59:16-21 This passage is connected with the following chapters. It is generally thought to describe the coming of the Messiah, as the Avenger and Deliverer of his church. There was none to intercede with God to turn away his wrath; none to interpose for the support of justice and truth. Yet He engaged his own strength and righteousness for his people. God will make his justice upon the enemies of his church and people plainly appear. When the enemy threatens to bear down all without control, then the Spirit of the Lord shall stop him, put him to flight. He that has delivered, will still deliver. A far more glorious salvation is promised to be wrought out by the Messiah in the fulness of time, which all the prophets had in view. The Son of God shall come to us to be our Redeemer; the Spirit of God shall come to be our Sanctifier: thus the Comforter shall abide with the church for ever, Joh 14:16. The word of Christ will always continue in the mouths of the faithful; and whatever is pretended to be the mind of the Spirit, must be tried by the Scriptures. We must lament the progress of infidelity and impiety. But the cause of the Redeemer shall gain a complete victory even on earth, and the believer will be more than conqueror when the Lord receives him to his glory in heaven.

Verse 19. - So shall they fear; rather, and they shall fear. The result of the triumphant exhibition of God's might will be a conversion of the Gentiles, who will flock in both from the west - the quarter of "the islands" - and from the east, to do reverence to the name and to the glory of the Lord. When the enemy shall come in (rather, come on) like a flood; literally, like the river; i.e. the Euphrates (comp. Isaiah 8:7, "The Lord bringeth up upon them the waters of the river, strong and many, even the King of Assyria and all his glory," etc.). When this shall be the case, then the Spirit of the Lord - hypostasized or nearly so - shall lift up a standard against him (comp. Isaiah 10:18; Zechariah 9:16), and easily vanquish him. The metaphor of "lifting a standard" for making an armed resistance is common in Isaiah (Isaiah 5:26; Isaiah 13:2; Isaiah 18:3; Isaiah 31:9, etc.).

So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun,.... The eastern and western antichrist being destroyed, way shall be made for the spread of the Gospel east and west; which shall be everywhere embraced, and the true worship of God set up; and the glorious name of the Lord, or the Lord who is glorious in his name, nature, perfections, and works, shall be feared and served from the rising of the sun to the setting of the same, or by all nations under the heavens; see Malachi 1:11 and even those that are left in the antichristian states, and escape the general ruin, shall be frightened at his judgments, fear his great and awful name, and give glory to the God of heaven, Revelation 11:13.

when the enemy shall come in like a flood; when Satan, the common "enemy" of mankind, the avowed and implacable enemy of Christ and his people, "shall come" into the world, and into the church, as he will in the latter day; and has already entered "like" an impetuous flood, threatening to carry all before him, introducing a flood of immorality and profaneness, as in the days of Noah and Lot, to which the times of the Son of Man's coming are likened, Luke 17:26 or else a flood of error and heresy of all sorts; see Revelation 12:15 and likewise a flood of persecution, as will be at the slaying of the witnesses, that hour of temptation that will come upon all the earth, to try the inhabitants of it, Revelation 3:10. Aben Ezra compares this passage with, and illustrates it by, that time of trouble which will be, such as never was since there was a nation, Daniel 12:1 when this will be the case, which seems to be near at hand:

the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him; Christ and his Gospel, or Christ the standard lifted up in the ministry of the Gospel, Isaiah 11:10 a set of ministers shall be raised up, having the everlasting Gospel, which they shall publish to all nations, and which shall have an universal spread; and by means of which the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea; and which will be a sufficient check to the enemy's flood of immorality, error, and persecution; and which, after this, shall be no more; see Revelation 14:6. Some render the words, "when he", the glorious name of the Lord, or he who is the glory of the Lord, the brightness of his glory;

shall come like a narrow flood, that flows with great swiftness and force, and carries all before it;

the Spirit of the Lord lifting him up for a standard (l), that is, in the ministry of the word; "so shall they fear", &c.; then multitudes shall serve the Lord, and worship him. The Targum is,

"they that afflict shall be as the overflowing of the river Euphrates; by the word of the Lord shall they be broken;''

and Vitringa thinks there is an allusion to the river Euphrates; interpreting the enemy of the Ottoman Turks, Tartars, and Scythians, stirred up by Satan to distress the church: all this may be applied to the case of particular believers under the assaults of Satan their grand enemy; who seeks all occasions to disturb their peace and destroy their comfort, though he cannot ruin their souls; he comes in, not only into their houses where they dwell, and gives them disturbance there; and into the house of God where they worship, and does all he can to hinder them in attending on the word and ordinances, and to prevent all usefulness, edification, and comfort thereby; but he enters into their hearts, and stirs up the corruptions of their nature, and causes these to rise like a flood, which threaten with bringing them into captivity to the law of sin and death; and attacks them with violent temptations, suggesting that they are not the people of God, the redeemed of the Lamb, or regenerated by the Spirit, but are hypocrites, and never had the work of grace on their hearts; aggravating their sins, and telling them they have sinned the sin against the Holy Ghost, and there is no pardon for them; and at other times filling their minds with blasphemous and atheistical thoughts; all which come upon them sometimes with so much force, that it is like an overflowing flood that threatens with utter destruction; when the Spirit of the Lord within them, who is greater than he that is in the world, lifts up Christ as an ensign or standard to them; and directs them to his blood for peace and pardon, for the cleansing of their souls and the atonement of their sins; where they may see and read, in legible characters, the free and full remission of their sins, and an entire satisfaction to the justice of God for them; and he holds up and holds out the righteousness of Christ unto them, with which God is well pleased, his justice satisfied, and his law made honourable; and by which they are justified from all things, and secured from all charges and condemnation; and who also leads them to the person, power, and grace of Christ, to preserve them in grace to glory, to keep them from falling, and present them faultless before the throne of God; the consequence of which is a check to Satan's temptations; an antidote to the doubts and fears he injects; and an abundance of spiritual peace and comfort; as well as it engages to fear the Lord and his goodness.

(l) "etenim veniet (sub. Dominus vel nomen Domini) instar fluminis angusti, spiritu Domini levante ipsum pro vexillo", Bootius, Animadv. I. 1. c. 1. p. 68.

19. (Isa 45:6; Mal 1:11). The result of God's judgments (Isa 26:9; 66:18-20).

like a flood—(Jer 46:7, 8; Re 12:15).

lift up a standard—rather, from a different Hebrew root, "shall put him to flight," "drive him away" [Maurer]. Lowth, giving a different sense to the Hebrew for "enemy" from that in Isa 59:18, and a forced meaning to the Hebrew for "Spirit of the Lord," translates, "When He shall come as a river straitened in its course, which a mighty wind drives along."

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