here gives
unquestionable proofs of it. (1.) He can, when he pleases, dry up the seas, and make the rivers a
wilderness. He did so for Israel when he redeemed them out of Egypt, and he can do so again for
their redemption out of Babylon. It is done at his rebuke, as easily as with a word's speaking. He
can so dry up the rivers as to leave the fish to die for want of water, and to putrefy. When God
turned the waters of Egypt into blood he slew the fish, Psa_105:29. The expression our Saviour
sometimes used concerning the power of faith, that it will remove mountains and plant
sycamores in the sea, is not unlike this; if their faith could do that, no doubt their faith would
save them, and therefore they were inexcusable if they perished in unbelief. (2.) He can, when he
pleases, eclipse the lights of heaven, clothe then with blackness, and make sackcloth their
covering (Isa_50:3) by thick and dark clouds interposing, which he balances, Job_36:32;
Job_37:16.
5. JAMISON, “I — Messiah.
no man — willing to believe in and obey Me (Isa_52:1, Isa_52:3). The same Divine Person
had “come” by His prophets in the Old Testament (appealing to them, but in vain, Jer_7:25,
Jer_7:26), who was about to come under the New Testament.
hand shortened — the Oriental emblem of weakness, as the long stretched-out hand is of
power (Isa_59:1). Notwithstanding your sins, I can still “redeem” you from your bondage and
dispersion.
dry up ... sea — (Exo_14:21). The second exodus shall exceed, while it resembles in wonders,
the first (Isa_11:11, Isa_11:15; Isa_51:15).
make ... rivers ... wilderness — turn the prosperity of Israel’s foes into adversity.
fish stinketh — the very judgment inflicted on their Egyptian enemies at the first exodus
(Exo_7:18, Exo_7:21).

14. 6. K&D, “The radical sin, however, which has lasted from the time of the captivity down to
the present time, is disobedience to the word of God. This sin brought upon Zion and her
children the judgment of banishment, and it was this which made it last so long. “Why did I
come, and there was no one there? Why did I call, and there was no one who answered? Is my
hand too short to redeem? or is there no strength in me to deliver? Behold, through my
threatening I dry up the sea; turn streams into a plain: their fish rot, because there is no
water, and die for thirst. I clothe the heavens in mourning, and make sackcloth their covering.”
Jehovah has come, and with what? It follows, from the fact of His bidding them consider, that
His hand is not too short to set Israel loose and at liberty, that He is not so powerless as to be
unable to draw it out; that He is the Almighty, who by His mere threatening word (Psa_106:9;
Psa_104:7) can dry up the sea, and turn streams into a hard and barren soil, so that the fishes
putrefy for want of water (Exo_7:18, etc.), and die from thirst (thamoth a voluntative used as an
indicative, as in Isa_12:1, and very frequently in poetical composition); who can clothe the
heavens in mourning, and make sackcloth their (dull, dark) covering (for the expression itself,
compare Isa_37:1-2); who therefore, fiat applicatio, can annihilate the girdle of waters behind
which Babylon fancies herself concealed (see Isa_42:15; Isa_44:27), and cover the empire,
which is now enslaving and torturing Israel, with a sunless and starless night of destruction
(Isa_13:10). It follows from all this, that He has come with a gospel of deliverance from sin and
punishment; but Israel has given no answer, has not received this message of salvation with
faith, since faith is assent to the word of God. And in whom did Jehovah come? Knobel and most
of the commentators reply, “in His prophets.” This answer is not wrong, but it does not suffice to
show the connection between what follows and what goes before. For there it is one person who
speaks; and who is that, but the servant of Jehovah, who is introduced in these prophecies with
dramatic directness, as speaking in his own name? Jehovah has come to His people in His
servant. We know who was the servant of Jehovah in the historical fulfilment. It was He whom
even the New Testament Scriptures describe as τᆵν παሏδα τοሞ κυρίου, especially in the Acts
(Act_3:13, Act_3:26; Act_4:27, Act_4:30). It was not indeed during the Babylonian captivity
that the servant of Jehovah appeared in Israel with the gospel of redemption; but, as we shall
never be tired of repeating, this is the human element in these prophecies, that they regard the
appearance of the “servant of Jehovah,” the Saviour of Israel and the heathen, as connected with
the captivity: the punishment of Israel terminating, according to the law of the perspective
foreshortening of prophetic vision, with the termination of the captivity - a connection which we
regard as one of the strongest confirmations of the composition of these addresses before the
captivity, as well as of Isaiah's authorship. But this ᅊνθρώπινον does not destroy the θεሏον in
them, inasmuch as the time at which Jesus appeared was not only similar to that of the
Babylonian captivity, but stood in a causal connection with it, since the Roman empire was the
continuation of the Babylonian, and the moral state of the people under the iron arm of the
Roman rule resembled that of the Babylonian exiles (Eze_2:6-7). At the same time, whatever
our opinion on this point may be, it is perfectly certain that it is to the servant of Jehovah, who
was seen by the prophet in connection with the Babylonian captivity, that the words “wherefore
did I come” refer.
7. SBC, “These words could have been spoken only by the Mediator between God and man, the
man Christ Jesus. They place before our thoughts:—

