LITTLE WRATH AND EVERLASTING KINDNESS
Isaiah 54:7-10. For a small moment have I forsaken thee, &c.
This precious passage is the property of all true believers in Christ (Isaiah 54:17). The people of God are often very severely afflicted. At such times there is powerful comfort for them in the fact that whatever the Lord may do unto them, He cannot be wroth with them, nor rebuke them, in the weightiest sense of those words. There may be much that is bitter in their cup, but since Jesus has made atonement on their behalf, there cannot be in it even a single drop of judicial punishment of sin, because Christ has borne all that justice could inflict. The Lord may be angry with us as a father is angry with his child, but never as a judge is angry with a criminal. God’s little wrath may light upon His beloved, but there is a great wrath which burns as a consuming fire; and this cannot fall upon them, for He has sworn that He will not be wroth with them nor rebuke them. Consider—
I. WHAT THE LORD CALLS HIS “LITTLE WRATH.”.
1. Our view of it, and God’s view of it may differ very greatly. To a child of God in a right state even the most modified form of the Divine anger is very painful. This may lead us to over-estimate—
(1.) Its severity, and, unless we are on our guard, we may fall into despair.
(2.) Its duration. The time during which God withdraws Himself from His people is very short: “For a moment,” He says; yea, He puts it less than that, “For a small moment!”
2. After the little wrath comes abundant mercies. Not merely “mercy,” nor “mercies,” but “great mercies.” God’s dealings never seem so merciful to us as after a time of trial. With great mercies will the Lord come to us, silence our fears, and help us to gather up our scattered hopes and confidences. These great favours are not to be sent to us by angels or external providences, but He Himself will bring them.
3. The wrath is in itself little. God’s wrath against His own people, as compared with that which burns against the ungodly, is little, and it can never get beyond that point. It is the wrath of a husband against his wife (Isaiah 54:5); not the wrath of a king against rebellious subjects, not that of an enemy against his foe, but the tender jealousy, the affectionate grief of a loving husband when his wife has treated him ill. It is the wrath of a Redeemer against those He has redeemed (ver, 8). It is, moreover, the anger of One who pities us (Isaiah 54:10). “Saith the Lord, that hath mercy upon thee,” is in the Hebrew, “Saith the Lord thy Pitier.” It is the wrath of one who is tender and compassionate, and pities while He smites.
4. The expression of His little anger is after all not so severe. “I hid my face.” Why? It is because the sight of it would be pleasant to us. It is a face of love; for if it were a face of anger, He would not need to hide it from His erring child.
5. This little wrath is perfectly consistent with everlasting love (Isaiah 54:8.) The Lord’s own people are as dear to Him in the furnace of affliction as on the mount of communion. You have no right to infer from the greatness of your grief that God is ceasing to love you, or that He loves you less.
II. THE GREAT WRATH OF GOD AND OUR SECURITY AGAINST IT.
This is given in Isaiah 54:8. As the waters of Noah shall no more go over the earth, so if you believe in Christ, the Lord will never be wroth with you, nor rebuke you, so as to destroy you.
1. The oath of God is our security.
2. Guaranteed by a covenant (Isaiah 54:10; Ezekiel 11:19-20; Ezekiel 37:26). Christ has fulfilled His side of the covenant by bearing all the penalty for His people’s sin, and fulfilling all righteousness, and now that covenant stands fast to be assuredly executed on the Father’s side.
3. What blessed illustrations of our security are added in Isaiah 54:10.—C. H. Spurgeon: Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 1306.
THE DEPARTING MOUNTAINS AND THE EVERLASTING LOVE
Isaiah 54:10. For the mountains shall depart, &c.
There is something of music in the very sound of these words. The stately march of the grand English translation lends itself with wonderful beauty to the melody of Isaiah’s words. But the thought that lies below them, sweeping as it does through the whole creation, and parting all things into the transient and eternal, the mortal and immortal, is still greater than the music of the words—these are removed—this abides. And the thing in God which abides is all gentle tenderness, that strange love mightier than all the powers of Deity beside, permanent with the permanence of His changeless heart.… And grander than all that, we have the revelation of the inmost nature and character of God in its bearing upon men: “Saith the Lord that hath mercy on you,”
I. THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE APPARENTLY ENDURING WHICH PASSES, AND THAT WHICH TRULY ABIDES.
