Isaiah 54-55

What’s Happening?

Israel was supposed to fill the world with justice and light, bringing God’s kingdom to earth like the Garden of Eden. But instead, Israel’s sin brought barrenness, exile, and shame. Now, Isaiah speaks to Israel as a barren woman; a wife who has not produced the life she was meant to bear (Isaiah 54:1). But God, her husband, tells her to sing for joy because she will have more children than she ever imagined. The family she births will not be bound by her past failures or her old borders. They will burst forth, spreading God’s justice and goodness across the earth (Isaiah 54:2-3).

Israel’s children will spread God’s image around the world because God is her husband (Isaiah 54:5). He is the God of the whole earth, and his love is stronger than her failures (Isaiah 54:6). His discipline in exile was brief, but his compassion is everlasting (Isaiah 54:6-8). Just as he once cleansed the world with a flood and then swore never to destroy it again, so now he promises to never forsake his people (Isaiah 54:9-10) Just as God promised Noah protection after the flood, so too will his people be eternally secure (Isaiah 54:11-17).

Israel is receiving undeserved grace. Though barren she will produce life. And now, God says that though she is bankrupt she will receive a feast. As in the Garden of Eden, Israel is invited into a fruitful land filled with a harvest they do not have to buy (Isaiah 55:1-2). God himself will bring them into this new garden kingdom. That’s because God has already promised this kingdom to them. Before exile, he promised that a son of David, his chosen king, would bring his people into this eternal kingdom (Isaiah 55:3; 2 Samuel 7:16). Even in exile, that promise still stands. They can return without price or qualification simply because God promised.

Such unqualified mercy seems impossible for any king or god to give to such a wayward people. But God is not like us or any other leader (Isaiah 55:8-9). His grace does not fit into human categories of fairness. We cannot earn his generosity any more than the ground can earn the rain that gives it life. But God pours it out because he is good (Isaiah 55:10-11). God will create a flourishing people that will fill and bless the whole earth like the Garden of Eden (Isaiah 55:12-13).

Where is the Gospel?

Jesus is the Husband who restores his bride. 

When Jesus came, he called himself the groom (Mark 2:19). Like God with Israel, Jesus sought out the outcast, the sick, and the sinful. He came to those who could not produce life in the world by themselves. These are the ones Jesus bids come to him. By their union with Jesus through the Holy Spirit, he would birth life through the most barren people on earth (John 15:5; Romans 8:11). In this way, Jesus is forming a new family—one that spans the whole earth, filled with children who bear his image and bring his kingdom to the nations (Romans 8:14-17).

Not only does Jesus bring life to the morally barren, he brings his wealth to the spiritually poor (Matthew 5:3). He invites those with no wealth or worth of their own to come and feast at the royal table of his kingdom forever. We hear this invitation on the last page of the Bible. In Revelation, Jesus stands at the end of history and repeats God’s invitation in Isaiah: “Come! Let the one who is thirsty come, and let the one who desires take the free gift of the water of life” (Revelation 22:17). This is the eternal garden kingdom we were made for. Jesus has prepared a feast that no one can afford, and yet he offers it freely. 

Jesus’ love breaks all the categories of human fairness. We may look at the suffering in our world and the hardships of our life and think that barrenness and poverty will last forever. We may even think that our past is so evil that God’s judgment of it will never end. But like Noah’s flood and Israel’s exile, the punishment is brief. It is God’s kindness and mercy that last forever. We do not deserve to be fruitful and to feast. But that was God’s invitation and promise in the Garden. And he invites us into it because his ways are not our ways (Romans 11:33). 

Jesus has done everything to secure our place in his family. We do not have to earn his love or buy our way into his kingdom. We only have to come.

See for Yourself

I pray that the Holy Spirit would open your eyes to see the God whose love far outlasts his anger. And may you see Jesus as the Servant who turns barrenness into fruitfulness and invites all who are thirsty to drink freely from the waters of life.