Isaiah 49:1-12, A Job Description

Isaiah’s Servant Song and the Lord’s Word to the Coastlands

Isaiah chapter 49 verses 1 to 12, hear the word of the Lord. Listen to me, O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples, from afar. The Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother. He named my name.

He made my mouth like a sharp sword, and the shadow of His hand He hid me. He made me a polished arrow, and His quiver He hid me away. And He said to me, You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.

But I said, I have labored in vain. I have spit my strength for nothing in vanity. Yet surely my right is with the Lord, and my recompense with my God. And now the Lord says, He who formed me from the womb to be His servant, to bring Jacob back to Him, and that Israel might be gathered to Him.

For I am honored in the eyes of the Lord, and my God has become my strength. He says, It is too light a thing that you should be my servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to bring back the preserved of Israel.

I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Thus says the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel and His Holy One, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nation, the servant of rulers.

Kings shall see and arise, princes, and they shall prostrate themselves, because of the Lord who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you. Thus says the Lord, in a time of favor I have answered you, in a day of salvation I have helped you.

I will keep you and give you as a covenant to the people, to establish the land, to apportion the desolate heritages, to apportion the desolate heritages, saying to the prisoners, come out, to those who are in darkness, appear.

They shall feed along the ways, and on bare heights shall be their pasture. They shall not hunger or thirst, neither scorching wind nor sun shall strike them, for He who has pity on them will lead them, and by springs of water will guide them.

And I will make all my mountains a road, and my highways shall be raised up. Behold, these shall come from afar, and behold, these from the north and from the west, and these from the land of Sihon. May the Lord add His blessings to the reading of His Holy Word.

Do you have a job description? Some of you have a job description, maybe something that describes exactly what you do. Those of you who are employed, have you had someone tell you exactly what's expected of you?

What you're supposed to be doing? What are your responsibilities? Is it written out? Some manual somewhere, maybe? For Wayne, I bet. Some federal manual, whatever, postal service manual. Several of you here, of course, are self-employed, and you work at your family's business, but I bet you know exactly what you're supposed to be doing, right?

Even if no one has ever written it out for you. Where's Joyce? Oh, there she is. She knows exactly what she's supposed to be doing, doesn't she? You're supposed to take orders, run the cash register, maybe clean the dining area as needed, that kind of thing.

Job descriptions are useful, so we know what to do, and what we don't necessarily have to do. When I ran track, my job description was simple. Run the 5 ,000 meters, or the 1 ,500 sometimes, or the steeplechase, even.

But I don't have to worry about the sprints, or the shot put. You wouldn't want to try me doing the shot put. It's not my responsibility. I don't want to pick up that big ball and try to throw it. Or the javelin, or the pole vault.

I wouldn't get very far with the pole vault. But sometimes you've just got to do what needs to be done. At Mary's Magazine, a subscriber came into the office to pay for her subscription, but the business manager, that's her job, right, was out.

The layout artist was there. She's the one that designs the look of the magazine. She doesn't want to do it. Not in her job description. Of course, never mind that the subscribers are the ones who pay the bills and make her salary possible.

Still, it's good to have a job description. Maybe yours is deliver the mail. So if you come across a house, we're missing David Scruggs today, but if you come across a house where the floors need sanding, Wayne doesn't think, well, I've got to do this job.

No, he knows that's a job for someone else. If your job description is to take the cash and the orders, you can't spend all your time behind cooking, right? Someone has to take the orders and the money.

Or the chef behind doesn't have any pay. In churches, there's a lot of confusion about job descriptions. There's really a whole lot. Some people in church don't have any sense that there is a job description.

They just kind of come and they listen, and that's all there is. Some come and go from ministries as they feel like, doing the parts they feel like, leaving the rest for the responsible ones who realize that someone has to, you know, someone has to wash those cups that the kids drink out of.

You know, someone's got to do that. That's why they're clean. And someone's got to close up the building. Deacons are supposed to be people with a specific job descriptions. They're not like in many Baptist churches in the Bible.

But, you know, many Baptist churches, they're like deacons at large. They don't know what they're supposed to be doing. And so then they end up meddling in things that are none of their business. But in the Bible, they actually have specific job descriptions.

And they're supposed to be responsible and faithful enough to fulfill them. If you remember, just a few weeks ago, when we were in Acts chapter 6, the calling of the first seven deacons, they had a specific job description.