15. I. His Divine power and glory. Power is naturally calm. The power that sustains the universe is,
in fact, most wonderful when, unseen, unfelt, with its Divine silence and infinite ease, it moves
on in its ordinary course; but we are often most impressed by it when it strikes against
obstructions, and startles the senses by its violence. Knowing our frame, and dealing with us as
with children, our Teacher seeks to impress us with a sense of His Divine power, by bidding us
think of Him as working by inexorable force certain awful changes and displacements in nature.
"I dry up the sea; I made the rivers a wilderness," etc.
II. His human life and education. "The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned," etc.
Gradually, it seems, the Divine Spirit, like a mysterious voice, woke up within Him the
consciousness of what He was, and of what He had come on earth to fulfil. Morning by morning,
through all the days of His childhood, the voice was ever awakening Him to higher
consciousness and more awful knowledge.
III. The mediatorial teaching for which He had been thus prepared. (1) It is personal. If His own
personal teaching had not been in view, there would have been no need for all this personal
preparation. "The Lord hath given Me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to
speak." This is His own testimony to the great fact that He Himself personally teaches every soul
that is saved. (2) It is suitable. Suitable to our weariness: (a) while we are yet in a state of
unregeneracy; (b) when we are sinking under the burden of guilt; (c) when fainting under the
burden of care; (d) when burdened under the intellectual mysteries of theology; (e) when under
the burden of mortal infirmity. (3) The teaching of Christ is minutely direct and particular.
When I read that He is ordained to speak "to him that is weary," I understand that He does not
speak in a general, impersonal, unrecognising way to the forlorn crowd of sufferers, but to every
man in particular, and to every man apart.
C. Stanford, Symbols of Christy p. 147.
Reference: Isa_50:2-6.—Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Ecclesiastes to Malachi, p. 243.
8. CALVIN, “2.Why did I come? This might be a reason assigned, that the people have not only
brought upon themselves all immense mass of evils by provoking God’ anger, but have likewise, by their
obstinacy, cut off the hope of obtaining pardon and salvation. But I think that God proceeds still further.
After having explained that he had good reason for divorcing the people, because they had of their own
accord given themselves up to bondage, when they might have been free, he adds that still it is not he
who prevents them from being immediately set at liberty. As he shewed, in the former verse, that the
whole blame rests with the Jews, so now he declares that it arises from their own fault that they grow old
and rot in their distresses; for the Lord was ready to assist them, if they had not rejected his grace and
kindness. In a word, he shows that both the beginning and the progress of the evil arise from the fault of
the people, in order that he may free God from all blame, and may shew that the Jews act wickedly in
accusing him as the author of evil, or in complaining that he will not assist them.
First, then, the Lord says that he “” and why, but that he might stretch out his hand to the Jews? Whence
it follows that they are justly deprived; for they would not receive his grace. Now, the Lord is said to “”
when he gives any token of his presence. He approaches by the preaching of the Word, and he
approaches also by various benefits which he bestows on us, and by the tokens which he employs for
manifesting his fatherly kindness toward us.
“ there ever any people,” as Moses says, “ saw so many signs, and heard the voice of God speaking, like
this people?” (Deu_4:33.)

16. Constant invitation having been of no advantage to them, when he held out the hope of pardon and
exhorted them to repentance, it is with good reason that he speaks of it as a monstrous thing, and asks
why there was no man to meet him. They are therefore held to be convicted of ingratitude, because, while
they ought to have sought God, they did not even choose to meet him when he came; for it is an instance
of extreme ingratitude to refuse to accept the grace of God which is freely offered.
Why did I call, and no one answered? In the word call there is a repetition of the same statement in
different words. When God “” we ought to be ready and submissive; for this is the “” which, he complains,
was refused to him; that is, we ought to yield implicitly to his word. But this expression applies strictly to
the matter now in hand; because God, when he offered a termination to their distresses, was obstinately
despised, as if he had spoken to the deaf and dumb. Hence he infers that on themselves lies the blame of
not having been sooner delivered; and he supports this by former proofs, because he had formerly shewn
to the fathers that he possessed abundance of power to assist them. Again, that they may not cavil and
excuse themselves by saying that they had not obtained salvation, though they heartily desired it, he
maintains, on the other hand, that the cause of the change ought to be sought somewhere else than in
him, (for his power was not at all diminished,) and therefore that he would not have delayed to stretch out
his hand to them in distress, if they had not wickedly refused his aid.
By shortening hath my hand been shortened? By this interrogation he expresses greater boldness, as if
he were affirming what could not be called in question; for who would venture to plead against God that
his power was diminished? He therefore relates how powerfully he rescued his people out of Egypt, that
they may not now imagine that he is less powerful, but may acknowledge that their sins were the
hinderance. (14) He says that by his reproof he “ up the sea,” as if he had struck terror by a threatening
word; for by his authority, and at his command, the seas were divided, so that a passage was opened up,
(Exo_14:21,) and Jordan was driven back. (Jos_3:16.) The consequence was, that “ fishes,” being
deprived of water, died and putrified.
(14) “Ains recognoissent que leurs vices empeschent que ceste puissance ne se monstre;” “ may
acknowledge that their sins hinder that power from being manifested.”
9. PULPIT COMMENTARY, “Wherefore, when I came, was there no man? Such being the
condition of things; Judah having rejected me, not I them—why, "when I came" and announced
deliverance from Babylon, was there no response? Why did no champion appear? Is it that my power
was doubted? that it was feared my hand was shortened, so that it could not redeem or deliver? But I
am he who has power with his rebuke todry up the sea (Exo_14:21), to make rivers a
wilderness (Exo_7:20; Jos_3:16, Jos_3:17); in fact, to change the course of nature as seemeth him
good, and accomplish his will against all obstacles. Is myhand shortened? i.e. "is my power less than it
was?" Can any one suppose this? Surely what I have once done I can do again. If I delivered from Egypt,
I can redeem from Babylon. Their fish stinketh (comp.Exo_7:21). But the object is rather to assert an
absolute control over nature than to take the thoughts of the hearers back to any special occasions when
control was exercised.
9B. PULPIT, “God's power over nature.

