I. "I saw the Lord," etc. Some of you may have been watching a near and beautiful landscape in the land of mountains and eternal snows, till you have been exhausted by its very richness, and till the distant hills which bounded it have seemed, you knew not why, to limit and contract the view; and then a veil has been withdrawn, and new hills, not looking as if they belonged to this earth, yet giving another character to all that does belong to it, have unfolded themselves before you. This is a very imperfect likeness of that revelation which must have been made to the inner eye of the prophet, when he saw another throne than the throne of the house of David, another King than Uzziah or Jotham, another train than that of priests or minstrels in the temple, other winged forms than those golden ones which overshadowed the mercy-seat.
II. "Above the throne stood the seraphim," etc. The sense of awe increasing with the clearness and purity of a spirit, and with the nearness of its approach to God; the face being veiled which receives its light from Him, and most covets to behold Him; the absence of all wish to display their own perfections in spirits that are perfect; the freedom and willingness to go anywhere, to do any errands of mercy, these are some of the more obvious thoughts which the study of this vision suggests.
III. The vision reaches its highest point in the cry, Holy, holy, holy. It is the holiness of God which the seraphim proclaim, that which cannot be represented to the eye, that of which descriptions and symbols offer no image. It was this which led the prophet to say, "Woe is me! for I am undone."
IV. The live coal on the altar is a substance dead and cold in itself, which has been kindled from above, and therefore is capable of imparting life and warmth. That warmth and life, communicated to the prophet, take away his iniquity and purge his sin.
V. "Here am I; send me." The mighty change which has been wrought in him is soon apparent. He is sure that God cares for Israelites, and has a message to them; he is sure that a man is to be the bearer of that message. The new fire which has entered into him makes him ready to offer himself as that man.
VI. The most awful lesson which Isaiah had to teach his people was that God's own ordinances, the regular sequence of sovereigns, the duties and symbols of the temple, were contributing to make their eyes dim, and their ears deaf, and their hearts fat. They were seeing all the outward tokens of an invisible King, but they perceived not Him.
VII. "Yet in it shall be a tenth." The nation will be preserved; the remnant, the tenth, would be a pledge and witness of its preservation. Their preservation would prove that the nation was a sacred and immortal thing, because the holy seed was in the midst of it, because it did not derive its life or its unity from this or that believing man, or from a multitude of believing men; but from Him in whom they believed; from that Divine King who lived, though king Uzziah and all other kings died, nay, though the whole land should seem to die.
F. D. Maurice, Prophets and Kings of the Old Testament,p. 218.
Reference: Isaiah 6:1. J. W. Lance, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xx., p. 244.