For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, the following simple resources are provided for you. Each passage has a four-Part approach to help you take in and think further about what you have read.

Passage: Isaiah 26:1-7

1 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:

We have a strong city;
    God makes salvation
    its walls and ramparts.
2 Open the gates
    that the righteous nation may enter,
    the nation that keeps faith.
3 You will keep in perfect peace
    those whose minds are steadfast,
    because they trust in you.
4 Trust in the Lord for ever,
    for the Lord, the Lord himself, is the Rock eternal.
5 He humbles those who dwell on high,
    he lays the lofty city low;
he levels it to the ground
    and casts it down to the dust.
6 Feet trample it down –
    the feet of the oppressed,
    the footsteps of the poor. 7 The path of the righteous is level;
    you, the Upright One, make the way of the righteous smooth.

A. Find Out

1. What will be sung when? v.1
2. Who may enter the city of God? v.2
3. Who will God give peace to? v.3
4. What are we to do with God and why? v.4
5. What does He do for the proud and the poor? v.5,6
6. What (by implication) does He do for the righteous? v.7

B. Think:

1. What have we been reading in these verses?
2. What will the Lord do for the righteous?
3. What will He do with the proud?

C. Comment:

In the midst of all the talk of the Lord’s coming judgment for unbelievers, and blessing for the faithful, comes this song of praise (v.1a), sung in Judah. It is about having a secure dwelling place with God (a strong city v.1b) the ‘surrounding security’ (walls), which is the salvation the Lord brings (v.1c). The fact that the Lord saves becomes a fact of reassurance, a protection against the enemy – think on that. This ‘city’ is a place for the righteous, for those who are faithful (v.2). As a follow on, there is a principle: we will have perfect, immovable peace when we trust in God and our minds are fixed on that truth (v.3).

So the call that follows is to trust in the Lord (v.4) because the “I Am”, the eternal God (LORD) is an everlasting Rock, one who is always there and unmovable. His character is unchanging and so you can know that He will bring down the proud (v.5a), those who are self assured and (by implication) who reject the Lord. He reverses the fortunes of men so that the oppressed and the poor are on top (v.6).

Meanwhile the righteous can take comfort and assurance that the Lord will make their path level and smooth (v.7). This is a sign of His blessing on their lives. To summarise, the righteous faithful remnant can know complete peace and security as they trust in the Lord who is unchanging and who will always be there for them, to bless them.

D. Application:

1. Knowing the Lord means you are in a place of complete assurance.   
2. Trusting in the Lord bring complete peace and blessing.

Passage: Isaiah 26:8-15 

8 Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws,
    we wait for you;
your name and renown
    are the desire of our hearts.
9 My soul yearns for you in the night;
    in the morning my spirit longs for you.
When your judgments come upon the earth,
    the people of the world learn righteousness.
10 But when grace is shown to the wicked,
    they do not learn righteousness;
even in a land of uprightness they go on doing evil
    and do not regard the majesty of the Lord.
11 Lord, your hand is lifted high,
    but they do not see it.
Let them see your zeal for your people and be put to shame;
    let the fire reserved for your enemies consume them.

12 Lord, you establish peace for us;
    all that we have accomplished you have done for us.
13 Lord our God, other lords besides you have ruled over us,
    but your name alone do we honour.
14 They are now dead, they live no more;
    their spirits do not rise.
You punished them and brought them to ruin;
    you wiped out all memory of them.
15 You have enlarged the nation, Lord;
    you have enlarged the nation.
You have gained glory for yourself;
    you have extended all the borders of the land.

A. Find Out

1. What does the prophet say his desire is? v.8,9
2. How are the wicked different? v.10-11
3. What does the prophet acknowledge of the Lord? v.12,13
4. But what about the wicked (implied)? v.14
5. What has the Lord done for the nation? v.15   

B. Think:

1. How are ‘the righteous’ blessed?
2. But how do ‘the wicked’ differ?
3. And what was their outcome?

C. Comment:

In this song of praise the prophet, as prophets often do, seems to step out of time as he speaks. He has just said that the Lord makes the way of the righteous a smooth and level path (v.7) and in the awareness of the Lord working for them, he now waits for the Lord (v.8) and yearns for His activities to be seen more and more so that the world will learn of Him. (v.9).