17. Modern pseudo-science, or "un-science," as it has been called, seems to hold that nature, having been
once for all arranged and ordered by God, was thenceforth left to itself, being an automatic machine,
bound to work in a certain way, needing no superintendence, and brooking no interference
thenceforward. Hence miracles are regarded as impossible, or at any rate as non occurrent; and we are
invited to ascribe to the combined influence of priestcraft and credulity all the statements with respect to
supernatural interferences with nature which we find in the history of our race. The view of the sacred
writers is the direct opposite of this. God is not regarded as having ever left nature to itself'. On the
contrary, he is always represented as working with nature and in nature. He" covereth the heaven with
clouds, and prepareth rain for the earth, and maketh the grass to grow upon the mountains. He giveth to
the beast his food, and to the young ravens which cry He giveth snow like wool, and scattereth the hoar-
frost like ashes. He casteth forth his ice like morsels: who can stand before his cold? He sendeth out his
word, and melteth them: he causeth his wind to blow, and the waters flow" (Psa_147:8-18). He is, in fact,
ever in his laws, executing them continually—making the sun to shine, and the moon to give her light, and
the stars to sparkle in the canopy of heaven, and the mountains to stand firm, and the winds to blow, and
the rain to fall, and the earth to give her increase. The secret of the quasi-unvarying character of nature's
laws is his unchangeableness—the fact that "with him is no variableness, neither shadow of turning"
(Jas_1:17). But, as he thus holds nature in his hand, and does not let it go, so he is necessarily at all
times omnipotent over nature, and can suspend or change any "law of nature' at his pleasure. In point of
fact, he does not do so unless upon emergencies. But, let a fitting occasion come, and it is as easy for
him to reverse a law as to maintain it. He can "dry up the sea" in a moment, "make rivers a desert"
(Isa_50:2), "clothe the heaven with blackness" (Isa_50:3), cause the stars to fall (Mat_24:29), create a
new heaven and a new earth (Rev_21:1), cast death and hell into the lake of fire (Rev_20:14). To regard
miracles as impossible is to be an atheist; to say that they are non-occurrent is to fly in the face of history.
No doubt many false miracles have been alleged, and an alleged miracle is not to be received without a
searching scrutiny. But the summary rejection of all miracles, which modern pseudo-science proclaims, is
as little reasonable as the wholesale acceptance of all alleged miracles without exception.
10. BI, The Mediator: Divine and human
These words could have been spoken only by the Mediator between God and man, the man
Christ Jesus They place before our thoughts—
I. His DIVINE POWER AND GLORY. Power is naturally calm. The power that sustains the
universe is, in fact, most wonderful when, unseen, unfelt, with its Divine silence and infinite
ease, it moves on in its ordinary course; but we are often most impressed by it when it strikes
against obstructions, and startles the senses by its violence. Knowing our frame, and dealing
with us as with children, our Teacher seeks to impress us with a sense of His Divine power, by
bidding us think of Him as working by inexorable force certain awful changes and displacements
in nature. “I dry up the sea,” etc.
II. HIS HUMAN LIFE AND EDUCATION. “The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the
learned,” etc. Gradually, it seems, the Divine Spirit, like a mysterious voice, woke up within Him
the consciousness of what He was, and of what He had come on earth to fulfil. Morning by
morning, through all the days of His childhood, the voice was ever awakening Him to higher
consciousness and more awful knowledge.
III. THE MEDIATORIAL TEACHING FOR WHICH HE HAD BEEN THUS PREPARED.
1. It is personal. If His own personal teaching had not been in view, there would have been
no need for all this personal preparation. “The Lord hath given Me the tongue of the learned,
that I should know how to speak.” This is His own testimony to the great fact that He
Himself personally teaches every soul that is saved.
2. It is suitable. Suitable to our weariness.
(1) While we are yet in a state of unregeneracy.

18. (2) When we are sinking under the burden of guilt.
(3) When fainting under the burden of care.
(4) When burdened under the intellectual mysteries of theology.
(5) When under the burden of mortal infirmity.
3. The teaching of Christ is minutely direct and particular. When I read that He is ordained
to speak “to him” that is weary, I understand that He does not speak in a general,
impersonal, unrecognizing way to the forlorn crowd of sufferers, but to every man in
particular, and to every man apart. (C. Stanford, D. D.)
The Redeemer described by Himself
In my opinion, these verses (2-6) run on without any break, so that you are not to separate
them, and ascribe one to the prophet, another to the Messiah, and another to Jehovah Himself;
but you must take the whole as the utterance of one Divine Person. That Jehovah-Jesus is the
One who is speaking here, is very clear from the last verse of the previous chapter: “I the Lord”
(“I, Jehovah,” it is,) “am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty One of Jacob.”
I. BEHOLD THE MESSIAH AS GOD. Link Isa_50:3; Isa_6:1-13: “I clothe the heavens with
blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering . . . I gave my back to the smiters,” etc. He, then,
who suffered thus, and whom we regard as redeeming us by His death, and as saving us by His
life, is no less than the Almighty God. I think the first reference, in these words, is to the
miracles which were wrought by the plagues in Egypt. It was Jehovah-Jesus who was then
plaguing His adversaries. In a later chapter, Isaiah says that “the Angel of His presence saved
them;” and who is that great Angel of His presence but the Angel of the covenant in whom we
delight, even Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour? But we must not restrict the text to that which
happened in the land of Egypt, for it has a far wider reference. All the great wonders of nature
are to be ascribed to Him upon whom we build all our hopes for time and for eternity. The last
miracle recorded here, namely, that of covering the heavens with sackcloth, was performed by
our Lord even when He was in His death agony. You are not depending for your salvation upon
a mere man. He is man, but He is just as truly Divine.
II. BEHOLD THE MESSIAH AS THE INSTRUCTED TEACHER (verse 4). I call your special
attention to the condescension of our Lord in coming here on purpose to care for the weak—to
speak consoling and sustaining words to them; and also to the fact that, before He performed
that service, He learned the sacred art from His Father. For thirty years was He learning much
in Joseph’s carpenter’s shop. Little do we know how much He learned there; but this much we
do know, “Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.” And
afterwards, when He entered upon His public work among men, He spake with the tongue of the
learned, saying to His disciples, “All things that I have heard of My Father I have made known
unto you.” All through His time of teaching, He was still listening and learning.
III. BEHOLD JESUS CHRIST AS THE SERVANT OF THE LORD (verse 5).
1. He speaks of Himself as being prepared by grace. “The Lord God hath opened Mine ear,”
as if there had been a work wrought upon Him to prepare Him for His service. And the same
Spirit, which rested upon Christ, must also open our ears.
2. Being thus prepared by grace, He was consecrated in due form, so that He could say to
Himself, “The Lord God hath opened Mine ear.” He heard the faintest whispers of His
Father’s voice.

