Welcome to the MHB Podcast. This is Michael Baun. And welcome to my eighty eighth episode. In this episode we are going to study Isaiah chapter 26. Remember that chapters 24-27 are meant to be understood together. They are Isaiah’s prophecy concerning the end of time. Chapter 24 described God’s final judgment on all of creation. We came across the term wasted city and I told you to remember it because it is a representation of humanity’s attempt at social order without God. Isaiah calls it a wasted city because it is a design that never achieves the potential of what the proper order will be like under God. Chapter 25 told us about God correcting the structure of reality and defeating death forever. He will restore all things to the proper order. So in contrast to the wasted city, chapter 26 is a song that reflects the city of God and what it will be like to reside there. Let’s begin with verses 1-2:
Isa 26:1 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: “We have a strong city; he sets up salvation as walls and bulwarks.
Isa 26:2 Open the gates, that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in.
In verse one we see the phrase, in that day. The context of chapters 24 and 25 suggests that Isaiah is referring to the day when Jesus will reign over Israel and over all the world. This will be a time of great joy, praise, and singing. The song in this chapter begins with the people saying we have a strong city. Since the earliest cities had not been built until after the Fall, humanity has never known a truly godly city. But in the day that Isaiah is describing, all will know the strength and glory of the city of God.
When we think about strong cities throughout history, Rome is one of the obvious examples. But in the fifth century Rome was conquered by less civilized tribes from the north. Many of the citizens blamed the fall of Rome on the fact that it had adopted Christianity as its official religion. The famous theologian Augustine tried to sort out this confusion in his work titled, The City of God. Augustine argued that Rome represented the wasted city or the city of man. So while the fall of Rome was a tragic loss for the city of man, Augustine believed it meant the city of God was that much closer. Today the city of man is any world system that attempts moral or social order without God.
It’s interesting to note that cities are being used at all to represent the Kingdom of God. We often think that cities are dirty, polluted, and dangerous compared to idyllic scenes of the natural world. The Bible is telling us that in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ on this earth there will be cities – but these cities will be redeemed. These cities will be glorious communities united under the strength, salvation, righteousness, and truth of God. Since modern cities can be such dangerous places, we tend to think that private communion with nature brings us closer to God’s supreme ideal. We must remember that Scripture says the Kingdom of God will be realized in a strong city.
There’s a couple different ways to interpret the last part of verse one which reads, he sets up salvation as walls and bulwarks. The first understanding is that God’s salvation will serve to protect us inside the city. This is a play on the idea that God’s salvation is the only thing that can protect us now. The second understanding is that the entire city of God, down to the last brick of infrastructure, is benefiting from God’s salvation. A fully redeemed city unlike anything we’ve ever seen.
As amazing as this city is, only the righteous who keep the faith may enter into it. We see the same principle in Revelation – listen to this description of the New Jerusalem:
Rev 21:22 And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.
Rev 21:23 And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb.
Rev 21:24 By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it,
Rev 21:25 and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.
Rev 21:26 They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.
Rev 21:27 But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Before we move on to the next verses we need to make a distinction. The city in Isaiah 26 is not the New Jerusalem. The city in Isaiah 26 represents Christ’s millennial reign. The New Jerusalem is the city brought by God after the earth passes away. The two cities sound similar because both of them are from God. But they come at different times in God’s plan for the ages. Okay let’s read verses 3-4:
Isa 26:3 You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.
Isa 26:4 Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock.
It’s a wonderful thing to be in perfect peace. People will spend their time, their money, and their effort to achieve even just one moment of perfect peace. I want you to think of the place you go to that is most peaceful to you. This is your sanctuary. Now, imagine if you could take that peace with you. Imagine if your sanctuary could be wherever you are at any moment. That is what a fixed focus on God will offer you. Isaiah is saying that not only can we have perfect peace – but if we keep our minds stayed on God, God will keep us in perfect peace.
