Isaiah 42-45: Behold My Servant: Chapter 22: God’s New Covenant Vow

Isaiah 45:18 says,

¹⁸ For thus says the Lord, who created the heavens (He is the God who formed the earth and made it. He established it and did not create it a waste place, but formed it to be inhabited.), “I am the Lord, and there is none else.”

Gen. 1:1 is the beginning of Scripture and the foundation for all other divine revelation. It all begins with the statement that God is the Creator. This establishes not only His sovereignty but His right of ownership as the Creator. He has the right to do with His creation as He pleases. No other being has the right to tell Him what to do or to revise His plan according to his will.

Those who tell God what to do are trying to be gods in themselves, because they usurp the Creator’s right of ownership. However, God asserts that in reality “there is none else.” In fact, there can be only one sovereign God in the universe. All other created beings have authority, which is delegated to lesser beings so that they may be empowered to carry out the will of the Sovereign.

Authority is never more powerful than the Sovereign Master who authorized it. Jesus said, “A slave is not greater than his master” (John 13:16).

Speaking the Truth Openly

In Isaiah 45:19 God continues,

¹⁹ “I have not spoken in secret, in some dark land; I did not say to the offspring of Jacob, ‘Seek Me in a waste place’; I, the Lord, speak righteousness, declaring things that are upright.”

The revelation of God was not revealed to the few alone, at least not at the beginning. As time passed, of course, men rejected divine revelation and substituted the traditions of men, which then blinded them to the revelation that was all around them. Yet God did not create a mystery religion, where only a few priests supposedly knew the secrets of God. Far from it.

Psalm 19:1-4 says,

¹ The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. ² Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. ³ There is no speech, nor are their words; their voice is not heard. ⁴ Their line has gone out through all the earth, and their utterances to the end of the world…

Silent revelation pours forth every day and every night as God shows us His glory in the stars. The constellations, in fact, tell us the entire story of Christ from His birth through a virgin (Virgo) to His role as the Lamb of God (Aries) to His coming as the Lion (Leo) to rule the earth. This was given to men at the beginning, long before the first word of Scripture was penned. Unfortunately, men perverted it and applied it to false messiahs and to ungodly men (such as Nimrod).

Isaiah 45:20, 21 says,

²⁰ “Gather yourselves and come; draw near together, you fugitives of the nations; they have no knowledge, who carry about their wooden idol and pray to a god who cannot save. ²¹ Declare and set forth your case; indeed, let them consult together. Who has announced this from of old? Who has long declared it? Is it not I, the Lord? And there is no other God besides Me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none except Me.”

God invites the “fugitives of the nations,” when they flee the destruction of their homes and cities. Figuratively, these “fugitives” are also escaping from their idols in whom they had trusted to protect or save them. When false gods fail, men lose confidence in them. They flee in a state of panic and confusion. Then, perhaps, they are in the best position to search for a better God.

The Creator then steps forward and sets forth His credentials. Who was it that announced the downfall of nations long before it happened? False gods do not announce the collapse of the nations that they claim to rule. But the Creator openly proclaimed this ahead of time. The writings of Isaiah himself prove this, for he wrote of the downfall of Babylon more than a century before Babylon had become the dominant empire.

Hence, God appeals to these “fugitives,” saying in Isaiah 45:22,

²² “Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other.”

This was a universal appeal to people of all nations—not just to Israel or Judah.

God’s Sworn Statement

Isaiah 45:23, 24 says,

²³ “I have sworn by Myself, the word has gone forth from My mouth in righteousness and will not turn back, that to Me every knee will bow, every tongue will swear allegiance. ²⁴ They will say of Me, “Only in the Lord are righteousness and strength.” Men will come to Him, and all who were angry at Him will be put to shame.

Again, we find ourselves in a court of law, where we hear sworn statements. In verse 21 God tells His opponents to “declare and set forth your case.” In verse 23 God Himself is sworn in before setting forth His own case. God swears to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth. He says, “I have sworn by Myself,” because there is no one greater to swear by, no one else to hold Him accountable if He should swear falsely. Hence, if He should swear falsely by lying in court, He would commit divine suicide and cease to exist.

God’s sworn testimony is the revelation of His own plan, which He formed by His own wisdom. This is not the only time that God revealed His plan for creation by an oath. Moses too bore witness to a similar oath in Num. 14:21, when God said,

²¹ “but indeed, as I live, all the earth will be filled with the glory of the Lord.”

The phrase, “as I live,” shows that God swore upon His own life. The legal implication of this is that if He were to speak falsely, His own life would be forfeited. Since no man could possibly enforce the law of perjury upon such a powerful God, it is clear that God would have to commit suicide, if this were possible. Yet if it were possible for God to violate His own nature by committing perjury (Deut. 5:20), could we expect Him to uphold the penalty of the law? “The wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23). Why not absolve himself of guilt as well?

The point is that “God, who cannot lie” (Titus 1:2) must always be true to Himself. His law, including the Ninth Commandment, is a revelation of His very nature. This is the God who has set forth His plan to save all mankind by the power of His sovereign will. This testimony in court is not merely what God would like to do—if other gods and men allow it. It is what He has sworn to do, regardless of men’s opposition and regardless of the will of man in general.

The glory of God will indeed cover the earth, as God swore to Moses. A fuller account of this plan was given much earlier to Noah, when God made a covenant to Noah (not with Noah). That covenant did not involve the will of Noah or any other man. It was therefore a New Covenant, where God swears to do something by Himself without requiring the will of men to accomplish it.