19. 3. He not only heard His Father’s voice, but He was obedient to it in all things. “I was not
rebellious.” From the day when, as a child, He said to His parents, “Wist ye not that I must
be about My Father’s business?” till the hour when, on the cross, He cried, “It is finished,”
He was always obedient to the will of God.
4. In that obedience, He was persevering through all trials. He says that He did not turn
away back. Having commenced the work of saving men, He went through with it.
IV. BEHOLD THE MESSIAH AS THE PEERLESS SUFFERER (verse 6). It has been asked, “Did
God really die?” No; for God cannot die, yet He who died was God; so, if there be a confusion in
your mind, it is the confusion of Holy Scripture itself, for we read, “Feed the Church of God,
which He hath purchased with His own blood.” In addition to the pain, we are asked, in this
verse, to notice particularly the contempt which the Saviour endured. The plucking of His hair
was a proof of the malicious contempt of His enemies, yet they went still further, and did spit in
His face. Spitting was regarded by Orientals, and, I suppose, by all of us, as the most
contemptuous thing which one man could do to another; yet the vile soldiers gathered round
Him, and spat upon Him. I must point out the beautiful touch of voluntariness here: “I hid not
my face.” Our Saviour did not turn away, or seek to escape. If He had wished to do so, He could
readily have done it. Conclusion: Notice three combinations which the verses of my text will
make.
(1) Verses 2 and 6. Those verses together show the full ability of Christ to save. Here we
have God and the Sufferer.
(2) Verses 4 and 5. Here you have the Teacher and the Servant, and the two together
make up this truth—that Christ teaches us, not with words only, but with His life. What a
wonderful Teacher He is, who Himself learned the lessons which He would have us
learn!
(3) Now put the whole text together, and I think the result will be—at least to God’s
people—that they will say, “This God shall be our God for ever and ever; and it shall be
our delight to do His bidding at all times.” It is a high honour to serve God; and Christ is
God. It is a great thing to be the servant of a wise teacher; and Christ has the tongue of
the learned. It is a very sweet thing to walk in the steps of a perfect Exemplar; and Christ
is that. And, last and best of all, it is delightful to live for Him who suffered and died on
our behalf. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Isaiah 50:4-11
The Lord God hath given Me the tongue of the learned
The Lord’s servant made perfect through sufferings
In Isa_50:4-9 the servant is again introduced, speaking of Himself and His work, as in Isa_49:1-
6.
He describes—
1. The close, intimate, and continuous communion with God through which He has learned
the ministry of comfort by the Divine word, and His own complete self-surrender to the
voice that guides Him (Isa_49:4-5).
2. His acceptance of the persecution and obloquy which He had to encounter in the
discharge of His commission (Isa_49:6).

20. 3. His unwavering confidence in the help of Jehovah, and the victory of His righteous cause,
and the discomfiture of all His enemies (Isa_49:7-9). Verses 10, 11 are an appendix to the
preceding description, drawing lessons for the encouragement of believers (Isa_49:10) or
the warning of unbelievers (Isa_49:11). Although the word “Servant” never occurs in this
passage, its resemblance to the three other “Servant-passages” makes it certain that the
speaker is none other than the ideal character who comes before us in Isa_42:1-4; Isa_49:1-
6; Isa_52:13-15; Isa_53:1-12. The passage, indeed, forms analmost indispensable link of
connection between the first two and the last of these. (Prof. J. Skinner, D.D.)
The Messiah an instructed Teacher
After the Messiah had been exhibited in the preceding discourse labouring in vain and spending
His strength for nought among the Jews, despised of men and abhorred by the nations, when
actually employed in His public ministry, it became necessary to explain this surprising
phenomenon. It is, therefore, affirmed that the neglect and contempt which He suffered was not
owing to any deficiency on the part of this celebrated Teacher, who was eminently qualified for
acquainting men with the Will of God, in the knowledge of which He was perfectly instructed.
This important qualification was not imparted to Him by any human teacher, neither did He
acquire it in the schools of philosophers and orators, nor was it communicated to Him by the
most eminent of the prophets, but by the Spirit of the Lord God, to whom it is here attributed.
(R. Macculloch.)
The tongue of the learned
I. THE CHARACTER DESCRIBED AS NEEDING THE SAVIOUR’S GRACE. “Him that is
weary.” This description includes a very large class. All may not ascribe their weariness to the
same cause, nor may all be sensible of their weariness to the same extent. Yet all are weary.
1. Not in the world of sense only do you complain of weariness. It is impossible for the
unrenewed heart to find rest even in things that are Spiritual. Heaven itself would to such a
one cease to be heaven. What a weariness do you find in the religion of Jesus Christ! Of
prayer, of public worship, of hearing sermons, of religious conversation, of the service and
work of the Lord you say, “What a weariness!”
2. The description, certainly, includes those who are truly anxious about the salvation of
their souls.
3. The Lord’s weary ones include His own quickened people, who feel the burden of the body
of sin, and are cast down because of their difficulties.
4. The assaults of the adversary, too, contribute not a little to the sense of weariness, which
often prostrate a child of God.
5. Add to these the numerous and varied trials and afflictions which beset his pathway to
heaven, and you have in outline the picture of his case.
II. CHRIST’S QUALIFICATIONS TO MEET THE CASE OF SUCH.
1. His participation of our nature. Absolute Godhead could not of itself have conveyed to us
sinners one word of sympathy or comfort. Neither could the angels do it. They are total
strangers to the weariness to which sinful children of men are heirs. But, the man Christ
Jesus becomes a partaker of the very nature whose burdens He sought to relieve.

21. “Forasmuch as the children were partakers of flesh and blood, He also took part in the
same.”
2. As He thus took upon Him our nature, so He also endured our sinless though humbling
infirmities.
3. In addition to all this, the Lord God had given Him the tongue of the learned in another
sense. I refer to the communication of the Divine Spirit Isa_61:1). Never was there a tongue
like Christ’s—so learned, soskilled, so practised, and so experienced. “Never man spake like
this man.”
4. The purpose for which this tongue of the learned was given Him is thus described—“That
He should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary.”
(1) A word,
(2) a word in season,
(3) that He should know how to speak.
5. But when Christ speaks to the weary, it is not to the outward ear merely, but to the heart—
with almighty power. And the result is rest.
III. THE REST WHICH JESUS IMPARTS, when He speaks the word in season.
1. We are seeking rest by nature everywhere, and in everything but in Jesus. We seek it in
the outward world, in the moral world, in the religious world—and we find it not. We seek it
in conviction, in ordinances, in doing the works of the law—and still it evades us. We go from
place to place, and from means to means, and still the burden presses, and we find no rest.
No, and never will, until it is sought and found in Jesus.
2. Yet, in the case of a tried believer, the rest that Jesus imparts does not always imply the
removal of the burden from which the sense of weariness proceeds. The burden is permitted
to remain, and yet rest is experienced. Wonderful indeed! How is it explained? That burden
takes us to Jesus. He pours strength into our souls, life into our spirits, and love into our
hearts, and so we find rest. It is also matter of much practical importance, that you take heed
not to anticipate or forestall His promised grace. For every possible emergency in which you
can be placed, the fulness of Christ and the supplies of the Covenant are provided. But that
provision is only meted out as the necessity for which it was intended occurs.
3. There is an hour approaching—the last great crisis of human life—when, we shall all, more
than ever, need Him who hath the “tongue of the learned.” It will be of all seasons the most
trying and solemn—the season that separates the soul from the body, and ushers the
immortal spirit into eternity. Is it not our highest wisdom to know this Saviour now? (C.
Ross M. A.)
A word to the weary
I. THE POWER OF SPEAKING TO THE WEARY IS NOTHING LESS THAN A DIVINE GIFT.
We may say the right word in a wrong tone.
II. Though the gift itself is Divine, IT IS TO BE EXERCISED SEASONABLY. It is not enough to
speak the right word, it must be spoken at the right moment. (J. Parker, D.D.)
Christ speaking a word in season to the weary