But then it is as if he looks down on history and sees the wicked, those focused on their own pleasure to the detriment of others, doing what is wrong in God’s sight. These people do not learn of God’s ways (v.10) even when the nation as a whole is living for God. These ones just going on doing wrong irrespective of God’s blessings on the nation (v.11) and so they actually deserve judgment.

The prophet is aware of the Lord’s goodness towards them, the peace He has brought them and, indeed, he recognises that anything good that they have, has come from the Lord (v.12). They have, in the past, had other rulers ruling over them (v.13) but they were not worthy of honour; only the Lord was. But they are no more, for the Lord has dealt with them and they are dead and gone (v.14).

He sees a time when no more is Israel under the oppression of an enemy. Indeed he goes further, for he sees a time when he sees that God has blessed and enlarged Israel (v.15). It has been a clear work of the Lord and glory has been given to Him. No longer is Israel a small insignificant nation; now they are blessed of God and the world sees it.

D. Application:

1. We may go through times of trial but the Lord will overcome.
2. The righteous will be brought through triumphant.

Passage: Isaiah 26:15-21

15 You have enlarged the nation, Lord;
    you have enlarged the nation.
You have gained glory for yourself;
    you have extended all the borders of the land.

16 Lord, they came to you in their distress;
    when you disciplined them,
    they could barely whisper a prayer.

17 As a pregnant woman about to give birth
    writhes and cries out in her pain,
    so were we in your presence, Lord.
18 We were with child, we writhed in labour,
    but we gave birth to wind.
We have not brought salvation to the earth,
    and the people of the world have not come to life.

19 But your dead will live, Lord;
    their bodies will rise –
let those who dwell in the dust
    wake up and shout for joy –
your dew is like the dew of the morning;
    the earth will give birth to her dead.

20 Go, my people, enter your rooms
    and shut the doors behind you;
hide yourselves for a little while
    until his wrath has passed by.
21 See, the Lord is coming out of his dwelling
    to punish the people of the earth for their sins.
The earth will disclose the blood shed on it;
    the earth will conceal its slain no longer.

A. Find Out

1. How had their restoration started? v.16
2. What had they been like? v.17
3. Yet what was all that came forth? v.18
4. Yet what will happen? v.19
5. What counsel are they given? v.20
6. Why? v.21

B. Think:

1. How do these verses appear to look back?
2. How do they also look forward?
3. Yet what is the present counsel and why? 

C. Comment:

Previously in this chapter the praise had been because of the assurance they had of the Lord (v.1-7), yet they had to wait while the Lord dealt with the unrighteous (v.8-12), while still being confident that the Lord was blessing the nation (v.12-15).

In what now follows the prophet first LOOKS BACK to how, as a people, they had been disciplined by the Lord. In that, they cried to the Lord in prayer (v.16) showing their weakness, reflecting how they actually were. Like a woman in the last stages of labour, so they cried out expecting something to change (v.17) yet what came was not the salvation they expected (v.18).

But then the prophet LOOKS FORWARD. In all this the (spiritually) dead, or those who only expected death, will yet rise (v.17a). In the same way that the dew appears silently in the morning so the Lord will yet come and bring His salvation.

And yet there is a BUT and it is a ‘but’ that involves THE PRESENT. It is that this salvation is not coming yet and so the call is for them now in the present to go indoors and wait patiently because God’s wrath has yet to be worked through (v.20).

The big picture here is that although God will bring salvation to the faithful remnant, yet He is going to bring judgment on the unfaithful and unrighteous; they will be punished. Until it’s passed, wait! (v.21)

D. Application:

1. The earth may suffer upheavals at God deals with the unrighteous.
2. Yet the Lord will be there for His faithful ones.