Isaiah 10:7, commentary and pictures

The Assyrian oppressor did not intend to carry out God's limited charge of judgment and did not think it in his heart, for his own aim was to destroy and conquer many nations and not simply to fulfill God's will. A ruler can be an instrument in God's hands to accomplish His purpose while neither intending nor understanding that purpose, pursuing only his own destructive aims with no power independent of God. Wicked powers may be permitted as God's rod to afflict His people and may succeed for a time as His instrument of judgment, yet their triumph is brief, for after He has performed His whole work against Zion and Jerusalem He will punish the Assyrian king for his pride, proud heart, and high looks. So the angry, war-preparing powers are ignorant of God's purpose and have no desire to fulfill it, yet that purpose stands and grows brighter through all their ambition, wars, and commotions until His whole work on Mount Zion is accomplished and His downtrodden people find eternal rest.

Setting and Contrast

The verse stands in one of the four prophecies found in Isaiah 2–12, and more narrowly in chapters 10–12, which were given from about 760 to 700 B.C. during crucial times in Judah under Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah to reprove the great sins of Judah in Isaiah's day. It belongs to a historical account of an Assyrian invasion that does not name the king who carried out the deeds, and for that reason critics have described both the invasion and its Assyrian king as idealized. The strife, war, and wickedness pictured in Isaiah 10 stand in direct contrast to the rest, peace, and righteousness of Christ's kingdom pictured in Isaiah 11. At the same time chapters 10–12 foreshadow similar conditions in the last days and point to the great deliverance to come at the coming of Christ.

Divine Purpose Through Human Pride

The Assyrian oppressor did not mean to carry out God's limited purpose and charge of judgment, nor did he think it in his heart to do so. His own aim was to destroy and to cut off nations not a few, to conquer many nations rather than simply to fulfill what God had appointed. Assyria acted as an oppressor whose intent differed from God's purpose, intending destruction and conquest while God carried out His own purpose against Jerusalem through him.

A ruler can be used to accomplish God's purpose as an instrument in His hands while neither intending nor understanding that purpose, pursuing only his own destructive aims. Such a ruler has no power independently of God, for dominion over nations when given by God shows dependence on God and not independent sovereignty. This was seen in Nebuchadnezzar, whose great dominion over nations was given by God and therefore declared his dependence rather than his own sovereignty. Wicked powers may thus be permitted as God's rod to afflict His people and may succeed as His instrument of judgment against Jerusalem without becoming a model or a religious nation. God permits their actions and turns them to His purpose, and their triumph over the saints is brief. After He completes His whole work against Zion and Jerusalem, He will punish the Assyrian king for his pride, his proud heart and his high looks.

Like the Assyrian, the angry war-preparing and war-clashing powers of Europe are ignorant of God's purpose and have no desire to fulfill it. Yet that purpose stands and grows brighter through all their ambition, wars and commotions until His whole work on Mount Zion is accomplished. Then His downtrodden people will find long-looked-for eternal rest in the place of Christ's throne. So their gathering hosts are tokens of the calm, peaceful, eternal day of conquering Jesus.