Distribute food, particularly to the widows. That's why I think, that's why in this church, our deacons serve a specific task to do a specific job for the terms that they're given. For the pastor, a lot of people are very fuzzy when it comes to the job description.

He's probably the only one they think has a job description. But they're kind of fuzzy about what it says. They know he's supposed to preach. But what else? Is he supposed to visit everyone? Yeah, maybe.

Depending. And do everything? No. Now, Reformed churches should know better. If they have multiple elders, sharing the pastoral responsibilities. Though people with no sense of the body, that is, they kind of view the church as an inspiration station, kind of like a gas station, go to get your inspiration.

And they have no sense that they're members of a body. They often don't understand that that there are different members in the body have different job descriptions to keep the body going. That not everyone has to do, maybe not everyone has to be an evangelist or everyone has to be a preacher or whatever.

Many people's view today is if you're really committed to the Lord, you become the preacher, right? That's just kind of what you do. That's the highest level. No, that's not at all true. You could be completely committed to the Lord and still run your restaurant or deliver mail or sand floors or whatever it is, be a doctor, whatever it is you do.

You serve the Lord in your vocation. And for the church, you have a particular way that you serve, a particular job description. You don't have to do everything. You don't have to feel guilty that there's some things that you're not doing because they're just not your calling.

That's okay. The Spirit gives different job descriptions to different members of the body. And I shouldn't get caught away on that because that's really had nothing to do with Isaiah chapter 49. I'm just getting carried away.

Some people think that their job description is to be the pastor's critic. But funny, that doesn't, that one doesn't appear in scripture. Very popular calling. It just doesn't appear in scripture. What's your job description?

What about for Christ? Does he have a job description? Does he have something that describes what he is called to do? Well, we saw last week in the first servant song in Isaiah 42, we said, the Lord there said, he kind of ended that servant song by saying, behold, look at this.

I'm telling you about this beforehand. And now job descriptions are written beforehand. I would imagine all the time, you don't hire someone, then see what they do and then write the job description according to what they do.

I wouldn't think you would normally do that. You have a job that needs to be done. You define it and you then find someone to do that job. The Lord has a job that needs to be done. He's calling the servant, the one he calls the servant here.

We saw that in chapter 42. Now again, chapter 49. And in this second servant song, he provides the servant a job description. He describes three main jobs for the servant. The servant speaks, the servant shines, and the servant shepherds.

The Servant Speaks to the Coastlands

But first the servant speaks. He says that himself, speaking for himself in those first four verses. He says, listen to me. That, by the way, is our job. His job is to speak. Our job is to listen. The first servant song began with us being told, do you remember how it began?

Behold, look at the servant. The second one begins here in chapter 49 with telling us to listen to him. We behold him, we look at him, and we listen to him. He's speaking. We see that, we see that, this is the servant himself speaking in verse three, where he says, he said to me, he's talking about God said to me, you are my servant.

So this is the servant speaking in these first four verses. The servant says, first, listen to me. Who's he speaking to? Listen to me, you coastlands. That's odd, isn't it? Remember, he's in Israel. The furthest most parts of the earth, coastlands, places that you normally have to take a ship to, to get to.

Maybe today you could take a plane to go get to them, crossing oceans. The ends of the earth, remember what Jesus said in Acts, you go to the ends of the earth. They had just begun to do that when they got the gospel to the Ethiopian eunuch who would then be going to Ethiopia.

The ends of the earth, the coastlands, that's places like China, like America. The servant is speaking directly to us and telling us to listen. We're the ones from afar, from the coastlands. That's us.

He's talking to us here, being told to listen in verse one. So if you think this is just, you think this is just for the Jews, maybe there's the Old Testament. Maybe some people, you think the whole Bible is just for the Jews.

I think it's just for that ethnic group that that religion is part of their culture. And ours is different. Or maybe you think, depending on who you are, you think, well, that's, this stuff is the white man's religion.

Nevermind that the gospel actually got to Africa first before it got to Europe, as we saw. But some people think it's not ours, this stuff. It's not for our culture. It's fine. We're not insulting it.

It's great. I like your Bible. It has nice poetry here and there. But it's just not for us. It's not our stuff. Ours is maybe what? Confucius? Ancestral tablets? Jawsticks? Hell money? Taurus funerals?

And Buddhist art? The filial child remembering his or her ancestors? Or maybe for the past couple of generations, maybe the atheistic materialism of the Communist Party. That's my culture, some people think.

