KEY THOUGHT: Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.[i] [Isaiah 7:14 NKJV]
Kindly read your Bible before going through the commentary!
Isaiah 7 NKJV
Isaiah Sent to King Ahaz
7 Now it came to pass in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, that Rezin king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up to Jerusalem to make war against it, but could not [a]prevail against it. 2 And it was told to the house of David, saying, “Syria’s forces are [b]deployed in Ephraim.” So his heart and the heart of his people were moved as the trees of the woods are moved with the wind.
3 Then the Lord said to Isaiah, “Go out now to meet Ahaz, you and [c]Shear-Jashub your son, at the end of the aqueduct from the upper pool, on the highway to the Fuller’s Field, 4 and say to him: [d]‘Take heed, and [e]be quiet; do not fear or be fainthearted for these two stubs of smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin and Syria, and the son of Remaliah. 5 Because Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Remaliah have plotted evil against you, saying, 6 “Let us go up against Judah and [f]trouble it, and let us make a gap in its wall for ourselves, and set a king over them, the son of Tabel”— 7 thus says the Lord God:
“It shall not stand,
Nor shall it come to pass.
8 For the head of Syria is Damascus,
And the head of Damascus is Rezin.
Within sixty-five years Ephraim will be [g]broken,
So that it will not be a people.
9 The head of Ephraim is Samaria,
And the head of Samaria is Remaliah’s son.
If you will not believe,
Surely you shall not be established.” ’ ”
The Immanuel Prophecy
10 Moreover the Lord spoke again to Ahaz, saying, 11 “Ask a sign for yourself from the Lord your God; [h]ask it either in the depth or in the height above.”
12 But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, nor will I test the Lord!”
13 Then he said, “Hear now, O house of David! Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will you weary my God also? 14 Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.[i] 15 Curds and honey He shall eat, that He may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. 16 For before the Child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that you dread will be forsaken by both her kings. 17 The Lord will bring the king of Assyria upon you and your people and your father’s house—days that have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah.”
18 And it shall come to pass in that day
That the Lord will whistle for the fly
That is in the farthest part of the rivers of Egypt,
And for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.
19 They will come, and all of them will rest
In the desolate valleys and in the clefts of the rocks,
And on all thorns and in all pastures.
20 In the same day the Lord will shave with a hired razor,
With those from beyond [j]the River, with the king of Assyria,
The head and the hair of the legs,
And will also remove the beard.
21 It shall be in that day
That a man will keep alive a young cow and two sheep;
22 So it shall be, from the abundance of milk they give,
That he will eat curds;
For curds and honey everyone will eat who is left in the land.
23 It shall happen in that day,
That wherever there could be a thousand vines
Worth a thousand shekels of silver,
It will be for briers and thorns.
24 With arrows and bows men will come there,
Because all the land will become briers and thorns.
25 And to any hill which could be dug with the hoe,
You will not go there for fear of briers and thorns;
But it will become a range for oxen
And a place for sheep to roam.
Footnotes
a. Isaiah 7:1 conquer it
b. Isaiah 7:2 Lit. settled upon
c. Isaiah 7:3 Lit. A Remnant Shall Return
d. Isaiah 7:4 Be careful
e. Isaiah 7:4 be calm
f. Isaiah 7:6 cause a sickening dread
g. Isaiah 7:8 Lit. shattered
h. Isaiah 7:11 Lit. make the request deep or make it high above
i. Isaiah 7:14 Lit. God-With-Us
j. Isaiah 7:20 The Euphrates
New King James Version (NKJV)
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Isaiah 7 Commentary
Judgment against Jerusalem. But Chapter 7 is different. Yes, the city would be flattened by an external executor, but not Judah’s sister kingdom called Ephraim – a moniker for the northern kingdom of Israel. Definitely not by Ephraim’s ally, Aram (Syria).
We learn a couple of things from here. The LORD God defines the time, how, and who executes judgment against Judah. It was never going to be a random occurrence against Judah.
The prophet’s message to Ahaz could be confusing. The book of Kings (2 Kings 16) describes at length Ahaz’s character. He wasn’t God’s friend, hence the strange message.
There would be salvation for Judah, but only temporary. Both aggressors, Ephraim and Syria, would have their own day of judgment. No one escapes! The Creator God is sovereign.
What makes the sinner sure of their own safety if the LORD can whip Judah so much that the nation scatters completely? Ephraim is scattered earlier.
Then we have an important messianic passage. The mention of the virgin and the boy’s name remind us of another boy we have come to know as Immanuel (God-With-Us).
Immanuel’s role here is simply his presence. It means salvation for the nation. Salvation from the hand of Ephraim and Aram. Yet Judah still has a rope around her neck.
The saint is warned never to relax because of what they consider God’s favor on them. A fortune here and a gift there, they all mean nothing if we don’t acknowledge and submit to the lordship of the LORD Jesus Christ.
The physically blessed can easily mistake their wealth for approval from the LORD. Their wealth and the general grace afforded every mortal could mislead the individual into false safety.
Let mortals remember the core message, “Though your sins are like scarlet…They shall be like wool. If you are willing and obedient,” Chapter 1. It’s a timeless message to humanity.
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