Introduction and Scripture Reading
We continue our series on Messianic prophecy in the Old Testament this evening. And as we mentioned last week, we’ve entered probably a rather lengthy section from the prophet Isaiah. This evening, we’ll look at Isaiah chapter 7. Verse 14, of course, is one of the best-known Messianic prophecies in the Old Testament. We’ll try to look at it in its context here: the prophecy of the virgin-born son.
Isaiah 7—I think I’ll take the time to read through the entire chapter:
In the days of Ahaz, the son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, Rezin, the king of Syria, and Pekah, the son of Remaliah, the king of Israel, came up to Jerusalem to wage war against it, but could not yet mount an attack against it. When the house of David was told, “Syria is in league with Ephraim” (Ephraim remembers the northern kingdom of Israel after the split. There are two Israel kingdoms now; the one in the north is often referred to as Ephraim). So when the house of David was told, “Syria is in league with Ephraim,” the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.
The Lord said to Isaiah, “Go out to meet Ahaz, you and Shear-jashub, your son, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the washer’s field. And say to him, ‘Be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering stumps of firebrands at the fierce anger of Rezin and Syria and the son of Remaliah. Because Syria with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah has devised evil against you, saying, “Let us go up against Judah and terrify it, and let us conquer it for ourselves, and set up the son of Tabeal as king in the midst of it.”‘ Thus says the Lord God, ‘It shall not stand, and it shall not come to pass. For the head of Syria is Damascus and the head of Damascus is Rezin. Within sixty-five years, Ephraim will be broken to pieces so that it will no longer be a people. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.'”
Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz, “Ask a sign of the Lord your God. Let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.” But Ahaz said, “I will not ask and I will not put the Lord to the test.” And he said, “Here then, O house of David, is it too little for you to weary men that you weary my God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you dread will be deserted. The Lord will bring upon you and upon your people and upon your father’s house such days as have not come since the days that Ephraim departed from Judah—the king of Assyria.”
In that day, the Lord will whistle for the fly that is at the end of the streams of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria, and they will all come and settle in the steep ravines and in the clefts of the rocks and on all the thorn bushes and all the pastures. In that day, the Lord will shave with a razor that is hired beyond the river with the king of Assyria: the head and the hair of the feet, and it will sweep away the beard also.
In that day, a man will keep alive a young cow and two sheep, and because of the abundance of milk that they give, he will eat curds, for everyone who is left in the land will eat curds and honey. In that day, every place where there used to be a thousand vines worth a thousand shekels of silver will become briars and thorns. With bow and arrows, a man will come there, for all the land will be briars and thorns. And as for all the hills that used to be hoed with a hoe, you will not come there for fear of briars and thorns, but they will become a place where cattle are let loose and where sheep tread.
The Context
On the context here, as we’ve seen several times in these Old Testament studies, we are rather early in the prophetic days of Old Testament prophets. We are around 734 BC, something like that. And there’s been a threat against the southern kingdom of Judah. We have Ahaz, who is king of Judah in the south. Remember, now there’s a split in the kingdoms. There’s a north and a south. In the south, there’s the king of Judah, who is Ahaz. He is the son of Jotham. Jotham was a fairly good king. Ahaz, a very wicked king. Ahaz—we read in 2 Kings 16 that Ahaz offered one of his sons to the false god Molech in sacrifice. So he’s that kind of a guy. Now you know who you’re dealing with here.
Now then, we also have Rezin, who’s king of Syria. If you have a New International Version in front of you, it says the king of Aram; that’s Syria. And we also have Pekah, who is the king of Israel up in the north. And these two, Rezin and Pekah, have formed this anti-Assyrian alliance, and they want Ahaz in the south to join them in this anti-Assyrian alliance. Ahaz refuses, and so they’ve combined their attack against him then instead to attempt to force compliance and to join them in this anti-Assyrian alliance.