1. The mountains shall depart.… And so we begin to think that humanity is small and life insignificant, and sometimes we feel as if we were ruined and there was nothing left to us, and so my text comes and says, “The mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my loving-kindness shall not depart from thee,” &c.
2. The other side of that great truth. There rises high above all that is mortal, which although it counts its existence by millenniums, is but for an instant, and there appears to the eye of faith the Great Spirit who moves all the material universe Himself unmoved, and lives undiminished by creation, and undiminished if creation were swept out of existence. Let that which may pass, pass; let that which can perish, perish; let the mountains crumble and the hills melt away; beyond the smoke and conflagration, and rising high above destruction and chaos stands the calm throne of God, with a living heart upon it, with a council of peace and purpose of mercy for you and for me, the creatures of a day, but that shall live when the days shall cease to be. And so look how wonderfully there come out in these words phases of that Divine revelation to us, which are meant to strengthen us in the contemplation of that that changes. “My kindness!” The tender-heartedness of an infinite love, the abounding favour of the Father of my spirit, &c. What a revelation of God! If only our hearts could open to the right acquaintance of that thought, sorrow and care and anxiety, and every other form of trouble, would fade away and we should be at rest. The infinite, undying, imperishable love of God is mine.
3. And then there is the other side to the same thought. The consequent outcoming of the imperishable and immovable loving-kindness is what my text calls “the covenant of my peace”—that is to say, we are to think of this great, tender, changeless, love of God, which underlies all things and towers above all things, as being placed, so to speak, under the guarantee of a solemn obligation. God’s covenant is the great thought of Scripture which we far too little apprehend in the depth and power of its meaning; and this covenant with you and me, poor creatures, is this, “I promise that My love shall never leave thee.” Have you entered into this covenant of peace with God? Then you may be sure that that covenant will stand for evermore, though the mountains depart and the hills be removed.
II. A FEW PRACTICAL LESSONS WE MAY GATHER FROM THESE GREAT CONTRASTS HERE, BETWEEN THE PERISHABLE MORTAL AND THE IMMORTAL DIVINE LOVE.
1. To warn you and me from setting our hearts upon these perishable things.
What folly it is, looked at from the last point of view, for a man to risk his peace and the strength of the joy of his life upon things that crumble and change, when all the while there is lying before him open for his entrance, and wooing him to come into the eternal home of his spirit, this covenant!
2. To stay the soul in seasons which come to everybody sometimes, when we are made painfully conscious of the transientness of this present. Whatever comes thou canst not be desolate if thou hast God’s loving-kindness.
3. To give to us hopes of years as immortal as itself. We are immortal as the tenderness that encloses us. God’s endless love must have undying creatures on whom to pour itself out. The hope that is built upon the eternal love of God in Christ is the true guarantee to me of immortal existence, and this all turns on the one thing. Come into the covenant—the covenant of peace. Take the covenant God offers you, close with the offer, and then life and death, principalities and powers, things to come, height and depth, and every other creature shall be impotent to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.—A. Maclaren, D.D.: The Freeman, April 29, 1881.
I. THE TEXT ASSUMES THE MUTABLE AND EVANESCENT NATURE OF ALL EARTHLY THINGS.
1. The Lord fixes not on things most evanescent, but on those which are obviously the most enduring.
2. Even these stupendous works shall be shaken and removed. The discoveries of modern science. The Bible assumes it.
3. May be regarded as a type of the evanescence of all earthly things. Of human nature itself. “All flesh is grass,” &c. Of our earthly possessions, &c.
II. THE TEXT ASSERTS THE DURABLE AND IMMUTABLE NATURE OF HEAVENLY AND INVISIBLE THINGS.
These are put strikingly in contrast with the objects of time and sense (Hebrews 12:28, and others).
1. The benefits comprehended in the engagement. The favour of Jehovah—the love which He bears to His redeemed people. This love is traced up to eternity, and gave birth to the covenant of peace.
2. The nature of the affirmation. His covenant shall not be broken, His favour not removed. We are tempted to fear the reverse. He sometimes appears to withdraw His favour. His covenant is established on immutable principles. His regard for His people is unchangeable.
III. THE MOST AMPLE AND CONSOLING ASSURANCE IS AFFORDED OF THE CERTAINTY OF THIS FACT.
No higher kind of evidence could be afforded or even desired than that contained in the text.
