Isaiah 60 PEACE FINALLY, GLORY TO GOD! The righteousness of life that is needed for true fellowship with God and effective testimony to the world, is beyond our capability to produce by ourselves. In these last chapters of Isaiah’s prophecy, he emphasizes the fact that it is God alone who is able to make people righteous. This the fundamental point of the Gospel. What we cannot do for ourselves, and no one else can do for us, God can, and did, for us. The darkness that permeated the history of Israel will turn to light, and the mourning of the Jews for hundreds of generations, will become praise and salvation world- wide.
The world’s darkness will be overcome by the light of Israel, and it happened to a certain degree when our Lord Jesus Christ was born, “A Light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel.” However, His own rejected Him then, but that Light was turned on, and the church has been reflecting His light world-wide since He left right up until this time. “Ye are the light of the world,” gives us a sense of the worth the Lord places on believers who testify to His saving grace whenever and wherever they preach the Gospel. That awareness of who we are and why we are still here challenges His people to conduct their lives in a holy and righteous way because everything we do reflects on Him. It is our responsibility to reflect Him before people around us in all we do.
Redeemed people who love the Lord, want other people to comes to Him and be saved. Those who appreciate the fact that He gave His life for us because He loved us, love Him in return, and hopefully that love is a bright light to show the reality of the Gospel. People who have tried to be saved by their own efforts, have failed. However, when they repent of their sins and trust Christ alone as their Savior, they receive a glory that doesn’t fade away like man- made and human glory.
The Lord’s first coming was like a sunrise over a dark world. Since then, both Jews and Gentiles have been blessed through the Gospel message being preached, and are saved when they believe it. All the blessings that evaded Israel through the past, will someday come to the nation in the future. All of God’s promises to that nation, and are still waited for, will come to pass in His time when people and conditions are ready to receive their fulfillment. Those who are converted from among the nations of the world, will bring their offerings of thanksgiving and appreciation to the Lord. This includes sons and daughters (converted Jews) who have been dispersed among the Gentile nations. Both will come to worship the Lord at the new temple in Jerusalem.
In the coming millennium, Jews and Gentiles will be as one in fellowship when Jerusalem becomes the capital city of the world. The Messiah/King will be supreme over every government on earth and will not allow rebellion to go unpunished. There will be a great contrast between Israel in the millennium, and the Jews in the time of Isaiah. There will be glory for God and righteousness instead of contempt. Where there was poverty in the time of Isaiah, there will be wealth in the millennial kingdom. Righteousness will take the place of injustice and peace instead of war. The glory of God will be so obvious that the very wall will be called “Salvation,” and the gates to the city will be called “Praise.” Godliness will be normal rather than apostasy. Instead of only a very few believers, there will be a great number that are like a mighty nation.
Jews who for many generations have been mixed among the nations all over the world, will return to their ancestral homeland and will receive, revere and respect their Messiah who will reign. God’s judgment because of righteous, legal and just wrath was always meant to be temporary with the view to promoting change in the behavior of the people. When that truly happens and their behavior toward the Lord is real and evident, His favor will be upon them. God’s favor was always meant to be eternal. Many people in many nations who have responded to the Gospel that came when the “Light shone in the darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not,” will be saved by God’s grace. Israel itself will be nurtured by the nations in the millennium when they bring much of what they have to be given to sustain Israel.
Repentance and faith in the Lord will bring recovery and exaltation to those who have been previously persecuted. The people of Israel will be called righteous when they turn to their Messiah and own Him as their Savior and Lord. As a result, they will have righteousness imputed to them in the same way the children of God today are made righteous by God, before God. Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, gives us a new nature that is godly in both attitude and conduct. We who are believers in this time of grace, get a jump-start on all God will be doing in a more inclusive way in the future.. “This may be the dawning of that day.”