THE TWOFOLD EFFECT OF DIVINE JUDGMENTS
Isaiah 1:27-28. Zion shall be redeemed with judgment, and her converts with righteousness: and the destruction of the transgressors and of the sinners shall be together, and they that forsake the Lord shall be consumed.
These verses are closely and vitally connected: it is a mistake to separate them, as in the Authorised Version. Their meaning would be conveyed to the English reader, if they were translated—“Zion shall be redeemed with judgment, and her converts with righteousness; and thereby also the transgressors and sinners shall be destroyed, yea they that forsake the Lord shall be consumed” [463] By judgment is meant the doom which in the preceding verses had been threatened against guilty Jerusalem (e.g., Isaiah 1:18): this “judgment” would be a manifestation of God’s punitive righteousness, and the declaration is that the infliction of this “judgment” would have a twofold effect—it would redeem Zion and her converts, and it would destroy the transgressors and sinners.
[463] The word “together” does not mean that the transgressor shall be destroyed together with the sinner; but that the destruction of this one class, called both transgressors and sinners, shall come in close connection, “together with,” the salvation of the penitent who are brought back to God by correction, as is said in the previous verses. The same sort of infliction that reclaimed the “converts” (Isaiah 1:27), bardened and sealed over to ruin those who would still “forsake the Lord.”—Cowles.
The diverse effects of Divine judgments is a matter well worthy of our study.
I. One effect of those judgments by which God manifests His righteous indignation against sin is to redeem His people from their transgressions. A prolonged period of peace and prosperity such as the Jews enjoyed under Uzziah is always perilous to the vital religion of a nation. Formalism is apt to prevail. The lines of demarcation between the Church and the world are apt to be effaced; “Zion” is apt to become merged in “Jerusalem.” In love to His people, God is therefore compelled to send upon their nation great calamities. These lead to searchings of heart, and reformations of conduct and character. Men learn again to wait upon God, and reverently to regard His will (Isaiah 26:9). The Church shines once more with the glory of spiritual conformity to God, and the result is that she is increased by converts from the world: to these also the season of judgment is also the season of redemption. But,
II. Another effect of God’s judgments is to harden the obdurate. His chastisements lead some men to further acts of rebellion against Him (Isaiah 1:5). Like Pharaoh, they harden themselves more and more as God sends plague after plague upon them (Exodus 8:19; Exodus 8:32, &c.) Hence seasons of public calamity (such as that of the plague in London, &c.) have always been seasons of public crime. Transgressors madly dare Omnipotence to a trial of strength, and the result is their utter destruction.
Our subject as thus unfolded gives rise to the following practical reflections—
1. In a season of national or individual prosperity we should be especially watchful and prayerful against conformity to the world [466]
2. We should not regard judgments that come upon our nation or ourselves merely as calamities: they may be God’s angels sent in truest mercy, and they bring with them to the people of God great moral and spiritual compensations.
3. Judgments, when they come upon us, afford us an admirable test of our real character: if we be indeed the people of God, they will lead us to submission and to more earnest strivings after holiness; but if they awaken within us a spirit of murmuring, of repining, of resentment against God, we have good cause to suspect that our religion has never been the work of God in our hearts [469]
4. In the season of judgment we really have only one alternative before us—to turn or burn. No stoutness of heart will enable us to resist God’s consuming wrath against iniquity (Malachi 4:1).
[466] How often does worldly prosperity tend to this lapsing of the soul from God! How often do our very outward mercies and blessings superinduce this spiritual languor and decay! It is with believers individually as with the Church collectively—they are never in a condition less favourable to spiritual health and advancement than when they have no trial or cross to brace their energies and invigorate their graces. The soldier gets supine after battle. History tells us how the bravest veterans of the great Carthaginian general got demoralised and degenerate when, victory over, they sat down to rejoicing and revelry, before the gates of Capua; they never were the same heroes again.—Macduff.
[469] As it is easy to know a piece of gold from a piece of brass when they come both to the anvil and be stricken with the hammer, for brass will not be handled, but when it cometh to the beating breaketh and maketh a sharp din and irksome, but gold soundeth sweetly, and is pliable; so when the hypocrite cometh between the anvil and the hammer of affliction, he breaketh with impatience, and lamenteth in blasphemies against God; whereas a faithful Christian praiseth God, and layeth out his heart, submitting himself willingly under the Lord’s hand that striketh him.—Cawdray, 1598–1684.
FORSAKING THE LORD
Isaiah 1:28. They that forsake the Lord shall be consumed.
I. The guilt of forsaking the service of the Lord.
1. Man is bound by the law of his nature to obey that Almighty Being by whom he was made an intelligent and immortal creature. Every discovery which reason opens to him of the transcendant perfections of the Lord of the universe urges the duty of offering to this great and glorious Being the homage of his heart and life. Every day’s preservation increases his obligation to serve his gracious Preserver.
2. Many in forsaking the Lord violate their own express and solemn engagements (Hebrews 10:29).
II. The folly of forsaking, &c. If we do so, we shall
(1) incur the reproaches of our own mind;
(2) forfeit the esteem and confidence of all good men;
(3) forfeit the favour and incur the wrath of God. And for what are all those tremendous sacrifices made? For “the pleasures of sin,” which are but “for a season”!
III. The danger of forsaking, &c.—“shall be consumed.” The threatened doom is
(1) awful;
(2) certain.—J. H. Hobart, D.D., Posthumous Works, ii 220–229.