According to verse 1, that was not successful, but Jerusalem was under attack. This is sometimes referred to as the Syro-Ephraimite War. In verse 6, we find that these two, the king of Syria and the king of the north—the king of Israel, Ephraim—had intended to set up the son of Tabeal as king in the south, down in Judah. Now we don’t know who Tabeal is; it’s just unknown. It’s an Aramaic name, so it’s probably someone, there’s no doubt, who’s sympathetic to the alliance. Some suggest that it might have been even a descendant of David, but a son of a princess that was married off in an alliance or something like that, but we don’t know; those are guesses.
But anyway, the bottom line of this is that they’re wanting to replace Ahaz in the south in Judah and have one of their own puppet kings there instead. So this is not a threat only against Ahaz. This is very important here to keep in mind for the rest of the passage. This is not just a threat against Ahaz. This is a threat against the house of David. And it’s a threat against the Davidic covenant and the Davidic promise. Everything’s at stake here. If they succeed, then everything falls apart.
And we read then in 2 Chronicles 28, verse 22, “In the time of his distress, he, Ahaz, became yet more faithless before the Lord.” And then here in Isaiah 7, in verse 2, we find that “the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.” So they’re scared to their socks. They’re afraid of what’s happening. We’ve got this alliance that has formed. He’s refused to join it. Now that has turned on him—not just Judah and not just Ahaz, but the whole Davidic dynasty now is under threat because of this military situation.
So in that context then, verse 3, God sends Isaiah the prophet to the king Ahaz. Now remember we saw last time that Isaiah probably had some family connections to the royal house through his father, so there’s easy access to the king. But in any case, the prophets regularly confronted the kings. That was part of their job. This was a monarchy with a king in charge and ruling, but it was not just a monarchy; this is a theocracy—God rules. And so we have this rather odd situation where the king, who’s the ultimate authority in the land, has to listen to the prophets when they come and say, “Thus says the Lord.” He’s your King, and you had better listen. And of course, there were mixed responses when those kinds of things happened in those days.
Well, God sends, verse three, God sends Isaiah to assure Ahaz, and he commands Isaiah to take his son, Shear-jashub, with him. Now keep that in mind. We are not told explicitly why it’s important for Isaiah to take his son, Shear-jashub. That’s a curious detail, and the significance of it I think we’ll see in a little bit as we work our way through.
Verses four and five, Isaiah—I think it’s kind of humorous—he refers to Pekah not by name. He refers to Pekah, the king in the north, as “the son of Remaliah.” The son of Remaliah. I don’t know how to read that except to say that it’s a contemptuous put-down. “For the life of me, I can’t remember that king’s name up there, but he’s the son of Remaliah.” It’s that kind of thing. It’s “this little pipsqueak up there.” It’s that kind of tone, I think, is what’s going on. And I think we know that because we also have, in verses four and five, referring to Pekah and Rezin both as “these two smoldering stumps of firebrands.” In other words, there’s more smoke than fire. These little pipsqueaks are nothing to God. Don’t be afraid about them. And so he brushes them off in that kind of way.
Well, Ahaz, being who Ahaz is, is not impressed. He’s still not willing to trust the Lord, and instead he subjects himself to Tiglath-Pileser, who is king in Assyria, and he calls on them to help him. And so, according to 2 Chronicles 28, Ahaz takes a portion of the wealth from the house of the Lord and from the king’s treasury and from the princes, and everything else; takes a stash of money and sends it up to Assyria, to Tiglath-Pileser, the king there, and says, “Help me out against this alliance that has formed against you. I’m your loyal subject.” And of course, the king of Assyria is glad to take the money, and it didn’t work out well for Ahaz. But rather than trusting God, Ahaz now is trusting the king of Assyria, asking him to intervene. We read of that in 2 Kings chapter 16. Well again, Tiglath-Pileser agrees, but it proved very costly for Judah. And we’ll see some of that in a minute.
In verse 7 then, Isaiah assures Ahaz, “It shall not stand, it shall not come to pass.” That is, this threat will not be successful; the alliance will be broken. He gives them that assurance. In fact, verse 8 tells us within sixty-five years—a very specific prophecy here—in under sixty-five years, the northern kingdom of Israel will be utterly destroyed. It’ll be dissolved. It’ll be over. Ephraim, it says, will be shattered from being a people.
