God calls Isaiah, cleanses him, commissions him
6
📚In the year that King Uzziah died 📖 I saw 📖 the Lord sitting on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 📚Above it stood the seraphim 📖. Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 📚And one cried to another, and said,“Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of hosts 📖!
The whole earth is full of his glory 📖”.
4 📚And the posts of the door were shaken
at the voice of him who cried out,
and the house was filled with smoke.
5 📚Then I said, “Woe to me, for I am undone 📖! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King 📖, the LORD of hosts”.
6 📚Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from the altar, 7 📚And he touched my mouth with it, and said, “See, this has touched your lips, and your guilt is taken away, and your sin is purged”.
6:6-7 Isaiah is seeing a vision, and this is a symbolic act. It was given to assure Isaiah that his sins were forgiven. God commanded the priests of Israel to keep fire burning permanently on the brazen altar of sacrifice (Lev 6:12-13). A coal of fire from there would speak of atoning sacrifice. Note on atonement at Ex 29:33. Every servant of God before he enters the ministry should have the assurance that his sins are forgiven, his guilt atoned for. It is a very basic part of the foundation of a ministry successful and pleasing in God’s eyes. In Isaiah’s case the coal of fire touched his lips – that part of him which made him most conscious of his sin and depravity.⚜
8 📚Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us 📖?” Then I said, “Here am I 📖. Send me”.
6:8 God has His work on earth and he wants willing servants to do it. This willingness of men should arise out of God’s mercy toward them in making atonement for their sins and blotting out their guilt. Compare Ps 51:1, 13, 14; Rom 12:1-2.⚜
9 📚And he said,
“Go, and tell this people,
‘You listen and listen,
but you do not understand;
and you look and look,
but you do not perceive.’
10 📚Make the heart of this people dull,
and make their ears 📖 heavy,
and shut their eyes 📖;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their heart,
and turn to me and be healed”.
6:9-10 Isaiah’s ministry in part was to pronounce God’s judgment on his nation, to be God’s instrument in making them ripe for destruction. The very truth he preached would harden the people because they would not repent and receive it into their hearts. But why would God want the hearts of His people (or any people) hardened? Because the time had come to punish them for their sin and rebellion. God does not delight in punishing, but justice demands it. On hardening see note at Ex 4:21. The Lord Jesus quoted these verses from Isaiah in Matt 13:14-15, and Paul in Acts 28:26-27. He probably referred to them also in Rom 11:25.⚜
11 📚Then I said, “Lord,
how long?” And he answered,
“Until the cities are made a wasteland
without inhabitant,
and the houses without man,
and the land is utterly desolate,
12 📚And the LORD has removed men far away,
and the forsaken places in the midst
of the land are many.
13 📚But yet a tenth part will be in it,
and it will return and be
for consuming,
like a terebinth tree or an oak.
Its stump remains to it
when it is cut down.
So the holy seed will be its stump 📖”.
6:13 Even in the work of hardening and destruction God would preserve a remnant of the people for Himself. This is always God’s way.⚜