Yet the number, &c.— Though God casts off the ten tribes, yet he will in due time supply their loss by bringing in great numbers of true Israelites into the church, not only of the Jews, but also of the Gentiles; and making them who before were strangers to the covenant of promise fellow-heirs with the Jews. The prophet plainly refers to the final restoration and admission of the Jews into the church of Christ. For these expressions are too magnificent to be understood of any thing but the final rescue of the Jews from the power of Antichrist in the latter ages, by the incarnate God destroying the enemy with the brightness of his coming; of which the destruction of Sennacherib's army in the days of Hezekiah might be a type, but it was nothing more. It may seem, perhaps, that the prophesy points at some deliverance peculiar to the house of Judah, in which the ten tribes will have no share; such as the overthrow of Sennacherib actually was; whereas the destruction of Antichrist will be an universal blessing. But, in the different treatment of the house of Judah and the house of Israel, we see the prophesy hitherto remarkably verified. After the excision of the kingdom of the ten tribes, Judah, though occasionally visited with severe judgments, continued, however, to be cherished with God's love, till they rejected our Lord. Then Judah became Lo-ammi, but still continues to be visibly an object of God's peculiar providence, preserved as a distinct race for gracious purposes of mercy. Perhaps in the last ages the converts of the house of Judah will be the principal objects of Antichrist's malice. Their deliverance may be first wrought, and through them the blessing may be extended to their brethren of the ten tribes, and ultimately to the whole world. This order of things the subsequent prophesy seems to point out.
And it shall come to pass, that in the place, &c.— That is, at Jerusalem, or at least in Judaea, where this prophesy was delivered, and where the execution of the sentence took place. There, in that very place, they, to whom it was said, Ye are no people of mine, shall be called children of the living God. This must relate to the natural Israel of the house of Judah; for to them it was said, "Ye are no people of mine." And since they are to be acknowledged again as the children of the living God, in the same place where this sentence was pronounced and executed, the prophesy clearly promises their restoration to their own land.