22. I. CONSIDER THE STATE AND CHARACTER OF THOSE THAT ARE WEARY.
II. SHOW, FROM THE CHARACTER AND PERSON OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST, THAT
HE IS A SEASONABLE AND ALL-SUFFICIENT SAVIOUR TO THOSE WHO ARE WEARY. The
excellency and glory of Christ may not only be perceived by viewing Him in the whole of His
mediatorial character; but, also, by fixing on specific parts of it, and showing that there is a
Divine suitability to all the exigencies of ruined men.
1. He can give rest to the mind of the man who is wearied with his researches after human
wisdom.
2. He can give rest to those who are oppressed under a sense of guilt.
3. He can speak a word in season to those who have wearied themselves in attempting to
establish their own righteousness.
4. He can give rest to those who have wearied themselves in vainly trying to overcome their
corruptions in their own strength.
5. He can speak a word in season to those who are weary with the weight of affliction and
trouble.
6. He can give rest to those who are oppressed and wearied with the cares of this world.
7. Christ can speak a word in season to those who are weary of living in this world. None of
the children of men can enjoy rest, or real peace of mind, but through faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. (J. Matheson.)
The ministry of preaching
(with Act_20:27). The first passage is spoken by the Messiah, the second by St. Paul. The one
looks forward, the other backward. The one speaks of a preparation and fitness for a work yet to
be done; the other is a thankful record of a mission already faithfully accomplished.
I. IN THE FIRST PASSAGE YOU HAVE THE CHIEF MINISTER OF THE CHURCH
ANTICIPATING HIS WORK OF TEACHING AND ANNOUNCING HIS FITNESS FOR THE
WORK.
1. Observe the gift with which He claims to be endowed as one element of special fitness for
His ministry. Speech was the chief instrument employed by Christ for conveying truth to the
minds of men. The dispensation under which we live, so emphatically designated the
dispensation of the Spirit, was ushered in by two miracles, both of which related to the
tongue The Holy Spirit Himself appeared resting upon each one in the form of cloven
tongues as of fire. A second miracle was wrought on the uneducated Galilean apostles,
enabling them, without learning, to speak intelligently in the dialects of all the nationalities
present, so that every man heard them speak in his own language. And why, at the very
founding of Christianity, was this twofold miracle wrought in relation to the tongue, if not to
indicate that the Holy Spirit purposed to employ speech as the chief instrument in the
regeneration of mankind?
2. The purpose for which this gift of speech is to be employed. “To speak a word in season to
him that is weary.”
(1) You will have to speak to men suffering, from mental weariness—men who have long
searched for truth and failed to find it. See that ye be well furnished with the Spirit, who
has promised to guide you into all truth, and who also will help you to guide others into
all truth.

23. (2) You will have others wearied in body, through excessive labour or sore affliction. You
may tell them of the illustrious Sufferer of Calvary who, though innocent, suffered for
our sins; was in all points tempted like as we are; and who, therefore, is able to succour
all those who are tempted.
(3) You will have others wearied in heart, by reason of bereavement. Imitating the Great
Teacher in the bereaved family of Bethany, you must direct the thought of the sorrowful
to the resurrection power of Christ, when the mortal shall put on immortality, and the
corruptible shall put on incorruption.
(4) Others will come to you weary of the vicissitudes, disappointments and reverses of
life. With the Master, you may speak to them of the lily, the sparrow, the grass, the flower
of the field; how your Heavenly Father careth for these, but how much more He will care
for those who have faith in and love towards Him, even to the numbering of every hair
on the whitening brow.
(5) Others will come with weary consciences, burdened with sin, fearing the wrath to
come, carrying with them, it may be, the dread secret of undiscovered and unconfessed
crime. Take solemn heed that the word you speak is a word in season. Do not heal lightly
the wounds thus made by the Spirit. Do not attempt to soothe the agony by minifying the
guilt, or lessening the condemnation, or diminishing the penalty. Do what the Spirit
does. Take of the things of Christ and show them unto the penitent; show them in their
preciousness, their efficacy, and their all-sufficiency.
(6) Others may come to you weary of inbred sin. Open your ear to hear what the Lord
your God will say unto you; humbly wait with an upward look to your Great Teacher, and
He will give you the tongue of the learned.
3. This learning claimed by the Redeemer is set forth as progressive. “He wakeneth Me
morning by morning. He wakeneth mine ear that I may hear as disciples do.” If our Lord
found it necessary to place Himself in the position of a pupil to receive daily instruction from
the Divine Father, how much greater need is there for you who are His ministers? You
cannot learn in one lesson all that the Holy Spirit has to communicate. Cultivate a sensibility
of soul, a readiness to hear the softest, gentlest tone of God, whether in nature, in
providence, in history, in the inspired word, or in the deep secrets of your own heart.
II. THE NOBLE TESTIMONY OF THE NOBLEST APOSTLE AT THE CLOSE OF HIS
MINISTRY AT EPHESUS. (R..Roberts.)
The weary world and the refreshing ministry
I. THE WEARY WORLD. It is not one man that is weary, the generation is weary, the world is
weary. All sinners are weary. Wearied with fruitless efforts after happiness. There is the ennui
yawn, and the groan of depression heard everywhere.
II. THE REFRESHING MINISTRY. “The Lord God hath given me,” etc.
1. The relief comes by speech. No physical, legislative, or ceremonial means will do; it must
be by the living voice, charged with sympathy, truth, light.
2. The effective speech comes from God. “The Lord God hath given Me the tongue of the
learned.” No man can speak the soul-refreshing thing unless God inspires and teaches him.
3. The speech that comes from God is a “word in season.” It is exactly suited to the mood of
the souls addressed. (Homilist.)