Well, this prophecy came to pass as prophesied. This is around 734. In 732, just two years later, Assyria comes, defeats the northern kingdom, and sent many away as captives into Assyria. Later, the big one in 722, they came again and they deported many of the Israelites in the north to Assyria and settled the land with some of their own people. So there are population transfers back and forth, which were a very common way of putting people down in those days. You remove them from their land; they no longer have the land to fight for; it reduces the risk of rebellion. Take them away and then put your own people there in their land, repopulate it, and you’ve extended your kingdom with some kind of security.
And then finally in 669 BC, this is just under sixty-five years later, Ashurbanipal enacted the final population transfers. We read of that in Ezra chapter 4, and this becomes then the beginnings of the Samaritans who we find in the New Testament. So we have these mixed ethnicities in the Northern Kingdom.
In verse 9, Isaiah presses the urgency of trusting God and he adds a warning. I mentioned last time that Isaiah is fond of puns. Here’s another one. Isaiah 7 verse 9, “If you are not firm in the faith, you will not be firm at all.” You trust God stoutly, robustly, or you’re going to fall to pieces. Either trust God, be firm with him, or whatever you thought you had holding you up is going to collapse and you’ll have no hope at all. That’s a note that sounds throughout the Old Testament and then again, of course, in the New as well. You trust the Lord or whatever else it is that you trust is going to collapse.
Well then, verses 10 and following, God even offers to assure Ahaz; God even offers to give him a sign. And it’s a sign of your own choosing. “Ahaz, just tell me what you want.” And there are obviously miraculous connotations to that. In fact, verse 11, “Let it be as deep as Sheol or high as heaven.” Anything in the world, anything that you want as a sign to assure you of what I’m saying is true, just ask for it and God will give it. So some kind of spectacular gesture from God—”I’ll move heaven and earth if you like”—to assure you of this prophecy.
Well, Ahaz being Ahaz, declines, and with verse 12, it’s just a feigned piety that he declines. “Oh, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t test the Lord.” And of course you read in the following verse, God is not impressed with that. This man is virtually a pagan, and he refuses God’s gracious offer to give him a sign.
And so then, in verses 13 and following, God gives a sign, and he tells Ahaz what will happen. And there’s some good news, and there’s some bad news. And we’ll work our way through it.
Therefore The Lord Himself Will Give You A Sign
Verses 13 to 15, he says, “Here then, O house of David, is it too little for you to weary men that you weary my God also? Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Immanuel. He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good.”
Now what’s important here, first of all, is at this point now, in verses 13 and 14, God, through the prophet Isaiah, is not addressing Ahaz individually. Ahaz is the one being spoken to and he’s the one hearing it, but God is not addressing him specifically. And we know that because there’s a change in the pronoun, right? And it’s not as evident in the English. This is one of the advantages, by the way, of the older English and the King James Version. It preserved the singular and plural pronouns in this kind of a situation.
But notice in verse 13, “Here then, O house of David,” that’s who he’s addressing now. He’s not addressing just Ahaz. Now Ahaz represents the house of David; he’s the king in place, but God is addressing the house of David. If you happen to have a King James Bible, at the beginning of verse 13, it will say, “Hear ye,” it’s plural; the plural pronoun here. “Hear ye then, O house of David, is it too little for you (plural) to weary men, that you (plural) weary my God also, therefore the Lord will give you (plural) a sign.” You, house of David, I will give you a sign.
So that’s who he’s addressing here. The Lord is addressing the Davidic house, the Davidic dynasty, which Ahaz now currently represents, but God has the big picture in view, not just Ahaz, and not just this current situation. It was the house of David that was under threat. God had made a promise back in 2 Samuel 7, and it’s not merely Ahaz now, but the Davidic house, and to them that God offers this sign of hope.
