Isaiah 9:1-7 - Fully God

1 But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. 2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. 3 You have multiplied the nation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. 4 For the yoke of his burden, and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. 5 For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. 6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

Target Date: Sunday, 24 December 2023

Word Study/ Translation Notes:

To us – carries with it the meaning “for us” – for our benefit.

Government - מִשְׂרָה misrâh, mis-raw’; from 8280; empire:— government

LXX translates it arché: beginning, origin, dominion

The arche was first conceived of over 2,500 years ago. While it is hardly scientific, it is still relevant to how we perceive our existence today. It is an elemental life force from which all things emerge, and essentially early philosophy’s answer to the question of what is the true “beginning” of things. It was a major area of concern for the Pre-Socratic philosophers, who spent lot of effort deciding which element was deserving enough to be called the arche and why. The concept of the arche is deeply linked to monism, the belief that all of the universe is made of a single element. Different Pre-Socratics each came to their own conclusions about what exactly this fundamental substance could be. Let’s have a look…

From: שָׂרָה sarah (975b); a prim. root; to persist, exert oneself, persevere:—contended(1), striven(1), wrestled(1).

This word is found in only these two verses in the Bible.

Prince - שַׂר sar, sar; from 8323; a head person (of any rank or class):— captain (that had rule), chief (captain), general, governor, keeper, lord, ([-task-]) master, prince (-ipal), ruler, steward.

7 - No end - קֵץ qêts, kates; contr. from 7112: an extremity; adv. (with prep. pref.) after:— + after, (utmost) border, end, [in-] finite, × process.

“There will be no after.”

Thoughts on the Passage:

Verse 6 is possibly the most concise description of everything we need to know about the Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, in the entire Bible. It encompasses everything vital about Him, and each thing is necessary to our understanding of Him.

It is entirely possible that, under the direction of the Holy Spirit, HE did not entirely understand the full implications of these words and descriptions of the Christ.

It is entirely possible that God exceeded even what Isaiah understood in this revelation.

Wonderful Counselor:

Presented as two nouns, these could be taken as two separate titles: indeed, the word Wonderful is used often to describe God. But to take it this way destroys the parallelism of the verse, so that interpretation is not to be preferred.

This can mean a few things, and all are undeniably true:

A wonder of a Counselor – His teachings will be invariably true and right. There will be no fault in the least with His answers or with His wisdom.

A Counselor of wonders – The teachings He gives are divinely given, proceeding from the God of wonders. He speaks that which He knows and has received from the Father.

A Counselor with wonders – One whose wisdom is proven in His miraculous works.

Isaiah makes no effort to distinguish between these interpretations.

There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. 2 And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. 3 And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, 4 but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; - Isaiah 11:1-4

The problem is the world doesn’t want that kind of wisdom. Indeed, even believers sometimes kick against this heavenly wisdom. We are much happier if we could figure things out for ourself. Give us more rules to strive for, and let us slide on some of them so we can decide which ones to follow. We want to follow our own wisdom; God’s wisdom is too strict. It is as if we believe the problem of Adam in the Garden is not that he disobeyed God, but that he didn’t take enough bites of the fruit.

Mighty God:

Make no mistake about who this Christ is: He is God Himself – in the flesh.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. – John 1:1

Everlasting Father:

He is identified with the Eternal Father – the creator of everything that was made.

He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. – John 1:2

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. – Colossians 1:15 – 16

 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. – Colossians 1:17

Prince of Peace:

For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. - Colossians 1:19-20

Sermon Text:

We come this morning to the culmination of this prophetic passage.

If you recall last week’s sermon, we ended with the beginning of verse 6: For to us a child is born.

TO us a child is born.

He is born FOR us, On our behalf, for our benefit.

This is God’s perfect and eternal answer for our inborn rebellion and sinful nature.

The child is not God’s offering to us;

He is God’s offering to Himself INSTEAD of us, if we will believe in Him. Have faith in Him.

This, as we mentioned last week, is God’s answer to those who have oppressed others, who have hurt themselves and others, and who live in the state of combat with the world and with God.

There is none righteous on this earth, not a single one.

Not now. Not ever.

And apart from God’s direct action on our behalf, we all face the consequences of our utterly ruined nature:

To be enslaved to sin.

To be captured and dragged to our deaths, all the time proclaiming our freedom.

“I am free!” the sinner says.

“I am better than that man”

“I have done pretty well following even God’s Law, considering my circumstances.”

