THE above words are found in a prophecy of Christ’s kingdom, in the eleventh chapter of Isaiah. The character and spirit and work of the Branch from the root of Jesse is portrayed in verses 1-5. The blessed results which shall follow are set forth in verses 6-9. From the strife and war and wickedness of chapter ten, we are brought to the rest and peace and righteousness of chapter eleven.
THE happy condition of peace is thus set forth: “And the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea.”
THIS is the condition which would have been and would have persisted if man had never sinned. All that God made was good. The brute creation knew no evil, no malevolence, no savagery. No life would have been destroyed to maintain life; no blood-lust would have sent forth one part of the creation to prey on another part. All would have been at peace, and their happiness would have augmented the happiness of sinless man.
At the head of God’s earth-creation stood man. To him God gave dominion over the earth and all upon it. Under God man reigned supreme. Upon him depended the welfare, the happiness, the continuance of all the orders of life below him. Upon his moral rectitude depended his own life and the life of his subjects. Failing, they fell; triumphing, they lived. The higher law of man’s being—the mortal, the spiritual—perverted, all below it became perverted. And perverted straightness is crookedness; perverted righteousness is sin; perverted light is darkness; perverted goodness is wickedness; perverted love is selfishness and hatred; perverted gentleness is savagery; perverted peace is strife; perverted life is death. All these came when man sinned and perverted the law of his life.
“For the creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it.” Rom. 8:20.
THAT happy condition can only be restored by Christ Jesus, the “Greater Man,” “the Seed of the woman,” “the Root and the Offspring of David,” “the Lamb of God.” Again and again He was ready to do this for His people. When He went out of Egypt before His people, He would have led them into a land where their days would have been “as the days of the heavens above the earth.” Deut. 11:21. He would have subdued their enemies, and gradually He would have made them possessors of the gate of their enemies. So also when Christ came at His first advent, it was their privilege to receive Him, yield themselves to Him, and He would have used them to convert or subdue the world; and all that Isaiah predicts would have been fulfilled. The Spirit of Christ would have taken possession of the brute creation, and the little child would have led them.
BUT again man failed. Since those attempts Christ has been gathering out from the nations a people for His name, to inhabit a new earth forever. In that new earth there shall be no more sin or war or4strife or bloodshed or death. Rev. 21:1-7. “The meek shall inherit the earth, and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace.” And if no children shall be on that new earth, at the end of the thousand years, the condition of peace shall be such, that if there were, we would see just such scenes as predicted by Isaiah.
BUT even now in a measure we shall see fulfilled the prophecy. When the wicked man forsakes his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and turn to the Lord and receive His pardon and mercy, God does a wonderful work for them. He takes away the old heart and gives a new. “Instead of the thorn” in their lives, “shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier” in their dispositions “shall come up the myrtle tree.” God takes the fierce heart of the human wolf and changes it to a heart of gentleness; the savage human lion heart, and makes it a strong heart to love and serve; and all are led by “the holy Child Jesus.” But the fulfilment, the plenary, glorious fulfilment of all God’s prophecies of rest and peace will be seen when Jesus Christ by His coming shall usher in His reign of righteousness and peace. It will begin in that thousand years in Mount Zion and the holy city on high; it will continue on that new earth as long as the sun and moon shall endure. To this kingdom and state Christ invites all the weary and oppressed of earth. All is found in Him. Accept Him, and find the earnest of it here and the glorious eternity of it at His coming.