And here’s the sign, verse 14: “Therefore. The Lord himself will give you a sign.” That is, you won’t ask for a sign, so I’ll give you one of my own choosing, and it will in fact be a miraculous sign. It will be a sign that just is unmistakably something stupendous and miraculous. “Behold, therefore the Lord himself gives you a sign. Behold,” that’s a regular way in the Old Testament of calling attention to something. Look, look, look, look, behold. This is going to be something spectacular.
What is it? The virgin. Now there’s been endless discussion on this word, “the virgin.” Unbelieving scholars, of course, don’t want to admit the miraculous, and so it’s important for them to try to disprove this idea of a virgin birth. And so “virgin” here, it is often alleged, does not mean a virgin, but simply a young maiden. I won’t go into the long discussion about that. Plenty has been written to show that what we have here is the word that’s used here is not just any virgin, but it’s particularly a young, unmarried woman—a young girl who’s just reached puberty even. This is a young virgin.
There are other words that are used for older virgins and maidens and young girls and everything, but every occurrence of this word in the Old Testament either clearly signifies a virgin, a young virgin, or there are a couple of instances where it’s just an indeterminate use and we can’t demonstrate that it means a young virgin. But never in the Old Testament is this Hebrew word almah, never is it used with reference to a married woman.
So a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. Now interesting enough—and I don’t know that this is significant, but I’m going to point it out anyway because I think it’s interesting—our versions almost always translate this as a verb, “a virgin shall conceive.” And actually the word is just an adjective: “a virgin pregnant.” So behold, a pregnant virgin. That’s a sign. That’s pretty amazing. A pregnant virgin and bearing a son. Now that’s a sign. If you can pull that off, well then, whatever else he has to say, you can bank on it; he can do it. If he can do that, he can do anything. Remember in verse 11, he says, “Ask for a sign from me, anything as deep as Sheol, or as high as heaven.” Ask me anything; I can do anything. And here he does. Behold, a pregnant virgin.
He has, in verse 14, three affirmations about this girl. One, she’s pregnant. Verse 14, “Behold a pregnant virgin,” and then next, “bearing a son,” so she’ll have a child, specifically a male child, and she, number three, “shall call his name Immanuel.” Now that’s simply a prepositional phrase in Hebrew: Immanuel. Immanu, with us, El, God. Immanuel, God with us. And so here the attention turns from the virgin mother to her son. And what is significant about this son specifically is that he is God with us. That’s who he is.
So this is a reassurance then to the Davidic house. God will not abandon you. He will send a son, and in fact, he’ll be born of a virgin, and he will be God with us. Now the question then comes up at this point, why does Isaiah point out his name? What’s the significance of that? Obviously, it’s to speak of this child’s—the son’s—unique significance in some way. He is God with us in some sense. What does that mean? Is it too much to say that Isaiah intends for us here to understand that “God with us” actually is to be understood in a very literal sense, that this child is himself God, with us?
I don’t think it’s too much to read into that at all. Let me give you a couple of examples. This expression, “call his name,” in Isaiah, that expression often is meant not simply nominally, but is meant to describe the people or the person himself. So, for example, Isaiah 4, verse 3: “He who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be called holy.” That is, he will be holy. That’s the significance of it. Isaiah 1 verse 26: “Afterward you shall be called the city of the righteous, the faithful city.” That is, they will be righteous, they will be faithful. That’s the significance of the expression. And in fact, if that’s not enough, if you just turn the page—a page or two at the most—Isaiah chapter 9 and verse 6 speaks of this son again, and “his name shall be called… the mighty God.”
Remember? So this is a sign: behold, a virgin pregnant bearing a son and that son in fact is himself God with us. So no military force will be able to wipe out the Davidic house. God is not going to allow his promise to David to fall to the ground. There will be a king to sit on David’s throne forever just as God has promised and God will not allow any threat to interfere with that.