And none of those pleas can cover the guilt of even our smallest sin, even our nicest thought.

Because they are all polluted by the sin that has ruined us.

Our best actions, our most noble deeds, our most admirable traits, are like rags we have pulled from a sewer.

They all proceed from that septic tank of a heart we have, so that even our best thoughts and most selfless acts are still thoroughly infected with pride, selfishness, and self-righteousness.

That is why there is anguish.

That is why there is contempt.

That is why those in darkness need desperately to see a great Light.

And because this is not simply a Jewish problem, but a mankind problem, we looked a couple of weeks ago at why the Christ, the Messiah of God, would proceed from the Gentile area – Galilee.

The great melting pot of the Middle East, where Jews and Gentiles worked and lived together side by side.

He would be the “Light to the Gentiles.”

And He wouldn’t just be a child, but a SON.

The only begotten Son of God.

Not simply another prophet sent to declare God’s will and God’s Law, although that is part of what He did.

He had sent prophet after prophet, and each of them was at best ignored and at worst, murdered.

The last of the prophets, John the Baptizer, saw people’s hearts turning back to God, repenting of their sins, and looking forward to the promise of God’s forgiveness.

And he was beheaded by a pathetic king.

No prophet could bring about God’s promise of forgiveness.

No eloquent or persuasive teaching could accomplish God’s redemption of His people.

The need of mankind, whether individuals or nations, is not to understand the Law of God better.

They DO understand it; that is the problem.

They understand it, and they reject it.

They tell themselves they can save themselves.

They lie to themselves, saying that a loving God would never punish them.

They think they can make some persuasive argument before God on that great Day of Judgment that will cause Him to shake His head, apologize for His wrath, and deny His own nature.

Or, perhaps most tragically of all, they close their eyes and ears, they close their hearts, and believe that if they deny that there is a God enough times, and they believe it strongly enough, they will be right.

And they never even realize the great tragedy that would be, should the common grace of God be removed from the world.

And they do all this so they can cling to their own will, their own ideas, their own prejudices, their own sin, even as each of those is killing them every single day.

And, for many, they will learn too late that all their denials, and delusions, and self-deceptions have taken them before the great God of all Creation, and they have no defense.

What we need is not a better explanation of God’s Law – that is quite sufficiently done in the Scriptures.

What we NEED is the Son.

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. – John 1:17

The Law was GIVEN through Moses.

Grace and truth CAME through Jesus Christ.

The final message of God about salvation for His people was not GIVEN through a prophet, not proclaimed on a scroll or tablet;

It CAME in the person of Jesus Christ.

At the very heart of our great need is our NEED of the Son whom God has sent.

The One who was born in complete innocence, and who NEVER lost that innocence.

The first baby EVER born in that state.

Adam and Eve had no children before they sinned and all creation fell because of their sin.

This child, born in a stable, laid in a feed trough, swaddled in rags, and announced by angels to shepherd was literally the FIRSTBORN of God’s new creation.

He was born of water and spirit, flesh and the Holy Spirit.

Born under the Law to redeem, to purchase, those who were under the sentence of the Law by His blood.

The government shall be upon HIS shoulder.

What government is Isaiah talking about here?

He is the only one to use this word in the Old Testament, and he uses it only here, twice in this passage, once in verse 6 and once in verse 7.

So to allow Scripture to interpret Scripture, we must go to the New Testament.

I won’t bore you with the linguistic details, but I will include a footnote in the notes I upload to the Web to describe in a little detail the path I took.

So, skipping to the important part, we do have a word that fits the meaning here: kingdom.

As in “the kingdom of heaven” or the “kingdom of God”.

According to my quick lookup in Strong’s Concordance, this word is used no fewer than 163 times in the New Testament.

And it is used in nearly every case I found to describe the kingdom of God, specifically proclaimed through the Son.

Both words CAN, most often outside of Scripture, refer to a piece of land or a set or borders, but they are never used that way in the New Testament at all when talking about the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God is like a sower…

The kingdom of God is like a merchant…

The kingdom of God is like a grain of mustard…

The kingdom of God is like a little leaven a woman hid in a loaf…

The kingdom of God isn’t about land or borders or nations:

It is about the extent, the realm, of God’s authority where His people dwell according to His will.

And that makes a lot more sense when Isaiah tells us the government, the kingdom, will be upon His shoulder.

Land cannot be loaded onto a shoulder, even really small countries.

But the title and authority to the realm of God on earth can easily be carried by the Christ of God.

And it doesn’t even take both shoulders.