And all that, all this Bible stuff, this Jesus, well, it's fine. I'm not complaining. I'm not putting it down. It's just not for us. And Jesus speaks to that in verse one. Jesus here speaking directly to that, to the people so far off and says, no, listen to me, Ethiopians, listen to me, Chinese, African-Americans, all Americans, all people pay attention.

No matter how far off on this planet you are. I'm the Lord's servant. Listen, the servant speaks and he addresses your culture, every nation. And he says about himself in the second half of verse one, the Lord called me from the womb.

An angel appeared to Mary and told her that she will conceive and bear a son, says in Luke, he will be great and be called the son of the most high. And the Lord God will give him the throne of his father, David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and his and of his kingdom.

There will be no end. Jesus, the servant, was called from his mother's womb. And he was called to be the Christ, the king who fulfills the promise to David. And then that last line from verse one, from my mother's, from the body of my mother, he named my name.

He shall be named Jesus, the angel said to Mary. What's his job description? Well, he's a king from the womb to rule. How will he rule? What's the instrument of his rule? Well, with the sword of his mouth.

Revelation pictures actually pictures a vision of him with a sword coming out of his mouth. That's a picture of the power of his word. The word of God is in Hebrews chapter four, verse 12, sharper, it says, than any two edged sword piercing to the division of soul and spirit, cutting to the intentions deep in your heart, exposing them.

So you say, wow, there's a lot of sin down there. Well, here his words are sharp. It says a sharp sword or a polished arrow. They can penetrate the armor of all the arguments that we make for our sin.

It can pierce the hardest hearts. That's why we're to equip ourselves with the sword of the spirit, the word of God. We need to learn it. We need to memorize it. That's why we're doing what we're doing right now.

That sword would be wielded. Use it to counter whatever the lies of the world, our own sinful nature. Well, we're telling ourselves, remind ourselves with it that whatever we need to remind ourselves at certain times, we need to be thankful to our spouses to keep our commitments to seek first the kingdom of God, not money or stuff.

Remind ourselves with it that what our relationship is with with God, with the Lord, that whom have I in heaven but you. And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. We say to God. That's why we seek to have a scripture saturated service.

We read a song. We sing the song. We pray the song. We read the scripture. We exposit the scripture. We preach the scripture. It's not my opinions, not my politics or whatever pop psychology you want to hear.

Maybe relationship tips, you know, seven steps to a great marriage, that kind of stuff. No, it's the word of God that needs to be wielded, even if it cuts us sometimes exposing those sinful thoughts and intentions that ego that hates correction.

The servant wields the sword of the word. That's his job description. Indeed, we'll see in the New Testament that he is the word called from the womb with the word of God coming out of his mouth. Wouldn't you think that he would be busy right from the start?

I mean, when you want to, you know, right from the moment he can talk that he's but he giving. He's going to start speaking in that word and bringing his reign and as soon as he could, maybe at least, at least maybe from like when he was 12.

Don't you think he went to the temple and instead of asking questions of the teachers there, what should he be teaching them? But in verse two, his job description was for a while to be hidden. Says in the shadow of his hand, he hid me.

In other words, God's hand was over him obscuring him. The Lord kept him in obscurity for about 30 years. You know, for the Lord's purpose. Apparently, he was working as a carpenter in a small town in Galilee.

Actually, the Bible doesn't even say that clearly what he was doing. Just says he's a son of a carpenter. People assume he's a carpenter, too. We don't even know that. We don't know. We still don't know because it was obscured.

He was in a small town in Galilee. It's on the, you know, Galilee. Israel was already on the outskirts of the empire and Galilee is on the outskirts of the outskirts. I mean, it's an obscure place. He grew physically and in wisdom and in favor with God and people.

Just being polished like an arrow to be taken out of the quiver at the right time. But for a while he was hidden until the right time came. For 30 years he was hidden away. What's his job description?

He's the servant of the Lord. He called him, verse 3, he called Israel. Now, some, like some Jewish people would say that then he, then he is, this is talking about Israel. It's not talking about Jesus.

It's talking about Israel corporately as a nation. Look at that. He's called Israel here. I can say, but just point it right at it. There it is. Don't you believe it? But in just a few verses in verse 5, so the servant gathers Israel.