Being kept in perfect peace really is a matter of the mind. It’s not so much about your spirit or your soul or your heart – it’s about your mind. Matthew 22 says you are to love the Lord your God with all of your mind. Romans 12 says that you are transformed by the renewing of your mind. 1 Corinthians 2 and Philippians 2 say that you can have the mind of Christ. Philippians goes on to say that you are not to set your mind on earthly things and Colossians finishes it by instructing you to set your mind on things above. Too many Christians believe walking with God is simply about doing and experiencing – but it is equally as much about thinking. Setting your mind in the right place is essential.
You can determine where your mind is set by asking yourself these questions and answering them honestly: What sustains your mind? What do you lay your mind upon? What upholds your mind? What does your mind stand fast upon? What is your mind established upon? What does your mind lean upon? If you want to be kept in perfect peace, your mind cannot occasionally come to God – it has to be stayed upon Him. Many people stay their minds upon themselves, their problems, or the difficult people in their lives. If your mind rests on these things you will not have peace.
Isaiah tells us that the key to resting our minds on God is trusting God. Human beings tend to keep their mind on whatever they trust the most. This is in part why bad habits are so difficult to break. The bad habit becomes a dark passenger that lives each day with you and you begin to feel comfortable with it. At home with it. Safe with it. It becomes a constant in your life and you learn to depend on it – which means you trust it. Proverbs chapter 3 tells you to trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. This doesn’t mean you blindly follow God without thinking. It means you presuppose that God is true and then use all of your mind in your attempt to figure out why. If you do this you will be kept in perfect peace because God is everlasting strength. It’s important to understand that this isn’t saying God has everlasting strength – but that God Himself is everlasting strength. Let’s read verses 5-6:
Isa 26:5 For he has humbled the inhabitants of the height, the lofty city. He lays it low, lays it low to the ground, casts it to the dust.
Isa 26:6 The foot tramples it, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy.”
So here we are seeing a shift in the time perspective. Isaiah is going back to the beginning of his apocalyptic prophecy in chapter 24 when God judged creation. He’s doing this to show us a comparison between the city of God and the city of man. The city of man is rife with corruption and lust for power. This cross examination of the city of man against the city of God is a lesson to us that we should assume our systems are going to be corrupt – and then take that corruption into account when designing the system. The founders of the United States did an exceptional job at this. When drafting the framework for democracy, they presupposed that corruption was going to work its way in. This is why we have things like balance of power, freedom of speech, and term limits.
The most dangerous territory that human beings can explore begins with the notion that we can be perfect without God. If we believe that we don’t need God, then we will fail to construct a system that accounts for corruption. If we fail to account for corruption, then corruption will seep into our system and the society will destabilize and collapse. Isaiah says that when the society rips itself to pieces, the feet of the poor and the steps of the needy will trample it. The idea is that if you exchange your principles for power – you better look out because you are going to get leveled by God. And after you are cast down into the dust the people whom you abused to ascend to power will still be upright and over you. This is why in the Beatitudes Jesus says, blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Jesus calls us to oppose wielding power and prestige and instead seek the Kingdom of God right here and right now. Let’s read verses 7-9, where we shift back to what it’s like for the people who follow Christ’s command:
Isa 26:7 The path of the righteous is level; you make level the way of the righteous.
Isa 26:8 In the path of your judgments, O LORD, we wait for you; your name and remembrance are the desire of our soul.
Isa 26:9 My soul yearns for you in the night; my spirit within me earnestly seeks you. For when your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.
In your walk with God you must aim at God if you want to avoid getting stuck in a ditch. Human beings seek what they desire. If you desire God you will seek God. If you seek God He will watch over you as you progress towards Him in your life. If your heart’s desire is to know God, then you will do the work of seeking to know Him and He will reveal Himself to you. Too many Christians build their relationship with God on avoidance of sin rather than desire for God. In Matthew chapter 6 Jesus tells you to seek first the Kingdom of God and what you need will be added to you. Christian perfection is all about having perfect love for God – not perfect performance in good works or avoidance of sin. Your righteousness must come from your desire to be with God – who is most upright – rather than your desire for righteousness itself.
