The Coming Pouring Out of the Holy Spirit (Isaiah 44:1-5).
‘Yet now hear, O Jacob my servant,
And Israel whom I have chosen.'
This reversal of order of the names Jacob and Israel (see also Isaiah 43:22) compared with Isaiah 41:8 may arise from what has just been described. At present Israel His hardened servant is more like scheming Jacob. But the nation as an entity is still His chosen. Thus not all of them will become ‘devoted to destruction' and ‘a reviling' (Isaiah 43:28). Implicit within the descriptions are that they are the seed of Jacob, and therefore of Abraham (Isaiah 41:8).
‘Thus says Yahweh who made you, and formed you from the womb, who will help you.'
The inner nation had been made, fashioned and shaped by Yahweh right from the time of conception. They are His firstborn (Exodus 4:22). Thus He will not desert them but will help them.
“Do not be afraid, O Jacob my servant,
And you Jeshurun whom I have chosen.”
The change of Israel's name to Jeshurun must be significant. It refers back to Deuteronomy 32:15-17; Deuteronomy 32 appears to be re-echoed in this passage. Consider for example the reference to the Rock and the use of Eloah (in Isaiah 44:8), the latter being the poetical word for God. There in Deuteronomy Israel, under the name of Jeshurun, (which is actually an affectionate term, ‘O upright one'), was castigated for growing ‘fat' and prosperous, and thus forsaking God and lightly esteeming the Rock of their deliverance, moving Him to jealousy with strange gods, and provoking Him to anger with their abominations, sacrificing to god who were not gods at all, but demons. The reference is therefore apposite after Isaiah 43:22-28.
The name Jeshurun occurs elsewhere only three times, in Deuteronomy 32:15; Deuteronomy 33:5; Deuteronomy 33:26. It probably means ‘upright one'. It may well therefore indicate the spiritual true Israel, while also through Deuteronomy 32:15 indicating rebuke.
So the mention of them as Jeshurun is in fact both a rebuke and a comfort. A rebuke because they had done exactly what Moses had said as described in Isaiah 43:22-28, and a comfort because He is promising to help them because He has in mind those who will yet be truly upright through His grace. It is a reminder that it is the upright ones who are the true Israel.
“For I will pour water on him who is thirsty,
And streams on the dry ground,
I will pour my Spirit on your seed,
And my blessing on your offspring,
And they will spring up among the grass,
As willows by the watercourses,
One shall say, ‘I am Yahweh's',
And another will call himself by the name of Jacob,
And another will subscribe with his hand to Yahweh,
And surname himself with the name of Israel.”
This is an extension on the idea in Isaiah 32:15-18, but here the emphasis is totally on spiritual transformation. The great change to take place in God's people will occur through the direct activity of God (compare Isaiah 45:8; Isaiah 55:10-13; Joel 2:28-29; Jeremiah 31:31-34; Ezekiel 36:26-27; Ezekiel 37:7-10).
Here the Spirit of God is again pictured in terms of water poured down and the streams that result. The ground is dry until God's Spirit works on it. But once His Spirit, His active, personal blessing, has come on Israel's seed and offspring, they will spring to life like vegetation among the grass. They will grow like willows beside plentiful water (compare Psalms 1:3; Jeremiah 17:8). Only someone who has lived in a similar climate to Canaan can picture the scene. First the dry barren ground, with everything brown and dead all around. And then the rain comes and suddenly as if from nowhere greenery springs up everywhere. It almost seems like magic, but it is really the result of the Creator's work.
This is thus a picture of new life, of a new creation. It was what Jesus meant by being ‘born of water, even of the Spirit' and being ‘born from above' (John 3:5-6), and was what John's baptism also signified. That is why John the Baptiser also spoke of grain that had to be separated from the chaff at the harvest, a picture of the ‘drenching with rain' by the Holy Spirit yet to come, producing abundant harvest. It is what Paul meant when he said, ‘if any man be in Christ he is a new creation' (2 Corinthians 5:17).
‘One shall say, ‘I am Yahweh's', and another will call himself by the name of Jacob, and another will subscribe with his hand (or ‘write on his hand') to Yahweh, and surname himself with the name of Israel.” Then those on whom the Spirit works will boast in being Yahweh's, they will delight in being called sons of Abraham (Galatians 3:7), the true seed of Abraham (Galatians 3:29), they will write on their hands Yahweh's name as a token of ownership, and they will gladly take the name of God's Israel and become true ‘children of Israel'.
