NOTES ON THE INTERNATIONAL LESSON
ISAIAH means "Salvation of Jehovah," and he has been called the "evangelical prophet." He wrote more about Christ and the Christian dispensation than did any other prophet. He prophesied in "the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah." If he began to prophesy in the last year of Uzziah, about 758, and continued to the end of Hezekiah's reign, about 698, this would give sixty years of service as a prophet. We do not certainly know that he lived throughout the reign of Hezekiah, but we know that he lived through the most of it, so that he prophesied, at the very least, nearly sixty years. It would thus appear that he was quite young when he was chosen of God to prophecy. IT would seem from Isa. 6 : 7 that it was in the year that Uzziah died that he began to prophesy; for there he records a vision of "the Lord, sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up," and he exclaims, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." Then one of the seraphim flew unto him, "having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar; and he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me." This must have been Isaiah's first vision, and the time when he was chosen to the prophetic work; for it was at this time that his sins were forgiven. And when he first sees the Lord, he exclaims, as we have read, "Woe is me! for I am undone." But when the seraph has touched his lips with the hallowed fire, and told him his sin is cleansed, his iniquity taken away, then he is ready to be a messenger for the Lord; and as soon as he hears the voice asking who shall be sent, he cries, "Here am I; send me. And he said, Go." Thus the Lord would have no one go to speak for him, nor in his name, till his iniquity has been taken away and his sin purged. Then, and not till then, can we bear the message of the Lord. IN this very first vision he spoke of Christ, and of the people in the day when Christ was upon the earth. John tells us so. In recording the words and works of the Saviour, he says, "But though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him." And these very ones who did not believe on Christ, in them was fulfilled the very saying of Isaiah as recorded in Isa. 6 : 9, 10. Compare John 12 : 38-41 and Isa. 6 : 1-13. Then says John, "These things said Esaias, when he saw his glory and spake of him." We see also by this that in the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah not only spake of this people, but he also spoke of Christ, and he then saw Christ. That majestic one whom Isaiah saw sitting upon that throne high and lifted up; that one whose train filled the temple in Heaven; that one in the presence of whose glory the bright seraphim shaded their faces; that one of whom these seraphim said, "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory,"—that was Christ our Lord and Saviour. That was He who speaks in righteousness, He who is indeed "mighty to save." WE have no prophecy which Isaiah refers definitely to the reign of Jotham, nor any message sent directly to Jotham as there is to Ahaz and Hezekiah. In chapters 7, 8, and 9 are prophecies spoken in the reign of Ahaz. Rezin, king of Syria, and Pekah, king of Israel, had formed a confederacy to take Jerusalem and Judah, and kill Ahaz and make the son of Tabeal, a creature of their own, king in Jerusalem. But the Lord sent a word to Ahaz and his people, "Thus saith the Lord God, It shall not stand, neither shall it come to pass." And in that message to Ahaz and his people Isaiah uttered his prophecy of Immanuel, "which is, being interpreted, God with us." See Isa. 7 : 14 and Matt. 1 : 23. At the same time he prophesied of that child which should be called, "Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, the everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." Isa. 9 : 6, 7; Luke 1 : 32, 33; and at the same time he prophesied of the second coming of the Saviour, the reform on the law of God, and the working of Spiritualism just before Christ comes in his glory. Isa. 8 : 16-21; 2 Thess. 2 : 9. And in the lesson for to-day, his word is a prophecy which Paul applied to the people in his day. See Isa. 1 : 9, with Rom. 9 : 29; 11 : 5. THESE are but a few instances in illustration of Peter's word about the prophets: "Unto whom it was revealed that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from Heaven; which things the angels desire to look into." 1 Peter 1 : 12. In reading the prophets, we are always to bear in mind that they have written many things to us, as well as some things to those of their own day. And when, in to-day's lesson, we read, "Ah, sinful nation," he means the people of to-day—not the people who make no profession of his name, but the people upon whom his name is called. To those of to-day, he says, "I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me." To what purpose are sacrifices, and offerings, and the calling of assemblies, when the law of God is despised and rejected? So in another place this same prophet says: "Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and and forsook not the ordinance of their God." Isa. 58 : 1-14. To what purpose are fastings and prayers, when the ordinance of God is forsaken? "He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer shall be abomination." Prov. 28 : 9. THEREFORE to-day he says to the people of to-day: "Wash you, make you clean. Put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless,712plead for the widow." "Turn yourselves and live ye." Hearken to the word of God and obey. Jesus said to his disciples, "Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you." John 15 : 3. Paul says that, "Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish." Eph. 5 : 25-27. Peter says: "Ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit." 1 Pet. 1 : 22. The only way in which to "learn to do well," is by strict obedience to the word of God, through the Spirit. AND the only way to obtain the Holy Spirit is by confession, and the forsaking of sin. "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper; but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall find mercy." Prov. 28 : 13. "Come now, let us reason together, saith the Lord; though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God." Rom. 3 : 24, 25. "If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land; but if ye refuse and rebel, ye shall be devoured with the sword; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." Christ is "the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him." "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams." 1 Sam. 15 : 22.