Isaiah says that your love for God will reveal itself in your willingness to wait for God and your desire to seek Him. Sometimes, bad things happen even when you don’t deserve them. Waiting on God means trusting in Him that if you stay the course and continue to seek Him then He will unfold the circumstances in your life in such a way that promotes your well being. You do this same thing when you get up every day and go to work. Many people dislike their jobs but they get up and grind anyway because they have faith in the fact that doing so will bring them a paycheck. Seeking God is the same thing – except the payment is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.
Seeking God means making the self-sacrifice to get closer to Him and know Him better. Waiting on God is having the faith that if you make this sacrifice He will lead you to a place where all things turn out for good – even if it means passing on to heaven for you to get there. It sounds like a crazy way to live – but that’s mostly because we are constantly bombarded with temptations to serve ourselves in the present moment. Faith in God means doing your best to stick it out even when you can’t see the payoff on your horizon. Isaiah says that the ways of the upright will be vindicated by God’s judgment because the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness. Let’s read verses 10-11, where we’re shifting back to the ways of the wicked:
Isa 26:10 If favor is shown to the wicked, he does not learn righteousness; in the land of uprightness he deals corruptly and does not see the majesty of the LORD.
Isa 26:11 O LORD, your hand is lifted up, but they do not see it. Let them see your zeal for your people, and be ashamed. Let the fire for your adversaries consume them.
Here Isaiah is making a clear indictment against enabling someone who is wicked. It’s becoming more common to think that love is equal to unbridled compassion. This just isn’t true. If a person comes to you with mental illness, addiction, and financial problems – telling them that they are perfect just the way they are is the most cruel thing you can do. You need to give them the responsibility of pulling themselves out of the pit because this responsibility gives them hope. If you tell them that none of this is their fault then they will have no hope because they will think the structure of being itself is aligned against them. Sometimes loving a person means walking with them as they face the difficulties of their life.
If you enable a person who has gone astray, you set them up to become blind to the majesty of God. Isaiah paints this as the worst outcome because when God’s hand is lifted – this person will not see it. Isaiah says that it would be better for this person to recognize the zeal of upright people and be ashamed by their own conduct. Because if they can recognize the difference between the upright and themselves then their eyes will be opened and they can start working to get better. Let’s read verses 12-18, this is the prayer of a humble heart:
Isa 26:12 O LORD, you will ordain peace for us, for you have indeed done for us all our works.
Isa 26:13 O LORD our God, other lords besides you have ruled over us, but your name alone we bring to remembrance.
Isa 26:14 They are dead, they will not live; they are shades, they will not arise; to that end you have visited them with destruction and wiped out all remembrance of them.
Isa 26:15 But you have increased the nation, O LORD, you have increased the nation; you are glorified; you have enlarged all the borders of the land.
Isa 26:16 O LORD, in distress they sought you; they poured out a whispered prayer when your discipline was upon them.
Isa 26:17 Like a pregnant woman who writhes and cries out in her pangs when she is near to giving birth, so were we because of you, O LORD;
Isa 26:18 we were pregnant, we writhed, but we have given birth to wind. We have accomplished no deliverance in the earth, and the inhabitants of the world have not fallen.