In the original, the word shoulder is singular, not plural.

What is the difference?

The government being on his shoulders leads us to understand it is a great weight, like the picture of Atlas holding up the world.

And while the price Jesus Christ paid for our redemption was great, that is not what is in view here.

The picture here is that He carries the authority easily, like a king wearing a crest on his coat,

Or at the worst, like a carpenter carrying a beam on his shoulder.

This government, for Him, is not a great weight, but a great honor.

It is something He bears, not something He falters under.

I suppose some translators made it plural in anticipation of the crossbeam our Lord would carry to the cross,

But this passage is about the great qualifications of our Lord, not the suffering He would endure.

So now we come to very quickly look at His NAMES.

These are names to describe the Christ, to tell us what He will be like and what He will do.

And I would like to suggest there is no more comprehensive description of Jesus Christ and who He is than right here in the Old Testament, 700 years before He was born.

As we go through them, I invite you to consider how each describes something the others do not, and how, if we should omit one, we would have an incomplete picture of the Christ.

Wonderful Counselor – there are some who have suggested these are two separate names, but it doesn’t ultimately change the truth of the title.

There are two words here, as with the other three names, and this one has some, I believe, intentional ambiguity.

1. It can mean, at its plainest, a wonder of a counselor, meaning that His counsels are always true and right.

2. The word “wonderful” can also mean “miraculous”, pointing to the heavenly source of His counsels.

So you might call Him the Counselor OF Wonders.

So that people exclaim – No one has ever spoken like this man.

3. It could also mean the Counselor who DOES wonders – wonder-filled.

One who confirms His teaching with signs given by God.

When Nicodemus came to our Lord in the night, he said:

Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” – John 3:2

All three of these understandings are consistent with what we know of our Lord in the New Testament.

Then He is called “Mighty God.”

This isn’t just the team He plays for, the name across His jersey, as it were.

This is WHO He is.

We saw this last week when we looked at the angelic announcement to the shepherds.

He was not declared as “The Lord’s Christ”; He was proclaimed as “The Christ, the Lord!”

He is the Christ, AND He is also fully God.

And notice the adjective: Mighty.

He has not come to be some pathetic symbol to draw on our heartstrings as we consider the great injustice done to Him by men who nailed Him to the cross.

He is MIGHTY.

Like we looked at before, He was born innocent.

But He, in His OWN STRENGTH, withstood every temptation, rejected every sin, held firm to all righteousness, and accomplished every task God had for Him in His life.

And then, physically weakened from beatings and scourgings, He endured God’s infinite and holy wrath against sin.

Sin that He never committed.

Sin that was put upon Him so it could be paid for.

And at no point in any tiny way, did He ever stray one hair’s-breadth from God’s perfect will.

And we know He did it all perfectly because God raised Him from the dead on the third day after His execution.

He is “Everlasting Father” – Eternal Father.

He was in the beginning with God.

He is God.

He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. – John 1:2

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together – Colossians 1:15–17

And He is the “Prince of Peace”.

I realize you have been patient with me, but hold on for a few minutes longer, because this, to me, was the most surprising.

We have been talking about the Christ all along as the King, but then we see Him called here “the Prince”.

There are some teachers who preach the idea that the Son is eternally UNDER the Father, and they might come here to make a bit of proof.

And Isaiah does, indeed, call Him the PRINCE of Peace, not the “King” of Peace.

So how are we to understand this?

First, we have to take all these titles as describing a SINGLE PERSON – the kingly and ruling titles and this “Prince” one.

He has already established that this Christ IS GOD, that He is the ETERNAL FATHER, completely equally the same God.

And that is as far as I go in describing the Trinity because that is all I can understand from the revelation of God about Himself in the Scripture.

Second, the key to understanding this title is to look at the position of the Prince.

He is the one, in the hierarchy of the kingdom, that sits IN BETWEEN the king and the people.

And that, coupled with the other descriptions of the Christ, tells us so much about the grace of God through Jesus Christ.

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? 33 Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. – Romans 8:31-34

We have another way of expressing these titles in our Confession:

Wonderful Counselor – Prophet

Mighty God, Everlasting Father – King

Prince of Peace – Priest

he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. – Hebrews 7:25

In no other person in all the world can these titles be joined:

Prophets are not priests who likewise are not kings.

But the greatness of God’s grace, sent to us through Jesus Christ, could barely even be described in these four truthful names.

The baby in the feeding trough came to save us from our sins, if we will only repent and believe.