How strikingly is the conduct of wicked and unregenerate men here marked! If the Lord's hand be lifted up in judgments; though they see the judgments; yet as the Lord's judgments they see them not. And though the Lord's hand be fallen down in punishments; though the punishments they feel; yet the Lord's hand in them they regard not. Here again, as in the former verses, the contrast is set forth between the righteous and the wicked; between him that serveth God, and him that serveth him not; Malachi 3:18.
Isaiah 26:11-18
11 LORD, when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see: but they shall see, and be ashamed for their envy at the people; yea, the fire of thine enemies shall devour them.
12 LORD, thou wilt ordain peace for us: for thou also hast wrought all our works in us.d
13 O LORD our God, other lords beside thee have had dominion over us: but by thee only will we make mention of thy name.
14 They are dead, they shall not live; they are deceased, they shall not rise: therefore hast thou visited and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish.
15 Thou hast increased the nation, O LORD, thou hast increased the nation: thou art glorified: thou hadst removed it far unto all the ends of the earth.
16 LORD, in trouble have they visited thee, they poured out a prayere when thy chastening was upon them.
17 Like as a woman with child, that draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs; so have we been in thy sight, O LORD.
18 We have been with child, we have been in pain, we have as it were brought forth wind; we have not wrought any deliverance in the earth; neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen.