Double Comfort

Isaiah’s Comfort for Exiled and Pardoned Israel

Amen.

Please turn your Bible to Isaiah chapter 40. Be looking at verses one through two today. This can be found on page 599 of the Pew Bible in front of you. Isaiah chapter 40. When you have that, please stand for the reading of God's word.

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord's hand and double for all her sins.

A voice cries in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

Amen. You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, you speak wonderful comforts in your word. Father, we ask that you would help us to receive those comforts today, that as you speak tenderly to us, that proper effects would be produced in us.

In Jesus' name, amen. So we now begin the second half of the book of Isaiah. Chapters one through 39 have primarily concerned Israel's sin and specifically the affliction of Assyria. Now, we come to more concerns about Babylon looking forward to the future rather than to the past, and also looking to the holiness that God will produce in his people, looking to his salvation.

The Double Comfort of Forgiveness and Restoration

Speaks in this passage of a comfort. Twice it says comfort, comfort. It says that she has received double for all her sins. Well, look specifically at this doubled comfort, this notion of double for all her sins, but more generally of God's salvation here.

So when it says her warfare is ended, her iniquity is pardoned, what is that iniquity? We've seen much iniquity throughout the chapters of Isaiah. People's hearts are not turned toward God as they worship.

They are turned away from him. They have sought other gods. They have made alliances with other nations, and then most recently, in this previous passage, Hezekiah has boasted before Babylon, and that is why the people will be taken away from Babylon and why they need this particular comfort.

This comfort that is being prophesied here is a comfort that is needed because the people will go away to Babylon as prophesied in the previous chapter, but the promise here is that this iniquity will be pardoned.

That is, the people will return from Babylon. People will be returned to our own land, and indeed, the people are returned to their own land. They receive pardon from the Lord. They are forgiven for their sins so that they are able to dwell in the land of Canaan once again.

They receive from the Lord's hand double for all her sins. So this is filled when Persia comes and conquers Babylon. Cyrus the Great returns the people to their land so they are able to dwell in it. At the same time, this is not the fullness of what is spoken here.

This people is not, their warfare does not completely cease as they continue to have nations rule over them. After Babylon rules over them, there's Persia. After Persia, there's Greece. After Greece, there's Rome.

And then after that, the whole nation dissipates when the temple is destroyed in 70 AD. And so the fulfillment to this prophecy cannot be completely found in the people's return from captivity in Babylon.

Instead, it must be found elsewhere. If you'll please turn to Luke chapter two. In Luke chapter two, you have people waiting on salvation from the Lord. Luke chapter two, verse 25 says, "'Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon.

"'This man was righteous and devout, "'waiting for the consolation of Israel, "'and the Holy Spirit was upon him.'". This word consolation is paraklesis, a word that means comfort. They are waiting for the comfort of Israel.

Isaiah 40, verse one, when it is translated into Greek in the Septuagint, the Greek translation in the Old Testament, it is translated paraklesis. This is the same word that is used in Isaiah 40, verse one.

He is waiting for the consolation of Israel. The comfort that is promised here is not a comfort that is completely had as the people return from Babylon. It is a comfort that even at the time of the birth of Jesus, people are still waiting for.

They are still looking for. Simeon is looking for this comfort. He is waiting for this comfort. Verse 26, it says, "'And it had been revealed to him "'by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death "'before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

"'And he came in the Spirit into the temple. "'And when the parents brought in the child Jesus "'to do for him according to the custom of the law, "'he took him up in his arms and blessed God "'and said, Lord, now you are letting your servant "'depart in peace according to your word.

"'For my eyes have seen your salvation, "'that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples "'a light for revelation to the Gentiles "'and for glory to your people Israel.'". So what is he looking for?

He's looking for comfort. He's looking for the promised comfort that God has spoken of. What does he receive? At what point does he feel that this has been fulfilled, that his eyes have sufficiently seen what he is waiting for?

It's when he sees Jesus Christ. This is the comfort that is due to the people. This is the comfort that God has promised them. We see later in this passage too, Anna. And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phineul, of the tribe of Asher.

She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin. And then as a widow until she was 84, she did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.

And coming up at that very hour, she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who are waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. So what is she waiting for? She is waiting for the redemption, and she speaks to those, waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.

There's people waiting for her to be bought out of a captivity that still exists. And Jesus being brought into the temple is the arrival of this fulfillment to the promise that God has given. He is the comfort.

He is the comfort because through his death, he's provided pardon from sin, pardon for all the iniquities of Jerusalem, not merely returning them to the land, but even as a hope for the Gentiles that all who would turn to him would have their sins forgiven and be saved by the mercy of Jesus Christ, by his substitutionary death on the cross.

Double Discipline, Double Correction

Now, one interesting question people ask in this passage in Isaiah is what does it mean when it says she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins? What does it mean that she has received double?

Very common way of interpreting this is referring to grace. She has received twice what is needed in terms of grace, in terms of a gift from God. Now, that's a very reasonable thing to think first. First glance at this, and she has received, God's people have received an enormous benefit, something that is far more than just our barest needs, but rather God in sending Jesus Christ sends us something excellent, way beyond even double.

However, there are a few reasons to question whether or not this is the right interpretation. The other alternative being she has received double discipline or double punishment for all her sins. In the context, that is what seems to be being talked about.

We see warfare, we see the hand of God mentioned. She has received from the Lord's hand double all her sins. And this is the context of Isaiah. Remember, Isaiah has repeatedly talked about God's hand being stretched out against the people.

He's talked about God's hand giving discipline to people. Even in the first chapter, chapter one, verse 25, it says, from his hand would come the kind of correction that would burn the dross out of the people.

It would put them through fire. So repeatedly, mentions of God's hand have not been about mercy, but have been about discipline.

About punishment.

Now the reasons that that would be doubted is because it seems wrong on a couple of accounts. How is it that it would be just for God to punish double for sins? Well, first of all, we see in Exodus 22, laws related to thieving, that is the just penalty, is double, the thief needs to pay back double.

So there's no reason to see this as necessarily unjust. It would be just to have to pay back double. In addition, if we think about this as discipline and not as punishment, there's no amount of correction that would be too much.

There's no amount of correction that would be unjust. So that is another account on which it would not be wrong or unjust to regard this as discipline from the Lord. And so given the context, given the use, Isaiah's use of the Lord's hand in speaking throughout this book, especially in the opening passage, given the context of warfare, I think it is right to understand this as referring to double correction.

She has received more than enough to correct her from her sins, and this is good and gracious from the Lord our God. Now, in addition to speaking of double for all our sins, it does, though, speak twice of comfort, emphasizing comfort at the beginning.

Now, while this is spoken of, while this is repeated for emphasis, and the word double is used for discipline, for correction, there's no reason, though, to reject that this passage speaks of a comfort that goes way beyond just a correction of the affliction that the people have experienced.

The people have experienced captivity. God removes them from captivity. The people have experienced affliction. God takes the affliction away. But this is speaking of much more than that. Throughout this passage, we see all kinds of promises of the people being lifted up in a way that is beyond the state that they had before, until at the very end of this book, in Isaiah chapter 65, it talks about the new heavens and the new earth.

This is not just a restoration of the people to what they had before. This is indeed a double comfort. This is something beyond the salvation that they had, beyond the state that they had before. Indeed, God's salvation is very good.

God's salvation is one that is much more than just pardon. Think, many people, when they think about salvation, they primarily think in terms of forgiveness. We've committed sins. We need those sins forgiven.

God takes away our guilt. And that is an amazing thing, that is a wonderful thing. But the salvation that God provides in Jesus Christ is something far, far more than that. It is not just forgiveness.

There's eternal life. It's not just pardon. There is justification. There's sanctification. There's glorification. There's the inheritance that we will receive. There is the sight of Christ that we will see.

There is the consummation of Christ and his bride. There are so many aspects of salvation that go beyond mere pardon, that go beyond merely restoring God's people to some former state, such as the state that Adam had in the garden.

The salvation that God provides is one far beyond, far beyond all of that. Now, that benefit, those benefits that go beyond, that Psalms tell us we should forget not all his benefits, those benefits that go far beyond mere pardon, mere forgiveness, are all afforded to us not merely by the death of Christ, okay, him dying for us, bearing the penalty that is owed to us so that we can be forgiven, so that our guilt can be removed, him bearing our guilt, but also by his life.

The Active Obedience of Christ

Okay, this is known as the active obedience of Christ. If you've never heard these terms before, there's a difference between his passive obedience and his active obedience. Okay, his passive obedience is where he is not resisting the Lord, as he is bearing the punishment that is being doled out on him on the cross on behalf of his people.

This is why it's known as the passion of the Christ. If you've ever wondered why that phrase is used, it seems odd to modern ears because when we think of passion, we think of excitement, right? And it's not really something that has to do with him being excited.

It has to do with him being passive, with him not resisting. Okay, and so this is what affords our forgiveness, is his passive obedience. But he has not merely passively obeyed, he has actively obeyed.

He is one who has fulfilled the whole law, lived a full life, obeying all the law of God, not merely the moral law, but even the ceremonial law of Israel. And he has obeyed it perfectly, earning for us something much more than pardon, something much more than taking us back to square one, something much more than just taking us back to the garden.

He has earned for us a salvation that is much greater through his active obedience. He has earned for us eternal life. Now, when I say eternal life, I think one thing that, once again, that a lot of people think, and I'm saying this because these are some of the misconceptions that I've had in the past.

When I think of eternal life, I used to think of indefinite life, right? That there's no certain end to it, right? So like Adam, Adam did not have eternal life. There was no guarantee that he would live forever.

What he had was an indefinite life that was not necessarily to end. But then when he sinned, that day he surely died. What we have in Jesus Christ is eternal life. It is a life that cannot be taken away.

It is by definition, since it is eternal, not temporary. It is not precarious. It is not something that can be lost. And this is what Christ has accomplished. He has gained for us eternal life. Now, this is something that is frequently rejected.

That might surprise you to hear because it sounds like such a good and wonderful truth, but it is frequently rejected, especially in contexts where they don't have the same kind of covenant theology to reinforce some of these notions.

Hosea tells us that Adam transgressed a covenant. There really was a covenant that God had with Adam. There was, in addition to that, First Corinthians 15 tells us that if there is a natural body, so also is there a spiritual body?

In other words, there was something yet for Adam to attain. Adam did not have a perfect state. It's perfect if you mean no sin. Sure, there was no sin in Adam's state, but Adam had not attained what he was on trajectory to attain had he obeyed God's law and not sinned by eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

And this is frequently denied because people do not see it said so directly in Scripture. You don't have a verse that says Christ has active obedience and passive obedience. You don't have a lot of verses describing the arrangement that God has with Adam in the garden.

What you have is these passages I've mentioned, a passage talking about Adam having transgressed the covenant in Hosea. You have statements about if there is a natural body, so also is there a spiritual body?

Speaking of our resurrection body, in other words, Adam's natural body was not enough. There must be something more for him to have had. Because we don't have many explicit texts, many people reject that.

So what I'd like to do for you today as we think of this double comfort, as we think of this salvation that is described in Isaiah 40 and through the rest of Isaiah, is to present to you several proofs for this active obedience of Christ, which is the reason that we have anything more than forgiveness.

The reason why it's not just, okay, we get to start over and get to be put in the same condition that Adam was and then fall again, which we would because this time around, we've been born with indwelling corruption.

We wouldn't even be able to have Adam's state, but we have much more. I want to give you a few reasons why you should affirm heartily the active obedience of Christ is necessary. The first one is simply in Christ's birth.

Christ Born Under the Law

In our catechism, it talks about the humiliation of Christ consisting in several things. Humiliation of Christ consists first in him being born, secondly, in him being born under the law. Galatians 4 .4 says that in the fullness of time, Christ was, God sent his son to be born of a woman to be born under the law.

If you ever wonder why it was important for Christ to be born under the law, could he not have been born above the law, not having to need the law and still sacrifice himself for us? Would that not have been a good enough sacrifice?

It would have if all that is needed or all that God wants to give to his children is forgiveness. If all that he wants to give, a perfect life in that sense would be good enough. But if something more must be merited so that it would be rewarded, not merely sins taken away by one life supplying for another, one death for another.

You see, Christ did not just die a substitutionary death for his people, he lived a substitutionary life for his people. He merited the reward of eternal life through his perfect obedience, having been born under the law.

It would not have been sufficient if he had not been born under the law. It would not have been sufficient if he had not lived a whole life. The reason that he lived a full life is not just so that he could lead some disciples and so that he could set a moral example for us, it was because if he had died not having lived a full life, having died only as a child, it would not have been a sufficient sacrifice in order to accomplish what God was accomplishing in salvation, which is meriting something much more for us, a glorious inheritance of eternal life.

The Righteousness of the Doers of the Law

Now, secondly, I would have you consider beyond his birth his obedience, his life, what Scripture says about obedience. A few verses, Romans 3, 13. For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.

In other words, counted righteous. First John 1, 7 says, beloved, I am writing to you.

Excuse me, that was placed in the wrong place.

First John 3, 7 says, little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. You see, righteousness is not just, if you think of righteousness as a synonym for innocence, that is not the full concept of righteousness in the Bible.

It is not merely innocence, it is not merely a lack of sin, okay? A rock has never sinned, okay? A rock is not righteous, okay? It's innocent, it hasn't done anything wrong, but it is not righteous, it's not positively righteous.

Christ is not merely innocent, he is righteous. He has done good things, he has fulfilled God's law, and he has not merely fulfilled moral law, meaning that which is eternally true according to God's character.

You know, thou shalt not lie, thou shalt not murder, et cetera, but he has fulfilled positive law, law given beyond just that law, right? The law of Moses requiring many more things, just as Adam was given an additional law in the Garden of Eden, not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

He, in receiving this additional law, in fulfilling both the moral law and this additional law, merits something much more than just forgiveness, than just innocence, right? He is positively righteous.

And this is what justification refers to. Justification, the words justification and righteous do not sound the same to us. I think I've mentioned this in a sermon not too long ago. Just and justification sound similar to us.

Okay, just is another word that means righteous. In the New Testament, okay, these are the same word roots. These are not different concepts. Being just or being righteous is the same thing. Being justified is being declared righteous or made righteous, right?

These are similar concepts. So being justified is not just being counted innocent in God's court, it is being counted positively righteous in God's court. But the danger is to think of it as just mere innocence.

And I think this is what many think. The Roman Catholic Catechism, paragraph 2010 of that, it's often abbreviated CCC, Catechism of the Catholic Church, says this. And I never understood how they could say these sorts of things, but I think I understand now.

It says this, since the initiative belongs to God in the order of grace, no one can emerit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification at the beginning of conversion. So they're saying, okay, no one can merit forgiveness, no one can merit justification.

Moved by the Holy Spirit, my charity, like those are things that have to be gifts from God, right? Our justification has to be a gift from God. Moved by the Holy Spirit and charity, we can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life.

Isn't that a crazy thing to say? To say that, okay, we can't, at least I didn't understand how they could come to these conclusions for so long. You cannot merit your justification, but you can merit your eternal life.

The problem is if you understand justification as being a positive righteousness that is the meriting of eternal life, those are one and the same. If you divorce them, you're free to make statements like this, as the Roman Catholic Church has done, where they end up saying, oh, there's some things that are truly a gift from God, but these other things, you need to work for those.

Those you must work out. You must merit the grace, which is oxymoron also, right? Grace being a gift. How do you merit grace necessary for eternal life? And this is the danger even in Protestant churches that would reject the need for the act of obedience of Jesus Christ.

It is a positive righteousness that is needed in order to have eternal life. And also, scripture is very clear about this in Romans 8 .30. Those whom he justifies, he glorifies. It's not those whom he justifies have an opportunity to earn for themselves glorification.

Those whom he justifies, he glorifies. First John 5 .13 says, I write these things to you. Believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. Okay, those who believe have eternal life.

It's not something more that needs to be done.

Why?

Because Christ has done those things. Okay, his obedience has been sufficient for us to have eternal life, something that not even Adam had in his innocence. Now, the last thing I would have you consider for this need for his act of obedience is the words of Romans 4.

Or, excuse me, there was one thing I wanted to say before that. Romans 5 .19, for as by the one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience many will be made righteous. Okay, Adam's disobedience makes everyone a sinner.

Christ's obedience makes everyone's righteous. Paul could have said death, right? He could have said, he could have said, for as by one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by one man's death the many will be made righteous.

That's not what he says. By the one man's obedience, many will be made righteous. Okay, now the last reason I want to give you is this verse in the chapter before, Romans 4 .25, that he was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

So consider that. He's delivered over for our trespasses. He is raised for our justification. This is not just repeating the same concept twice. Sometimes you see those sorts of things in Scripture. This is not that.

Okay, he is delivered over for our trespasses. He must die to pay the penalty owed to us for our sin, but that is not why he is raised. Okay, he is raised for our justification. He is raised for our positive righteousness.

If Christ had come, if he had not lived a full life right, let's say he had never sinned, but he had not lived a full life, he had not been given those tasks to do where he's meriting eternal life, right, and then he dies for us, why would he need to be raised again?

It would be one life for another, but he is raised again because what he has merited at that point is eternal life so that he cannot justly die and remain in the grave, but must be raised again. Okay, so his death is for our trespasses.

He has died a substitutionary death, but his life is for our justification, for our eternal life so that he is raised so that we can be raised. It would not have been enough for him to have just died.

He needed to be raised for our justification, and Romans 4 makes that clear in this verse. Romans 4, 25, who is delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. There's so many ways that this can apply to the Christian life as you recognize all the wonders of the benefits that have been given, all the truth of eternal life that entails much more than just a declaration of innocence, much more than just forgiveness from God, but an entire trajectory and a great hope in heaven.