Then in verse 6 he brings back the preserved of Israel. So, you know, how is the servant Israel and the one who gathers Israel? You know, obviously he's gathering people other than himself. Drawing the true Israel back together.

How can both be true? Well, it's true like the verse from Hosea. And Hosea said out of Israel, excuse me, out of Egypt, I called my son. Originally about Israel coming out of Egypt at the Exodus, about the nation being called out.

Out of Egypt I called my son. But it, but, that was fulfilled by Jesus being brought out of Egypt. Matthew, Matthew quotes that and says it's fulfilled by Jesus who's the true Israel called out of Egypt.

Here in Isaiah 49 the second servant song the servant embodies all that Israel was called to be. He is the true Israel. The servant Israel restores the nation Israel. The gathering of his people. In him the Lord says according to the servant who tells us to listen to him.

Listen to what he's saying. Here's his job description. What he's to do. The Lord will be glorified. The Lord will be made much of. People will exalt him, revere him. He'll be the most important thing in the lives of many people because of what the servant does.

Because of what the servant says. The servant is to speak. More people will believe in him. People in those coastlands. That's what he's talking to. In far away places. People in China and America. People like us.

Who wouldn't have otherwise have believed. But now we tremble at his word. Because of the servant Jesus is wielding that sword of his word. The job description of the servant is to glorify the Lord. And he's he's been busy doing that up until today.

But in verse 4 not without trouble. Not without disappointment. Not without people who who claim to believe him to be doing his will. Who are actually doing their own will. Who are actually just trying to get out of it what they can get out of it.

Glorifying themselves and bringing dishonor to the Lord. In my studies in church history, I read a book by a famous 19th century Presbyterian scholar named Robert Lewis Dabney who was from originally from Virginia and who taught first in Virginia and then went on to found a seminary Presbyterian Seminary in Texas.

The book was entitled Defense of Virginia and Through Her of the South. By the way, it was published in 1867. So two years after the Civil War. Defense of Virginia and Through Her of the South in the recent and pending contest against the sectional party.

Okay. It looks like he's it looks like he's expecting another Civil War here. South will rise again kind of thing. But in that book, Dabney defended slavery and he used the Bible to try to create sympathy for the Confederate cause.

Did that kind of thing bring glory or dishonor to the Lord? Just this past week, I saw someone online arguing that Christians, you evangelical Christians, you're so racist, you defended slavery and racism and they use Dabney as an example.

Here he is. Look at this guy. How about the church selling indulgences whenever the coin in the coffer rings another soul from purgatory Springs, which is really just a brilliant but cynical corrupt fundraising gimmick to build elaborate buildings in Rome.

How about teaching this salvation really does depend on man's will and effort contrary to Roman chapter 916. In other words, church saying you have to do these things which is what we tell you to do. Obey us, go through our rituals in order to get salvation.

You have to get salvation through us. And that convenient, but you would need a lot of money comes from that. How about all that? How do you think Christ himself looking at what has been done to his gospel for centuries, maybe till today, you know, these prosperity gospel preachers making millions of dollars off of a perversion of God's word.

I think Christ himself looks at that and feels about it and thinks about it. You know, people for centuries and still going on today, all the twisted presentations of the gospel, all the self-serving uses of it by people who are more interested in money than that they can make off of it than glorifying God.

All the dishonor that's been brought on God by people who mock him for what's been done wrong in his name. How do you think Christ himself sees that and feels about it? Or what about what he experienced in his own life when he was on earth?

You know, crowds were flocking to him. So many at one point they wanted to make him king. And then he told them, whoever of you wants to follow me must eat my flesh and drink my blood. Now, obviously he wasn't being literal.

The people at the time didn't think he was literal, but he actually told them in that very same passage in John chapter six, the flesh, in other words, literal body and blood is no help at all. The words I've spoken to you are spirit and life.

The people, though, said, I think the people understood what he said. They said, this is a hard saying. Meaning, not it was hard to understand, but that it was hard to accept. He meant that if you're to follow him, you have to accept, that is, you have to take in, you have to feed on, to drink down the same sufferings that he's going to suffer.

That's what we remember in the Lord's Supper, that this is his body, not literally. It would actually be easier if the elements of the bread and the juice were some kind of magic food that we get grace from God by eating.

I mean, that would be pretty easy stuff. That would be a great, easy way to get salvation, right? Eat some bread and juice a couple of times, you know, once a month, and you're saved. That's it. That's not what he, that's what, that's not what he meant at all.