This statement about ‘calling themselves by the name of Jacob' would be mainly redundant if it only referred to the Israel that was, for they already called themselves Jacob and bore the name of Israel. It is rather an indication of the wider outreach to the nations, often visualised by Isaiah, with individuals from among the nations uniting with the true Israel and becoming adopted Israelites, and thus calling themselves by the name of Jacob.
This first occurred during the inter-testamental period when many Gentiles became proselytes (converts to Judaism who were impressed by their monotheism and their strict morality and were circumcised into the covenant), and then abundantly when through the pouring out of the Holy Spirit Gentiles were converted worldwide and became Christians, part of the new Israel which sprang from the old, the Israel of God (Galatians 6:16).
This is how the New Testament saw it and proclaimed it. In its eyes Gentile Christians became an essential part of the new Israel, the true vine, founded on Jesus Christ and the Apostles, although by baptism not circumcision, becoming the true seed of Abraham (Galatians 3:29), ingrafted into the olive tree (Romans 11:17; Romans 11:19). For the New Testament regularly sees the ‘church' (ekklesia) as the new congregation (in LXX ekklesia) of Israel that sprang from the old, founded especially on the Apostles (for confirmation of this new congregation of Israel see Matthew 16:18-19) and on those Jews who entered under the Kingly Rule of God and became followers of Jesus Christ. These were the true Israel, becoming part of the true vine (John 15:1-6).
Then when Christian Jews had first formed the new true Israel, large numbers of Gentiles also became Christians and were united in Jesus' death with the true Israel, those Jews who had became followers of Christ, so that all became members of the commonwealth of the new Israel and of the household of God (Ephesians 2:11-22; Galatians 6:16), no longer strangers but fellow-citizens. They were grafted into the olive tree, while unbelieving Israel were cut off (Romans 11). That is why there was such a controversy about circumcision. Paul's reply was not that the church was not Israel, for he regularly stated that they were, but that circumcision had been replaced by the circumcision made without hands in the death of Christ (Colossians 2:11).
This pouring out of the Spirit was the great reality for the early church. It outwardly began at Pentecost as the Holy Spirit fell on Jews and reached out to Jews who were there from all over the Roman world (Acts 2), although the Spirit had unquestionably been at work throughout Jesus' ministry (e.g. Luke 4:1; Luke 4:18-21) and had been imparted in a special way to the Apostles in the upper room (John 20:22). It continued on in the early church, encompassing Samaritans and Gentiles who became a part of the Israel of God (Galatians 6:16). And that is what they delighted in, being the true Israel of God, being fellow-citizens with the ‘saints' (the Old Testament name for the pure in Israel) and members of the household of God, and recipients of the promises. No longer separate. No longer alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenant of promise, they saw themselves made one with the true Israel through the blood of Christ (Ephesians 2:12-22). Indeed they saw themselves as the true Israel as Paul makes clear, from which unbelievers in Israel had been cut off and the new believers had been grafted in (Romans 11:15-24).
It is unscriptural to see the church and Israel as two separate bodies. The separate bodies are unbelieving Israel (which is not really Israel at all) and believing Israel, and the church became one with the believing Israel. The church is not ‘spiritual Israel'. It is physical Israel, made up of all who truly believe and are made one in the covenant. It is literal Israel. Israel had always been made up of descendants of the patriarchs and all who had been co-opted in. All through the centuries, from the very time of Abraham, people had been able to enter within the covenant and become ‘Israel'. It included many of Abraham's servants and the foreign servants of the later patriarchs, it included the large number of foreign people who joined the Exodus (Exodus 12:38) and were confirmed as ‘Israel' at Sinai, it included Uriah the Hittite and many such, it included proselytes through the ages, and it included all who through baptism and new birth entered the Israel of God. They did not replace Israel. They became Israel. And all who did not believe were seen as cut off from Israel (Romans 11:15; Romans 11:17; Romans 11:20).
Thus these words found their final fulfilment in the ministry of Jesus, the One drenched (baptizo) in the Holy Spirit, and through the ministry of the Apostles, when they welcomed men of all nations by the Spirit into the Israel of God. As Paul could say, ‘If any man does not have the Spirit of Christ he is not His at all' (Romans 8:9).
Note the progression, ‘will say', ‘will call himself', will subscribe with his hand', ‘will surname himself'. The commitment begins and becomes ever deeper and more personal.
‘Write on his hand.' We know from the papyri found in Egypt that soldiers sometimes wrote the name of their commander on their hand, slaves bore the name of their masters, and devotees did the same with the name of their gods (compare Isaiah 49:16; Exodus 13:16; Deuteronomy 6:8; Deuteronomy 11:18).