24. A word in season to the weary
(with Mat_11:28-30):—
I. We may name WOUNDED AFFECTIONS as a very frequent cause of weariness. We do not
know, until the blow comes, how heavily we have been leaning on the staff of friendly sympathy.
Breaking beneath our weight, it leaves us tottering and weary. But amidst all our heart-troubles
the voice of the Saviour is heard saying, “Rest! Come unto Me and I will give you rest.”
II. THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF OUR DESIRES is another common antecedent of lassitude. All
of us are furnished with larger appetites than we have ability or opportunity for satisfying.
Pleasure! Money! Power! Reputation! How seldom do men know when they have enough of that
which they most desire. So, as the material of sensuous enjoyment becomes exhausted, the sense
of emptiness becomes more painful. But in this mood, too, we are met by the Divine Saviour:
“Come unto Me, and I will give you rest.” For Christ would fill the soul with the only object of
desire that cannot disappear in its grasp: with the Eternal Himself.
III. VACANCY OF MIND AND THE SENSE OF MONOTONY is another common cause of
weariness. “Nature abhors a vacuum,” as the old philosophers said. The mind cannot endure its
own emptiness. It is so constituted that it must have change and variety of impressions and
ideas; otherwise it turns upon itself, and its fine mechanism is worn down with useless friction.
But He who comes to reveal the Father meets us, too, in this mood of self-weariness. It is His
message to tell us of a new self which it is the will of God to impart to us; a new heart in which it
may please God to dwell, and with which He can hold fellowship. The man who yields himself to
the Spirit, and is born of the Spirit, need no longer be disgusted with himself, having found his
nature anew in God.
IV. But the load of A GUILTY CONSCIENCE is even more fatiguing than that of a vacant mind.
Need it be pointed out how profoundly Christ meets this guilty dejection of the human heart?
V. Quite a different cause of weariness is to be found in THE BURDEN OF EARNEST
THOUGHT AND NOBLE ENDEAVOUR. For the Christian, it is enough that his Saviour has
“suffered in the flesh”—has borne “the weary weight of all this unintelligible world” in
uncomplaining meekness. He is to “arm himself likewise with the same mind.” (E. Johnson,
M.A.)
Noble gifts for lowly uses
I. GOD’S HIGHEST GIFTS HAVE THEIR DEFINITE END AND PURPOSE. In Nature, for
instance, nothing has been created in vain. And so it ought to be in human life, that world of
feeling and desire within the breast of man. You see that the prophet looked upon the tongue of
the learned as a gift from God, holding it in trust, where many would have counted it as their
own. And he saw it was a gift for very plain and apparent purposes—for men are stewards, and
not owners of all that is bestowed upon them. This splendid administrative genius of the Anglo-
Saxon race, dominant and even imperious, but only because it has seen into the heart of
purposes working themselves out in the midst of the ages, the wealth it has acquired, the
influence it commands, has this no meaning in the economy of nations? You only need the touch
of Christ to consecrate it and turn it into right channels, and the whole world is blessed thereby.
“We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak.”
II. THIS DEFINITE PURPOSE IS A VERY SIMPLE ONE, AND POSSIBLY AT FIRST SIGHT
INSUFFICIENT. Ambition would say so, and ambition is as natural to the human heart as desire

25. itself. We ask great things, we would be great things, we would do them. It must be confessed,
however, that no sin of man has been more constant and apparent than that which has made
men look down upon these lowly uses belonging unto lofty gifts. A proud reserve has been
considered in all ages as appropriate to commanding talents. The statesman’s wisdom, the
orator’s art, the poet’s fire, what are they side by side with all that wondrous wealth lavished
upon simple fishermen in Galilee, and carried into the home of Lazarus, and spent among the
humble poor. Between the highest born among men and the humblest service henceforward
there can be no disparity. “If I, then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet,” He said to
His disciples, “ye ought also to wash one another’s feet.” And as with individuals, so with
nations. God gives special gifts for His own purposes.
III. THIS PURPOSE IS A VERY URGENT AND APPROPRIATE ONE. After all, the end is not
beneath the means. It needs the tongue of the learned to speak a word in season to him that is
weary, that word fitly spoken which dries the tear from the eye, and banishes sorrow from the
heart. To do away with pain and assuage grief, is not that a noble, a Divine thing? And will you
see how Christianity has been doing this in lower and yet very important directions, permeating
society by its subtle influences for good? And more when you understand Isaiah’s words in their
true and spiritual significance, what a field of usefulness unfolds itself! For the great burdens of
mankind are not physical, but mental and spiritual. (W. Baxendale.)
Words in season for the weary
I. THE EDUCATION OF THE DIVINE SERVANT. We must notice the difference between the
authorized version and the new. In the one, “the Lord God hath given Me the tongue of the
learned, that I should know.” In the other, “of them that are taught”—or, as the margin reads, “of
disciples.” The thought being that the Lord Jesus in His human life was a pupil in the school of
human pain, under the tutelage of His Father.
1. His education was by God Himself.
2. It was various. He passed through each class in the school of weariness.
3. It was constant. “Morning by morning” the Father woke Him.
4. It dealt with the season for administering comfort. “That I should know how to speak a
word in season.” There are times when the nervous system is so overstrained that it cannot
bear even the softest words. It is best then to be silent. A caress, a touch, or the stillness that
breathes an atmosphere of calm, will then most quickly soothe and heal. This delicacy of
perception can only be acquired in the school of suffering.
5. It embraced the method. “That I should know how.” The manner is as important as the
season. A message of good-will may be uttered with so little sympathy, and in tones so gruff
and grating, that it will repel. The touch of the comforter must be that of the nurse on the
fractured bone—of the mother with the frightened child.
II. HIS RESOLUTION. From the first, Jesus knew that He must die. The Lord God poured the
full story into His opened ear. With all other men, death is the close of their life; with Christ it
was the object. We die because we were born; Christ was born that He might die. On one
occasion, towards the close of His earthly career, when the fingers on the dial-plate were
pointing to the near fulfilment of the time, we are told He set His face steadfastly to go to
Jerusalem. What heroism was here! Men sometimes speak of Christ as if He were effeminate
and weak, remarkable only for passive virtues. But such conceptions are refuted by the
indomitable resolution which set its face like a flint, and knew that it would not be ashamed.
Note the voluntariness of Christ’s surrender. The martyr dies because he cannot help it; Christ

26. dies because He chose. It has been thought that the opened ear refers to something more than
the pushing back of the flowing Oriental locks in order to utter the secret of coming sorrow. It is
supposed to have some reference to the ancient Jewish custom of boring the ear of the slave to
the doorpost of the master’s house. Under this metaphor it is held that our Lord chose with keen
sympathy the service of the Father, and elected all that it might involve, because He loved Him
and would not go out free. The images may be combined. Be it only remembered that He knew
and chose all that would come upon Him, and that the fetters which bound Him to the Cross
were those of undying love to us and of burning passion for the Father’s glory.
III. HIS VINDICATION. “He is near that justifieth Me.” These are words upon which Jesus may
have stayed Himself through those long hours of trial. They said that He was the Friend of
publicans and sinners. God has justified Him by showing that if He associates with such, it is to
make them martyrs and saints. They said that He was mad. God has justified Him by making
His teaching the illumination of the noblest and wisest of the race. They said He had a devil. God
has justified Him by giving Him power to cast out the devil and hind him with a mighty chain.
They said that He blasphemed when He called Himself the Son of God. God has justified Him by
raising Him to the right hand of power, so that He will come in the clouds of heaven, with power
and great glory. They said that He would destroy the temple and the commonwealth of Israel.
God has justified Him in shedding the influence of the Hebrew people through all the nations of
the world, and making their literature, their history, their conceptions dominant.
IV. HIS APPEAL (verse 16). To obey the Lord’s servant is equivalent to fearing the Lord. He
who does the one must do the other. What is this but to proclaim His Deity? (F. B. Meyer, B.A.)
A word in season to him that is weary
A word to the weary
To speak a word is easy, to speak a word in season is difficult; but to speak a word in season to
him that is weary is more difficult still; and yet to be able to accomplish this end wisely and
successfully is to be one of the greatest benefactors to our race. (E. Mellor, D. D.)
Weariness
Weariness the word reveals its parentage clearly enough. To be weary is to be worn—or worn
out—or worn down. One wears his coat until it is worn out; and so you wear your strength until
it is worn out, There is a weariness also which is not the result of excessive toil, but of indolence.
For no man sighs so much, complains so much, fears so much, as the man who sets himself the
task of passing through life doing nothing. Sometimes weariness is a virtue; sometimes it is a
sin. But whether it be virtue or sin, there is no man who does not know well what it is to be
weary. (E. Mellor, D. D.)
Words to the weary
We have many doors in our nature, and at every one of these weariness may enter.
I. There is—to begin at the lowest door of all—the physical one, THE WEARINESS WHICH
COMES TO US FROM BODILY TOIL, or from toil which, whether bodily or not, tells upon the
body by wasting for the time its energies. So far as such toil is rendered necessary by the very
fundamental conditions of our existence, the weariness which ensues upon it is a Divine
appointment, and the most benign provision has been made for meeting and banishing it. You

27. need no word in season for such weariness as this. There is something better than a word for
you. There is night with its soothing darkness. There is your bed with its repose; and there is
sleep, “Nature’s soft nurse, that doth knit the ravelled sleeve of care, and steep your senses in
forgetfulness.” And there is not merely the night, but the Sabbath. But there is also a weariness
which has the nature of a chastisement, because it is produced by excessive and needless toil.
While labour is a Divine thing in just measure, yet, when it becomes care, worry, vexation, hot
and insatiable ambition, greed, it becomes criminal, and draws after it sooner or later grim
consequences, the thought of which ought to make men pause. You cannot run both quickly and
long. What is the word in season for such cases as these? The word may not be pleasant, for the
words in season which God utters to us are often like thunderclaps to startle us, or like a firm
grip of the hand which seems to say, “Stop, or you are undone.” But surely the word in season to
many is: Release your strain, moderate your speed, economize your energies, stop up the leak
through which your health is trickling already, and may soon be rushing like a stream; what
shall it profit you if you gain the whole world, and lose your life?
II. Some men are WEARY WITH PLEASURE. There is no decree of God more stern or more
inflexible than that which has determined that misery shall be the constant companion of the
man that seeks pleasure. He may be a swift runner, but pleasure runs more swiftly still. Let us
accept it as a moral axiom which has no exception, that the fulfilment of duty is the condition of
happiness in this world. The word in season, therefore, for those who are weary in pleasure is
this: Revise and reverse your whole judgment as to what you are and as to your relation to God,
and this world, and the world which is to come.
III. Some men are WEARY WITH WELL-DOING WHICH SEEMS TO COME TO SO POOR AN
END. This is so common a tendency that we are warned against it, “Be not weary in well-doing,
for in due season ye shall reap if ye faint not.” “Be ye steadfast, unmovable,” etc. Men who are
working for God in this world have doubtless a heavy task in hand. The soil is uncongenial. It is
beaten hard with sin and evil habit; and the ploughshare enters it with difficulty, and with
difficulty makes its way. Take any sphere of benevolence you like, whether the lower one of
sympathy with the common sufferings of man, or the higher one of concern for their spiritual
necessities and sorrows and dangers, and the labour is no holiday play. Well-doing appears so
often like building in a quagmire. We sow good seed, and then the enemy sows tares. We root up
one evil, and another springs up in its stead. Well-doing in the shape of teaching would not be so
wearying if the children were not so listless, so rude, so dull, so forgetful, so disappointing. Well-
doing in the shape of charity would not be so wearying if there were not so much of ingratitude
and imposture. What is the word in season to those who are weary in such good work? Such as
these: Think, before you withdraw from what appears to be unfruitful labour, that God still
holds on His Divine purpose, and is kind to the unthankful and the evil; think that He is good
and doeth good continually, and that, were He to grow weary in well-doing, He would plunge the
world into desolation in a moment. Think, too, that if you grow weary, all others may grow
weary too, and that then the world will be left to itself: ignorance, vice, crime, wretchedness
spreading with every hour, until the earth will be little better than a suburb of hell itself. Think,
to, that in well-doing you do find some results, though they may not be equal to your hope, and
that the results, though unseen, may still be there, and will appear some day, and be reaped by
another’s hand. And be sure of this, that nothing good is ever lost.
IV. There are those who ARE WEARY OF THE STRIFE WITH SIN. This is emphatically the
battle of life and the battle for life. What is the word in season to him who is thus weary? This—
that Christ has already vanquished your most powerful foe, and will make you more than
conqueror.
V. There is one word more in season for those who ARE WEARY IN SIN, BUT NOT YET
WEARY OF IT. Would to God they were weary of it! for to feel it to be a burden and a woe is the