I speak a lot about doing the work necessary to be Christlike and to become closer to God. This kind of discussion must always be tempered with the understanding that no amount of work can earn us our salvation – and any amount of good work we ever do is actually God working through us. So, in a sense, the measure of your effort is truly a measure of how much of yourself you’re willing to surrender to God. You’ll often hear people say that since God works through them, they don’t need to put any effort in themselves. This is a terrible misunderstanding. If you aren’t putting any effort into your walk with God, then the truth is that you haven’t surrendered yourself to God. And if you haven’t surrendered yourself to God, the question you need to ask yourself is: Do you trust God? Listen to Ephesians 2:8-10:
Eph 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
Eph 2:9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
Eph 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
God designed you for your calling. God prepared the good works that are inside of you. Any good that you are capable of comes from God. Therefore, the effort you expend toward realizing these good qualities is a reflection of your status of surrender and your faith in God. If you become great and do many great things – all that means is that God’s grace worked through your faith and He did these good things through you. Think of yourself as a sword for God’s use. You can be a rusted, bent, dull, and fractured sword. Or you can put in the effort to straighten yourself out, polish yourself into a bright sheen, and sharpen yourself so that you will always be ready for use.
Isaiah tells you to admit that other masters have ruled over you. It takes a lot of humility to recognize yourself as a broken sinner – but once you do then you can enjoy the freedom of serving God instead of serving these past sins. I want to plant a flag here and say that your continued struggle with sin should not prevent you from seeking God. I’m still a sinner and I continue to work to get better by way of repentance and seeking God. Sanctification, or being made holy, is a long process that is unique to you. It is a process that should be reserved for the relationship between yourself and God. Never compare your holiness to others, or compare their sinfulness to your own.
You must keep a humble heart. The humble heart can see that idols are powerless against God. The humble heart understands that God has won the final victory. The humble heart can see that efforts apart from God are futile. This is what Isaiah means when he says your efforts are like the pain of child-birth but you give birth to wind. If you believe that you are the source of your own good and that it is not God working in you – then eventually your work will come to nothing. The humble heart can see that it is God who brings the increase and the blessing. Finally, the humble heart depends on God in times of distress and futility. There’s quite a practical advantage to thinking this way. If you depend solely on yourself, then when you fail the failure will rest squarely on your shoulders. This could very well crush you. It is better to share the load with God and trust that He’s in control when it seems like your effort isn’t panning out. Let’s read verse 19:
Isa 26:19 Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise. You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will give birth to the dead.
Isaiah is given a confident glimpse of the resurrection – which is quite amazing for an Old Testament prophet. 2 Timothy 1 says that the secrets of the resurrection had been revealed by the appearing of the Messiah, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. So for Isaiah to be given a look at the resurrection long before Christ came to earth is special. Let’s finish with verses 20-21:
Isa 26:20 Come, my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourselves for a little while until the fury has passed by.
Isa 26:21 For behold, the LORD is coming out from his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity, and the earth will disclose the blood shed on it, and will no more cover its slain.
Isaiah speaks of a future time when those who trust in God will be invited to find refuge until the storm of judgment has passed. This refuge is secure. Isaiah likens it to chambers with the doors shut. The faithful will be hidden securely. I think this passage is a look at the rapture. The rapture is pictured in 1 Thessalonians 4 where it says that God’s people will be caught up in the air with Him and escape the horrific indignation poured out upon the world in the form of the Great Tribulation. This event will immediately precede the second coming of Jesus Christ. The Great Tribulation is not an event that you want to be around for. Listen to what Jesus says about it in Matthew 24:21-22:
Mat 24:21 For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be.
Mat 24:22 And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.
Eschatology aside, this idea gives us a good look at God’s love for us. He knows that things in your life can become too difficult. Psalm 103 says that He knows our frame, He remembers that we are dust. It is because of Jesus that we are free to have the bravery to struggle uphill toward the city of God. The way is difficult, too difficult sometimes, but we have a Savior. He walks with us and if you trust Him – you will be amazed by what He can do with you.
If you find this content valuable, feel free to share it and to use it in your own studies. If you’d like to support this podcast, you can do so at www.patreon.com/michaelhbaun. There is a link in the description. Your generosity goes a long way to promoting the growth of this enterprise and the cause of free speech. Thank you all for joining me this evening, and I will see you in the next episode.
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