Now, of course, we come to the New Testament, and I won’t take time to go there now, but you’re familiar with this in Matthew 1, verses 22 and 23. We have the account of the angel coming to Joseph, and we read in Matthew 1:22, “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: ‘Behold,'” and here he quotes Isaiah 7:14, “‘the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel’ (which means, and he even gives the interpretation of it, ‘God with us’).” So this is what Isaiah meant to say, that this child will himself be God with us. This is how Matthew understands it. And in fact, at the end of the book of Matthew, I think there’s an echo of this, Matthew 28 and verse 20 in the Great Commission, where Jesus says, “I am with you.” It kind of brackets the gospel of Matthew; that “I am with you” has significance only in the sense that this is his divine presence with his people.
All right, so here’s the prophecy, the next prophecy that is to be fulfilled. First, the destruction of the Northern Kingdom—that was fulfilled—and now this prophecy of this virgin-born son, a stupendous miracle that God has promised.
Now, the larger question in this then is, what’s the purpose? What’s the significance of this virgin-born son? Or let’s just bring it up to the New Testament times. What’s the significance or the purpose of the virgin birth of Christ? Why is that important? Well, one, of course, it’s a fulfillment of prophecy. That’s enough. Also, it’s a reassurance to the house of David that God’s promise to David will stand forever and nothing will overcome it. A son will be born in the Davidic line who is himself God with us and surely no one will overcome him.
But there’s more to it than that, and this is how it’s played out in the New Testament, that this virgin birth is the means by which the eternal Son became man. This is the means by which God became man. Jesus’ birth is different from all others. He was born of his mother like anyone else is, but his conception is supernatural, and it is not just from the normal procreation of a man and a woman. It is God—and this is how God interprets it to Mary in Luke’s gospel as well: “The spirit of God will overshadow you, and that which will be born to you will be called holy. He will be the son of God.” This is the means by which God became man.
And that, of course, is enormously important when we come to the New Testament, that the virgin birth is essential not only as a sign to the house of David, but as the qualifications of the Savior, that he is both God and man. And that’s what Paul picks up, for example, in 1 Timothy chapter 2: “We have one mediator between God and men, the man, Christ Jesus.” He is God. He is man. He’s able to represent both parties in this and bring about our salvation. That’s taken up at length in Hebrews chapter two. We have the great passage on the incarnation: that he, the eternal Son who is praised by angels forever, became all that we are and shared in our flesh and blood in order to make propitiation for us.
The Conditions Of Oppression
Well, that’s enormously important in the New Testament. Let’s work our way, though, through the rest of the passage here. Verse 15 adds another detail regarding the life circumstances of the nation: “He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good.” Eat curds—or butter—and honey. Now, some have understood this to be speaking of the food of royalty, and I think that’s just exactly wrong—exactly the opposite of what he’s presenting here. This eating curds and honey instead, in this context, is the food of oppression, and we’ll see that in verses 17 and following. The conditions of oppression are marked by eating curds and honey, and so the prophecy is this boy will grow up in poverty. We’ll see that in just a minute.
Now verses 16 and following give us more details. It looks more to the short term. Verse 16: “For before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you dread will be deserted. The Lord will bring upon you and upon your people and upon your father’s house such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah—the king of Assyria.”
In that day, the Lord will whistle for the fly that is at the end of the streams of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. And they will all come and settle in steep ravines and in the clefts of the rocks and on all the thorn bushes and all the pastures. In that day, the Lord will shave with a razor that is hired beyond the river. With the king of Assyria, the head and the hair of the feet, it will sweep away the beard also. In that day, a man will keep alive a young cow and two sheep. And now notice here how he characterizes the conditions of oppression. “Because of the abundance of milk that they give, he will eat curds. For everyone who is left in the land will eat curds and honey.”
In that day, every place where there used to be a thousand vines worth a thousand shekels of silver will become briars and thorns. With bow and arrows, a man will come there, for all the land will be briars and thorns. And as for the hills that used to be hoed with a hoe, you will not come there for fear of briars and thorns, for they will become a place where cattle are let loose and where sheep tread.