That would be easier than what he was actually saying. What he was saying is that you have to take in, first, well, first what he's saying is that your salvation will come through my broken body and my spilled blood, and you have to accept that.

And then he's saying, it's been granted to you, like in Philippians, to also suffer for my sake. You're going to have to take in some of my suffering, too. But remember the point, for Christ, the crowds were flocking to him.

They wanted to make him king. He's great. He's done all things well, but he told them that they would have to accept suffering. And so they, they went away. Today, they post unfollowing on his Facebook or his Twitter page.

Followers kept leaving until there was only one disciple left at the cross. Imagine that. There was only one left, a disciple to whom he could give his mother. On the cross, he not only felt forsaken by the Father, but he was forsaken by almost all of his followers.

We think he was thinking, looking out from the cross. Here's my followers. This is it. There's one disciple. There's my mother and a few other ladies. That's it. They're all gone. What's his job description?

Well, here's the first hint in the second servant song that the servant suffers. He suffers a feeling of vanity and the temptation that his work has been for nothing. Sure, a lot of people were entertained for a while, hearing my parables and watching me do miracles.

But when it came to the painful work of changing, first, the kingdom of God, well, that drove person after person away until it looked like, at least from the point of view of the cross, it looked like it was all for nothing.

Well, here we see that the servant is told beforehand that he will suffer a feeling of futility, that he will be tempted to say, I've labored in vain. I've spent my strength for nothing, for vanity, for emptiness.

That doesn't sound like the triumphant warrior king in verse two, does it? But both are true. He wields a sharp sword and yet often it looks like his word is getting nowhere. But in the second half of verse four, he encourages himself.

Notice he encourages himself not with success, but with the promise that surely my right is with the Lord and my recompense, that is my getting paid back for my work, my reward is with my God. And we're told in 1 Corinthians 15 that our labor for the Lord is not in vain.

We're given that promise because sometimes it will indeed appear, it will appear that it has been in vain, that no one has was changed, the money we gave to evangelism it didn't do anything. Even the people we pledged emotionally that they would be committed.

They sang with tears streaming down their cheek, though none go with me still I will follow. No turning back, no turning back. And yet they turned back when it got a little difficult. We will share what he felt.

Sometimes the sense of futility that it's not working. What's all this about? What have I given for? What have I gone to church services and what have I been part of ministries for? You know, maybe Jim Junior is it working?

Maybe Jim is a waste of time. Maybe the church isn't succeeding. Let's stay home, sleep late and study for instead. We should encourage ourselves that reward may not be immediate, tangible success. We encourage ourselves, though, with our God.

The Servant Shines as the Light for the Nations

What's his job description? He speaks and by speaking he glorifies the Lord and he suffers. Then he shines in verses five to seven. Now, after suffering, discouragement, despondency. Now the Lord says, according to the servant speaking to us, the servant is telling us this and he interrupts himself.

The servant is saying thus says the Lord and he erupts himself to describe who this Lord is whom he will be quoting who will be his reward. Even when it appears that all his work has been for nothing.

Even when Christian theologians write books defending slavery and so forth, get get our faith now scoffed at because of it. When when churches become just like the world when it looks like all our work has been all our work for the Lord has been.

Has it made any difference? Listen to him. This is what the servant does. So we hear he who for me from the womb. Again, Jesus was called from the womb here, by the way, his life and all human life begins in the womb.

He was formed to be here's a job description to be his servant. What's the servant do? He says to bring Jacob back to him and that Israel may be gathered to him. So he sent to gather his people. He's the gatherer.

He gathers them from the people of Israel. Sure. He did that through the Old Testament times and the church began with a lot, you know, the lost sheep of the house of Israel. So he is honored by the Lord and the Lord gave him the strength to continue despite the discouragement, the abandonment, seeing men who pledged to follow him then drift off to find something else.

You know, like Demas, Paul is near the end of his life at the end of Second Timothy. And he writes, you know, my friend Demas in love with this present world has abandoned me and left. God became his strength, not success.

Now, the Lord says in verse six, this is interesting. Job's scripture, whatever statement in verse six, it is to light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and bring back the preserve of Israel.

He says, you'll do that first. You will be the one who brings back Jacob to himself. Israel might be gathered to him, but it's to light a thing that that's all you do just for this one nation. Here we see that the Lord specifically say here's his job description give given 700 years before he came that just being the king of Israel, you know, just restoring that nation.