First of all, it guards from what we just read from the Roman Catholic Catechism. It guards from a legalism that says that, okay, well, Christ has died for my sins, but I need to merit my own kind of righteousness.

Okay, if you think you need your own righteousness and that Christ's righteousness is not sufficient, that's legalism. That is not, that is not, that is a treadmill of works. That is not the peace of salvation.

Now, on the other end, it also protects against license because the one who says, the one who says the only thing that really is important here is forgiveness, and there is not something more that has been accomplished, an eternal life that demands, and I'm not saying even demands in the imperative to the human sense, but demands even covenantally that there be a trajectory of sanctification and of growing in holiness through the work of God and the believer.

Then you will go about in license, in loose living that will not be for your eternal reward, but if you recognize that what God has accomplished in Jesus Christ is something more than just pardon, and you understand the work he is doing, you want something greater, you will be eager to follow that path of sanctification, to be led by the Spirit and growing in holiness, to be that pure vessel made for good works.

Hebrews 10, Hebrews 10 talks about this. It says, in Hebrews 10, 14, "'For by a single offering he has perfected for all time "'those who are being sanctified.'". Another interesting verse. "'A single offering perfected for all time,'' okay, past tense, once, forever, done, "'those who are being sanctified.'".

Progressive, happening now, present tense. Right, why is this? If it was done once for all time, why is something happening? Because it requires a growing in holiness, an establishment of something greater than just us being pardoned and given a blank check and taken back to square one.

It is something much more than that. What he has accomplished is something that produces in us a holiness. We are being sanctified. And the one who has his thoughts just centered around the notion of pardon, not recognizing all the other things that Christ's doing, not recognizing the promise of victory over sin, not recognizing the hope that exists in heaven, will tend toward hopelessness.

If you forget many of his benefits and only remember one, that is not what we are called to. We are called to remember all his benefits. And so you will tend toward hopelessness as you are not looking to the future that he has promised.

And you will tend towards resignation if on the other end you are focused on the heavenly realities, but not the earthly ones that are being accomplished as Christ works in your life through sanctification.

All of these things are aspects of salvation that are good and to be cherished. You are not to think of salvation merely as forgiveness, merely as pardon. You are to think of it as much, much more than that.

Comforting God's People with the Whole Salvation of Christ

Last thing I want to consider here in Isaiah 40 with this double comfort that we have received.

Who is he speaking to?

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem. Is this Isaiah recording something that was spoken to him that he is the one who must comfort? Maybe he's speaking to John the Baptist.

A lot of you probably recognize verse three, a voice cries in the wilderness. Maybe it's John the Baptist who's supposed to comfort. Later on in verse nine when it says, go up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news.

You can't see it in English, but there's feminine pronouns being used here. It's a female speaker, it's not John the Baptist. Okay, there are several different speakers here who are supposed to be declaring the good news.

This is not just the voice crying in the wilderness. It's not just Isaiah. This is not just this herald, whoever she is. This is command, even for us, that we are to comfort God's people. We are to speak this good news.

And we are to speak, we are to proclaim forgiveness of sins, not merely forgiveness, but eternal life. We proclaim pardon, not merely pardon, but sanctification, glorification. We are to proclaim peace with God, but not merely peace with God, but the hope of glory, an eternal inheritance with Jesus Christ.

We are to proclaim the whole of salvation. And these are all wonderful benefits that come from the glorious work that Christ has done, not only through his passive obedience and dying on the cross, but through his active obedience of fulfilling the whole law, both the moral law and the ceremonial law given to Moses.

And this is a great hope. I'd like to leave with the words of J. Gresham Machen. If you are unfamiliar with who that is, he is the guy who broke off of Princeton and started Westminster Theological Seminary.

He also broke off of the PCUSA and started the OPC. Along with him, there were several others, but he was kind of the main leader, and he wrote a book just over 100 years ago called Christianity and Liberalism that's pretty famous and was pretty critical in changing the tide of evangelicalism at the time.

One of the others who was with him in some of these projects was John Murray, who's a very excellent theologian. J. Gresham Machen, shortly before he died, sent a telegram to John Murray, telegrams are very short little snippets, like tweet sizes, right?

This is what he wrote in his last tweet to John Murray just before he died. I'm so thankful for the act of obedience of Christ. No hope without it.

Amen.

Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for the act of obedience of Christ. There really is no hope without it. We pray that you would help us to not forget any of these benefits, that we would remember all the wonderful things that Christ has accomplished, and that you would stir within us a great hope and zeal through those things.

In Jesus' name, amen.