1. We have the assurance of the word of Jehovah: “Saith the Lord.”
2. We have an appeal to the exercise of former mercy.
3. We have an assurance of a personal kind, and therefore most encouraging.
The personal pronoun, more than once employed, may well encourage our hearts. When the mind is oppressed with a consciousness of guilt; in times of affliction; in the hour of death; in anticipation of the judgment.
Such, then, are the glorious privileges of true believers. Are you one of them? Have you obtained mercy, &c.? “Incline your ear,” &c.—George Smith, D.D.
I. THE PERPETUITY AND UNCHANGE ABLENESS OF GOD’S REGARD TO HIS CHURCH, WHATEVER BE THE REVOLUTIONS AND VICISSITUDES WHICH OBTAIN IN THE WORLD.
1. That God should be unchangeable in His own nature is a necessary property of His infinite perfection.
2. Of equal importance is the doctrine of the Divine unchangeableness to the general interests of religion.… Hence the incalculable importance of those Scriptures which speak of God’s incapacity of change, and hence the value of the assurance of the text, as establishing our confidence in the Divine character, and furnishing a basis of certainty for our present and future hopes. Whatever else perishes the Church shall live, &c. You may take the text figuratively—or comparatively—or in its most direct and literal sense. What is true respecting the Church as a whole is true of every individual of which it is composed. The promise of the text is sure to all the seed. Many things may depart, and hope and life itself may depart, but God’s loving-kindness shall never depart.
II. THE FAITHFULNESS OF GOD TO THE PROMISES RECORDED IN HIS WORD. The covenant of grace. The promises are made to Christ, and in the application of it they are made to us in Him. Confirmed by an oath (Hebrews 6:17-18). Think of God’s condescension in giving such a pledge. Come and rest your all upon this great foundation. By faith in Christ you become a party to this covenant, and have a claim to all its stupendous blessings, &c.
CONCLUSION.—
1. Appropriate the character in order to share the consolation.
2. Expect faith and hope to be put to the test.
3. Walk worthy of your high expectations.—Samuel Thodey.
All earthly things are uncertain. But we have here something unchangeable. God speaks of Himself as having entered into a covenant respecting man; and He pledges Himself that it shall not be changed. Contemplate—
I. ITS NATURE.
In what sense can the Divine Being be properly said to enter into covenant with man? Certainly not in the sense in which equal parties bind themselves to do certain things on given conditions. Man has no claim on God, nor right to bind Him to anything. If God enters into covenant with sinful man it is an act of grace. He binds Himself. And man’s interest is to accept the conditions imposed upon him. Accordingly, in the Scriptures, the term covenant is variously used to express the Divine purposes, promises, laws, dispensations, institutions, relations to man, established through the operation of God’s grace. Thus the covenant may be viewed—
1. In relation to God. Then, it is an infinite purpose and plan of the Godhead that sinners should be saved in a certain way.
2. In relation to the Mediator. Then it is the inscrutable arrangement that He should have a people saved out of the world as the result of His redeeming death.
3. In relation to man. Then, it is God’s gracious promise, His purpose revealed and made known, that He will bestow the blessing on the persons described. It is, therefore, God’s gracious purpose, plan, and promise to save sinners through the Gospel of Christ
II. ITS PROVISIONS.
In covenanting to bestow salvation He meant all that leads to it—
1. The sending the Redeemer.
2. The gift of the Holy Spirit.
3. The communication of spiritual blessings. The sinner is justified, and sanctified, and will be glorified.
III. ITS STABILITY.
It is assured to us—
1. By the pledged word of God. Better than the word of a king, which has often been falsified. Better than the word of a father, which he may be unable to perform. Better than man’s word of honour, which is not always respected.
2. By the past acts of God.
(1.) He prepared for it by prophecies, types, historic events.
(2.) He ratified it. Each form of it by blood (Genesis 15; Exodus 24:6-8; Hebrews 9:15-26).
(3.) He sealed it. By His Spirit, which is the “earnest” in our hearts.
3. By the revealed nature of God. Consider the love, the faithfulness, the immutability of the Divine nature.
CONCLUSION.—Have you an interest in this covenant? Will you accept its blessings? You are free to do so. You are freely invited. Those who are willing can have no greater encouragement as to the certainty of obtaining anything than the certainty of salvation.—J. Rawlinson.