So the land then, he says, will be shaved. There’ll be no crops. The fields will be left bare. You’ll be unable to work the land. And so the land now is only used for grazing of the oxen and the sheep. And because of that, there’ll be an abundance of dairy. And then because of that, also, there will be an abundance of honey from the bees pollinating the wildflowers out in these deserted fields. So verse 15: “He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good.” That is, Immanuel will be born during a time of oppression. Well, it fits very well with what we find in the New Testament where we find Israel living under the boot of Rome when Immanuel is born.
Who Is The Boy?
Verses 16 and following then—this kind of oppression will come soon. It will be “before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. The land whose two kings you dread will be deserted.”
Now, here’s where it gets complicated. And there’s been endless discussion because there are some twists in this that don’t seem to fit. The crucial question at this point here is: who is, verse 16, who is “the boy”? That’s the crucial question here. Who is the boy? If the prophecy here, verses 16 and following, has to do with the coming military oppression on Israel in the eighth century BC, then is this prophecy about Jesus after all? Because he doesn’t come for another 700 and some years yet. But yet Matthew says it’s a prophecy about Jesus. So how do we fit all of this together?
And there have been several different interpretations that have been given to that. One is just to take it as a non-miraculous historical view: that there’s a young woman who’s presently a virgin, she will become pregnant, she’ll have a son, and before he reaches a certain age, these two threatening kings will be removed and something like that. Others, wanting to be more—or acknowledge some miraculous element to it—and this is the typical interpretation that’s given—they’ll recognize a dual or a multiple fulfillment or some kind of typological fulfillment. There’ll be a natural birth of a son in Isaiah’s day. Some say it’s Isaiah’s son. He has another, a second wife who comes along, and that would be the birth of Maher-shalal-hash-baz that we saw last week. Others have said Ahaz will have a son. But either one, it’s typical or prophetic or a pattern that it represents the coming of Immanuel himself, who comes centuries later.
The difficulty with that view, although that is the dominant view today, the difficulty with that is Isaiah is giving a sign and there’s nothing significant about a young woman having a child—unless, of course, that young woman is a virgin. So how does it serve as a sign? He says there’ll be a virgin pregnant bearing a son, and Matthew picks it up and says the very same thing.
So this has been a notorious puzzle for interpreters, and I think there have been a couple of interpreters in particular who have unraveled it wonderfully. One, a book I found from the 1950s—a man named Kligerman, who gave this interpretation that I’ll give—and another one, a more contemporary man by the name of Rydelnik. He’s an Old Testament professor at Moody. Which is interesting as well because this is no criticism of Moody at all; it’s just the fact that Moody is not generally recognized today as a place where significant scholars, put it that way, have made contributions to biblical studies or something like that. But Rydelnik has interpreted this, paid very close attention to the Hebrew text, and interpreted it very carefully, and he’s won favorable response from all sides, and I think he’s right.
First of all, verses 16 and 17, remember there’s the change in pronoun. There was a change in pronoun back in verses 13 and 14, but now in verses 16 and 17, the pronoun changes to the singular again. Now he’s speaking to Ahaz himself. And next—and this is very important—is there another boy in the context? Other than Immanuel, is there another boy? It seems to me that now we know why God told Isaiah to take Shear-jashub with him to see Ahaz: “take his little boy with him.” Otherwise, there’s no point to it in the passage and it’s left unanswered entirely.
Now, we saw last time—just briefly, I mentioned it—that Isaiah says to Judah in chapter 8 verse 18: “Behold, I and the children whom the Lord has given me are signs and portents in Israel from the Lord of hosts who dwells on Mount Zion.” So I think what he’s saying here is that before Shear-jashub reaches maturity, the kings of Israel and the king of Syria will no longer be a threat. Well, that came to pass just two years later. Tiglath-Pileser came and took care of that, defeated the Northern Alliance, and that was the end of that.
Now, did Ahaz catch this very subtle shift? Suddenly, Isaiah is not talking about Immanuel who was just mentioned, but this little boy that he has with him, Shear-jashub. Did he catch that? He may not have. And in fact, Alec Motyer, one Old Testament scholar, suggests that Isaiah deliberately allowed Ahaz to believe that the birth of Immanuel was imminent. Let him think about that. God was not concerned with what Ahaz thinks at this point. He’s a wicked man.