The scope of God’s vow is seen in Gen. 9:9, 10,

⁹ “Now behold, I Myself do establish My covenant with you, and with your descendants after you, ¹⁰ and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, even every beast of the earth.”

The rainbow was the sign (God’s signature) on this covenant, written on the scroll of the great expanse. Gen. 9:13-15 says,

¹³ “I set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a sign [signature] of a covenant between Me and the earth. ¹⁴ It shall come about when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow will be seen in the cloud, ¹⁵ and I will remember My covenant, which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh, and never again shall the water become a flood to destroy all flesh.”

A signature is one’s name, which is synonymous with one’s nature. Hence signature is “sign-nature,” the sign of one’s nature. In Ezekiel 9:4, God’s signature is set forth as the tav, the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The tav was originally written as a cross, or X. This is His Name/Nature that is now written on our foreheads (Rev. 22:4).

In other revelations from the prophets, we find that the floodwaters that are coming, as “in the days of Noah” (Luke 17:26), will be the flood of the Holy Spirit. Whereas Noah’s flood removed the breath (spirit) of life from all flesh (Gen. 7:22), the next world-wide flood will put the Holy Spirit back into men.

One may read the entire chapter and not find a single place where God’s vow depended upon the will of any man or beast. Hence, His vow was inherently different from the Old Covenant vow that Israel was required to make in Exodus 19:5-8. An Old Covenant vow is what men make, hoping to have the power and strength to fulfill the words of their mouth. A New Covenant vow is what God makes, knowing that He has the power and strength to fulfill the words of His mouth.

The nature of this New Covenant is not merely to make salvation available to those who exercise their will and thereby make God’s promise valid. The New Covenant does not depend upon man’s validation. If that were the nature of the New Covenant, then it would be no different from the Old Covenant. But God did not swear to help men fulfill their own Old Covenant vows. Far from it. God swore to turn their hearts by the sovereign power of His own will in order to save all mankind and the entire earth with them.

Therefore, if any knee does NOT bow, or if any tongue does NOT “swear allegiance” to the Messiah, then God’s plan will have failed. If the will of man is the source of salvation, then no man could be saved, no matter how well-intentioned he may be. Israel’s Old Covenant is proof of that, for, as Paul says, “all have sinned” (Rom. 3:23).

Paul quoted Isaiah in Phil. 2:9-11, adding some interpretation to the prophet,

⁹ For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, ¹⁰ so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹ and that every tongue will confess [exomologeo, “profess”] that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Isaiah 45:24 tells us what words men will say when they “swear allegiance” to the Messiah. “They will say of Me: “Only in the Lord are righteousness and strength.” In other words, they will forsake all false gods and all false paths of salvation. They will trust only in His righteousness and strength by the power of His will.

Paul interprets this to mean that every tongue will profess “that Jesus Christ is Lord.” Paul restates this in a little different manner in Rom. 14:11,

¹¹ For it is written, “As I live,” says the Lord, “every knee shall bow to Me, and every tongue shall give praise to God.”

In other words, when Isaiah 45:23 says that “every tongue will swear allegiance,” Paul interprets this to mean that “every tongue will profess that Jesus Christ is Lord” (Phil. 2:11) and that “every tongue shall give praise to God.” Thus, Paul interprets Isaiah so that we know the nature of God’s vow.

It is clear that God has vowed to turn every heart so that they will profess Christ and “give praise to God.” They will do this at the great White Throne when all are summoned to appear before Him. That will be the moment of truth for most of humanity. More important, this will be the final triumph of God, proving that He was indeed able to keep His oaths.

In fact, at the great White Throne judgment, these new believers will rejoice that God has fulfilled His oaths, because they were unable to save themselves by the power of their own will. They will then reflect back on their previous lifetime on earth and be ashamed of their anger at God. “And all who were angry at Him will be put to shame.” Those were the unenlightened days when they did not know Him, nor did they know of His oaths, nor did they understand His plan.

Isaiah 45:25 concludes,

²⁵ “In the Lord all the offspring of Israel will be justified and will glory.”

This does not limit the scope of salvation but is meant to include the exiles of Israel. So also Paul says, “all Israel will be saved” (Rom. 11:26), but later he includes “all” in Rom. 11:32,

³² For God has shut up all in disobedience so that He may show mercy to all.

Again, in Rom. 11:36 the apostle concludes his train of thought, saying,

³⁶ For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.

This was a universal statement referring to the creation itself, not just to Israel. The New Covenant was made with the whole earth in the days of Noah, all nations were to be blessed through Abraham, and Moses was told that the glory of God was to cover the whole earth. Paul understood that, and so he too included the entire creation in the salvation of Israel.

Summary

Isaiah 40-45 is the start of Isaiah’s second book, where he sets forth the New Covenant and its promise of salvation. A big feature of this section is the sovereignty of God, which sets forth God’s right as the Creator to make vows according to His will and His power to keep those vows.

The section reaches its climax at the end of Isaiah 45, where God swears by Himself and by His own integrity and power to save all mankind. We see, then, that the divine plan is incomplete until all have professed Christ to be “Lord,” as Paul explains it.

I thank God that He has not given up His position as the Sovereign Lord of Creation, so that we may have full confidence in His ability to save the world.