God Always Had The Plan To Bring You Home

In Isaiah 48, the Lord turns His attention back onto His people Israel. They are obstinate and stubborn. They have turned aside and worshipped idols. They have trusted the nations around them for protection and peace. But none of this caught God off-guard. And that is the first part of this great chapter. 

Isaiah 48:1 (ESV) Hear this, O house of Jacob, who are called by the name of Israel, and who came from the waters of Judah, who swear by the name of the LORD and confess the God of Israel, but not in truth or right.

God calls them out right away. They confess the Lord but they do not walk in His ways. 

Isaiah 48:4–5 (ESV) Because I know that you are obstinate, and your neck is an iron sinew and your forehead brass, 5 I declared them to you from of old, before they came to pass I announced them to you, lest you should say, ‘My idol did them, my carved image and my metal image commanded them.’

God reminds them that He knew they would rebel. If you go back to the days of Moses, the Lord said this exact thing before any of it took place. 

Deuteronomy 31:16–18 (ESV) And the LORD said to Moses, “Behold, you are about to lie down with your fathers. Then this people will rise and whore after the foreign gods among them in the land that they are entering, and they will forsake me and break my covenant that I have made with them. 17 Then my anger will be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them and hide my face from them, and they will be devoured. And many evils and troubles will come upon them, so that they will say in that day, ‘Have not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?’ 18 And I will surely hide my face in that day because of all the evil that they have done, because they have turned to other gods.

Amazingly all the way back in Deuteronomy, the Lord declared that this nation would rebel and lose their favor before the Lord. The Lord was aware, but the Lord was also using their story to point to the greater need in the human heart than special privileges or laws from God. They would need a Savior. 

Back to Isaiah 48:

Isaiah 48:8b (ESV) For I knew that you would surely deal treacherously, and that from before birth you were called a rebel.

Then the Lord declares His purpose beyond the affliction they see:

Isaiah 48:10–11 (ESV) Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tried you in the furnace of affliction. 11 For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it, for how should my name be profaned? My glory I will not give to another.

And in verse 16 we hear the Gospel declared. 

Isaiah 48:16 (ESV) Draw near to me, hear this: from the beginning I have not spoken in secret, from the time it came to be I have been there.” And now the Lord GOD has sent me, and his Spirit.

You may think it is Isaiah referring to himself at the end of this verse but it is Yahweh. The Lord will send Himself in the power of the Spirit to proclaim the salvation this rebellious people so desperately need. Notice that the Lord says this is no secret. The Biblical text points us forward to a true Moses, a true David, a true prophet like Isaiah who will teach God's people the true way of the Lord and lead them back to Himself. 

What does this mean for me? It means simply that even my rebellion is no surprise to God. He knew I could not keep the Law just as Israel failed to do though they had the prophets and covenants and promises along the way. And because God knew this, His plan was always to send Himself in the Person of Jesus to lead us home. 

Isaiah 48:17 (ESV) Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: “I am the LORD your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go.