And then verse 17 then: though Judah would survive, the Assyrian invasion of the northern kingdom will in fact spill over into the southern kingdom. Verse 17: “The Lord will bring upon you,” at-na, as you sing, “you Ahaz, and upon your people, and upon your father’s house, such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah—the king of Assyria.”
We find, if you want to look over across the page to chapter eight and verse eight: “it will sweep on into Judah, it will overflow and pass on, reaching even to the neck, and its outspread wings will fill the breadth of your land, O Immanuel.” So Judah—Assyria came down, sacked the northern kingdom, that in fact—because wicked kings in those days are wicked kings. And they saw the opportunity to take the southern kingdom as well. He kept coming and spilled over into the southern kingdom. And in fact, there was some extensive devastation in Judah as well. But it had to stop at Jerusalem. And there we read of that famous miraculous intervention of God where Assyria was stopped by God at Jerusalem and had to go back home licking their wounds. A miraculous intervention and Jerusalem is spared, but they are left severely weakened.
And that’s what the prophecy says. Chapter 8, verses 12 and following: “Do not call conspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy, do not fear what they fear, nor be in dread. But the Lord of hosts, him you shall honor as holy, let him be your fear, let him be your dread. And he will become a sanctuary and a stone of offense, and a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, and a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and many shall stumble on it. They shall fall and be broken. They shall be snared and taken.”
And the idea there is that you must either trust the Lord or you will be judged by him. He will either be your Savior or he’ll be your judge to condemn you. Of course that’s picked up in the New Testament. In fact, this passage in Isaiah chapter 8 is picked up by the Apostle Paul, Romans chapter 9, and then Peter in 1 Peter chapter 2. The Lord Jesus will be the cornerstone of your life or he will be the stone over which you will stumble and you will be crushed.
So what we have here in this chapter then is two prophecies. Verses 13 to 15, we have a longer-view prophecy that is of the house of David. This virgin-born deliverer will come. This is a sign to the house of David. And there’s the birth of this “God with us” who comes to restore the Davidic dynasty and to preserve it and to fulfill God’s promise. And then verses 16 and following, we have a shorter-view prophecy, and this is to Ahaz, and it resumes the assurance of verses 1 to 8 where God says to Ahaz, “You will not be overrun and you will not be destroyed; this will not happen.” Within a few years we’ll see Israel in the northern kingdom and the kingdom of Syria no longer, because Assyria has come and destroyed them.
So the Northern Alliance was shattered, the Northern Kingdom was destroyed, 722 BC—one of the major events of the Old Testament where they’re carried off, and that’s that; it’s the end of the Northern Kingdom. Both of these prophecies then—the longer view in verses 13 to 15 and the more immediate view in verses 16 and following—are both fulfilled exactly the way they were given.
These are fascinating prophecies, and one of the things that’s striking about them is the precision and the details that are given that seem absolutely impossible until after the fact. One: a virgin giving birth to a son. Whoever would have imagined the incarnation of the Son of God? And then also, not only the destruction of the Northern Kingdom, but the timeframe for it and what will happen and how it will be brought about. As I mentioned last time, this is no trouble if you’re the God who writes history. He’s not just the God who watches over it. He doesn’t just have his eye on history. His hand is on it and moving it where he wants.
And this matter then of this Immanuel, God with us—a virgin-born son who is himself God with us. That’s something we’ve already seen in some of these Old Testament prophecies, and we’ll see it again. As I mentioned, we’ll see it in Isaiah chapter 9, verses 6 and 7: “His name shall be called… the mighty God, the everlasting Father.” And also we’ll see it in Isaiah chapter 11 where he’s both the root and the shoot of Jesse. We’ll see it again and again that this is God himself come to the rescue. Matthew chapter 1 picks that up: that he is Immanuel. He is God himself come to save just as he has promised.
All right. Next time then we’ll pick up, I think, with Isaiah chapter 11. Let’s stand and be dismissed in prayer.