The Servant is a Covenant

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Isaiah 42:5–9 NKJV

5 Thus says God the Lord, Who created the heavens and stretched them out, Who spread forth the earth and that which comes from it, Who gives breath to the people on it, And spirit to those who walk on it: 6 “I, the Lord, have called You in righteousness, And will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, As a light to the Gentiles, 7 To open blind eyes, To bring out prisoners from the prison, Those who sit in darkness from the prison house. 8 I am the Lord, that is My name; And My glory I will not give to another, Nor My praise to carved images. 9 Behold, the former things have come to pass, And new things I declare; Before they spring forth I tell you of them.”

Study

Verse 5 The new creation

The new creation is the work of the same one who accomplished the first creation - he called the world into existence, stretched out the heavens (expansion of the universe - big bang)

He breathed life in the mankind, and is capable of new life in the new man

Verse 6 - the servant’s commission

Servant CAN refer to Israel, and does in many passages. But here it cannot. Israel cannot be a covenant to the gentiles.

Called in righteousness. The unrighteous cannot stand in God’s sight. Unrighteousness is why the first creation failed. A new covenant is needed

Grasped your hand (strengthened, held). The almighty power of God is strengthening this servant, who comes in the name of the Lord

A covenant for the people

Laban and Jacob - definition of covenant.

How to get along. You do this, I will do that.

Keep the laws and commands, and I will be your God and you will be my people.

But that failed, and death entered.

Rather than simply giving new conditions, a new covenant is needed. The Servant IS the covenant.

“How to get along with God, and receive his blessings” - Christ alone. he IS the covenant. All the blessings of God are only there, in him.

Romans 5:17–19 NKJV

17 For if by the one man’s offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.) 18 Therefore, as through one man’s offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man’s righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. 19 For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous.

This is the “mediator” - who mediates between God and man in his two natures, united in one person

“one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, recognized in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation;”

The person of Christ is the covenant between God and man

Jeremiah 31:31–33 NKJV

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah—32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord. 33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

When the covenant comes, and relationship with God is restored, the result is light.

1 John 1:5 NKJV

5 This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.

Christ unites us to God, and therefore we have light. Light includes hope, peace, knowledge, love - all the fruits of the spirit

Verse 7 - the purpose

When death is overcome and the covenant with God is restored, darkness is overcome

Open blind eyes. Naturally, we don’t know what we are doing here, where we are going, where we fit.

Adam sought to be God, and ended up blind - just a purposeless one day after another. Trying to find something to hold on to.

And we all follow suit. Sin is blindness, because it turns us into ourselves. Sight looks out upon those things that are NOT ourselves - to God and to neighbor. And by understanding God and our place among our neighbors, we understand ourselves.

Blindness seeks to put our own hearts on the throne, and ends up lonely, desperate, fearful,

But when God opens the eyes, we have purpose, we have a future, we have hope.

We have someone other than ourselves that gives us a foundation, a cornerstone, a meaning to our existance.

Prison - opening the doors of the prison-house. We are kept in the prison awaiting death. But when death is done, the law has no more hold on us.

Verse 8 The name of the Lord.

Idols cannot give freedom from bondage. They cannot release a soul from the power of sin.

They cannot bring Israel back from Babylon.

And notice here - God’s plan of redemption is to reveal himself. It is his nature to communicate himself.

He begot the Son, he breathes forth the spirit, he reveals himself by his word and spirit and through that he begets the church.

James 1:18–19 NKJV

18 Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures. 19 So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath;

And so God - who declared the former things. The captivity, the exile, the destruction of Jerusalem - also declares the new things.

A new era comes. And he brings it to pass by his word through his Servant…who is gradually being revealed