That's what you think this is all about. What the crowds in John chapter six wanted him to be the king who put Israel back on top again, making them the dominant power in the Middle East again. What the Jews were expecting Jesus to do on that first Palm Palm Sunday when they welcomed him in Jerusalem, waving the palms and shouting Hosanna.

That's what we want. We want you to put us on top again. What some Christians today think was the main purpose Jesus came. But here the Lord says that's to light a thing for you for the servant. He deserves a better job than that.

He would be underemployed if just being the Messiah of Israel was all he did. That's below him. Just that it may involve that, but it's greater than that. Instead, from the beginning he was he was called a light for the nations from the beginning to be, as he said it himself in John chapter eight, verse 12, the light of the world.

He is the light that shines. That's his job description to shine, not just for the Israel, but for all people that here's his job description at the end of the last line of verse six for the purpose of God says my salvation may reach the end of the earth.

Where have you heard that phrase before? The end of the earth. Same end of the earth. Same China, America, you know, Australia, Brazil, Indonesia, wherever. Jesus said the church to to bring his gospel to enacts.

He shines to all kinds of people it's too little to think that he's just the light for Israel or just for the white people or just for African people or restricted to any kind of people to say that he's not for my people is to make too light of him.

He shines. Don't make light of him. He is the light. He shines for all kinds of people all over the world. Now in verse seven, the Lord is speaking before in verses five to six. The servant was telling us what the Lord said to him.

It's too light of thing that you just be the light to the Jews to be just be a national God for one nation. You're called to shine to the whole world. Now in verse seven, the Lord tells us what he said to the servants of the father speaking to the servant.

First, again, he tells us something about himself. Now the Lord is telling us about himself. The Lord is, he says, is the remnant of the Redeemer. Excuse me, the Redeemer of Israel. That is the kinsman Redeemer like Boaz was to Ruth in the book of Ruth.

You know, he's the one who bought her back. The one who will show steadfast love, a covenant love, a covenant commitment to buy back his people from sin and death that they were in bondage to. And the Lord is the holy one of his people.

The one who makes them holy. He's the holy one. The rest of us aren't so holy. We're the unholy ones. He's the he's the holy one. And he makes us holy by being among us. This is what the Lord says in verse 7, one to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nation who's deeply despised, who's abhorred.

Well, the servant is. He will be the suffering servant. He'll suffer first of all, rejection, hatred, abhorrence. Unpopularity. He'll be looked on as as repugnant. And so will we be if we eat his suffering.

He is here now that he called the servant of rulers serving them by shining the truth to them, revealing himself to them. And kings will see the servant and stand up out of respect, out of awe, just to stand when they see him.

You know, kings almost always they stay seated on their throne. Everyone else stands out of respect for them. But here when the servant comes, the kings rise to attention. Princes will prostrate themselves on the ground before him.

Every knee will bow. No matter how lofty and powerful, how many billions of dollars they had, how many armies they commanded on Earth. They'll do this before the servant because at the end of verse 7 the Lord is faithful.

He's faithful to the servant to honor him. The Holy One has chosen him. Again, like last week, he is the elect. We become elect if we're in him. He shines on us and gathers us. Right? What's his job description?

The Servant Shepherds His People Home

He shines. Finally, what's his job description? Well, he shepherds. In verses 8 to 12, that last section, the Lord speaks to the servant. We get to over here, in this passage. The Father speaking to the Son before the Incarnation, giving him his job description, telling him, this is what you're going to do.

The Father promises that he has already answered and helped him. He can be assured of that. No matter what he suffers, so can we. Then he says, I will keep you. He will uphold him, as in the first servant song.

A lot of themes here shared with the first one. He will uphold him and give you as a covenant to the people. That's an odd phrase. It's also repeated from the first servant song. Give you as a covenant to the people.

It's a strange phrase, though. You will be a covenant. We'd expect, you know, we'd expect him to say something like, I'm going to give you, you'll make a covenant. But it's, I'm giving you as a covenant.

Well, to who? To the people who he's giving the servant. Who is he giving the servant to? Well, to the people God is making a covenant with. That is the people from afar, from the world, the ones he's gathering.

Us. Jesus, the servant, is not only the one, but why is he, you know, he's given as a covenant. This is odd. And I think it's because Jesus is the one, not only the one we make a covenant with to be in relationship with, he is also the one.