28. first step to deliverance. (E. Mellor, D. D.)
Weary souls
So far as we can tell, all life is joyous, except that of humanity. Even those creatures which are
under the care of man have not the joyousness they might have if they were roaming the fields or
hills. Look at the horse on the American prairies; see him in some of the cabs and coal carts at
home! Though the life of birds and animals is naturally a happy one, the life of humanity, for the
most part, is one of trouble. People who firmly resolve to act rightly and Christianly in this
world, shall certainly “have tribulation.” In the Bible, we have the record of many people who
knew what it is to have a weary soul. Above all weary souls, let us remember the loving Saviour,
who was “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.”
I. YOU MAY BE WEARY WITH THE PARTICULAR BURDEN WHICH WEIGHTS YOUR LIFE.
Every one of us has a special burden of our own. The Christian philosophy of burden-bearing is
to take things as we find them and make the best of them; not like a vicious horse to kick against
the “splinter hoard,” or set up our back rebelliously. Directly we submit to the yoke, and say Thy
will he done, our burden becomes lighter. The Divine Word teaches that your life has a Divine
purpose.
II. Perhaps, your soul is WEARY BECAUSE OF THE UNKINDNESS OF YOUR FRIENDS. Let
your only aim be to please God and do your duty; and then, though the action of friends may
grieve you, it shall neither hinder your work nor give you a weary soul.
III. But another may say that his weary soul is caused by HIS SIN. When you behold Jesus on
the Cross you will see what He suffered for sin; and when you behold Him risen from the dead,
you will see the power at your hand to enable you to flee from every temptation.
IV. Some of you may have weary souls, because YOUR LIFE IS VERY BITTER. But in heaven
your sorrow and sighing, like that of the apostle John, shall flee away. (W.Birch.)
A word to the weary
I. Are there any WEARY WORKLINGS here? The soul of man once found its rest in God. Weary,
was a word unknown in the language of Eden; for Jehovah was then the spirit’s home. Its
affections reposed upon the all-sufficient God. He was a Friend of whose company the soul could
never tire, and in whose service it never could grow weary. But now that the soul has taken leave
of God, it has never found another rest like Him. Till it comes to live on God Himself, the hungry
soul of man never will be satisfied. Ye worldlings, who wander joyless through a godless world,
with weary feet and withered hearts, seeking rest and finding none, come to Jesus, and He will
give you rest.
II. Are there any WEARY WITH THE BURDEN OF UNPARDONED GUILT? You remember
when Christian had panted up the hill, and came in sight of the Cross, how his burden fell off
and rolled away down into the sepulchre; and you remember how he wondered that the sight of
a cross should instantly relieve him of his load. Come to Christ upon the Cross, and you will
understand the pilgrim’s wonder; for your burden will, in like manner, fall off and disappear.
III. Are there any WEARIED WITH THE GREATNESS OF THEIR WAY? You have been long
seeking salvation. Suppose that one of those winter evenings you went down into the country on
a visit to a friend. It is a dark night when the stage coach stops; the conductor steps down, opens
the door, and lets you out. He tells you that your friend’s house is hard by, and if the night were
a little clearer, you would see it just over the way. “‘Tis but a step, you cannot miss it.” However,

29. you contrive to miss it. Your guide springs up into the box—the long train of lamp light is lost in
misty gloom, and the distant rumble of the wheels is drowned in the rush of the tempest. You
are left alone. The directions you received were quite correct, and if you followed them
implicitly, you could not go wrong. But you have a theory of the matter in your own mind. “What
did he mean by saying, that it was just a step? He cannot live so very near the highway.” You
pass the gate, and plod away up the hill, till at last you become impatient—for there are no
symptoms of a dwelling here. You turn aside into this lane, and you climb over that stile, till
weary with splashing through miry stubble fields, and all drenched with driving rain, you find
yourself, after many a weary round, precisely where you started. Half dead with fatigue and
vexation, you lift the latch of a cottage-door, and ask if they know where such-a-one resides. And
a little child undertakes to guide you. He opens a wicket, and points to the long lines of light
gleaming through a easement a few paces distant. “Do you see the lights in yon window? Well,
that is it; knock, and they’ll open the door.” In such a homely instance, you all know what it is to
be weary in the greatness of your way—to spend your strength in a long circuit, when a single
step might have sufficed. But are you sure that it is not in some such way, that you “labour and
find no rest,” whilst there is but a step betwixt you and Christ? That is the wisest and happiest
course which the sinner can take—to go at once to the Saviour. (J. Hamilton, D.D.)
The weary
“Weary” denotes a class to which a multitude belong that no man can number, of every nation,
kindred, tribe, and people.
1. Physical weariness—of the slave on the march; of the toiler in the sweating den; of the
seamstress working far into the night by the wasting taper; of the mother worn with
watching her sick child.
2. Mental weariness—when the fancy can no longer summon at will images of beauty; and
the intellect refuses to follow another argument, master another page, or cast up another
column.
3. Heart weariness—waiting in vain for the word so long expected but unspoken; for the
returning step of the prodigal; for the long-delayed letter.
4. The weariness of the inner conflict of striving day by day against the selfishness and
waywardness of the soul on which prolonged resistance makes so slight an impression.
5. The weariness of the Christian worker, worn by the perpetual chafe of human sorrow, sin,
and need. (F. B. Meyer, B.A.)
The gift of consolation
Nothing so clearly betokens a tongue befitting the disciples of God as the gift of consolation, and
such a tongue has He who is the speaker here: “to aid with words him who is exhausted”—
through the pain of suffering and mortification of spirit. (F. Delitzsch, D.D.)
He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned
God’s day school
“Morning by morning He openeth mine ear to hear as the scholars.” If we would rightly
understand this Divine application of Isaiah’s words, we must first understand the human