57:1  The righteous disappear, and no man gives it a thought; the godly are gathered out, but no one perceives that from impending calamity the righteous are withdrawn.

The calamity, in the book of Isaiah, is that which is wrought by the king of Assyria; he’s the one whom the Lord uses to destroy the wicked, and yet his anger is not upon those who take pride in the Lord, as chapter thirteen, verse three says: “ I have charged my holy ones, called out my valiant ones.” They come out from destruction before it happens. That’s how they disappear. They disappear from the midst of the wicked, before anyone realizes they’re gone. They don’t miss them. They don’t think about them, they’re so busy doing what they’re doing. From their midst they are gathered out. How are they gathered out? On an exodus. In the book of Isaiah, the gathering is in an exodus from the four directions of the earth, to Zion. They walk through the fire and through the waters, and so on. And when it happens, people are not even going to be aware that these righteous people have gone; they’ve left. The wicked are left by themselves.
Now there’s nothing there to prevent them from being destroyed. “No one perceives that from impending calamity the righteous are withdrawn,” because they’re all blind. Like the watchmen are blind; they don’t see trouble coming. Everyone is after his own advantage, and so on; they’re all diverted to their own way. So they don’t perceive anything. They don’t perceive what the Lord does. In an earlier chapter it says that they don’t perceive the Lord’s hands at work, neither the left hand nor the right hand. They don’t see the Lord’s right hand gathering up the elect. And they don’t see the left hand ready to strike and destroy. Like Lot, being taken out of Sodom, these Godly are gathered out from impending destruction.

57:2  They who walk uprightly shall attain peace, and rest in their beds.

Meaning that there are those who are not going to rest, in their beds. The wicked will not rest in their beds. Remember chapter twenty-eight where “the couch is too short to stretch out on, the covering too narrow to wrap oneself in. There is no peace for the wicked,” and so forth. “They—the righteous-- shall obtain peace,” or salvation, those who walk uprightly. Rest is a covenant blessing. Rest is synonymous with peace, here. It’s in parallel with peace. It’s one of the synonyms of peace. Rest is also the condition of the elect in the Millennium or in the new paradise that’s to come. It’s a time of rest.

57:3  As for you, come here, you children of the sorceress, offspring of adulterer and harlot!

Yuck! Perhaps this is literal children. Perhaps it is those who are born into that situation.
Or it is simply disciples, as Isaiah uses the term, also. “Sons of the prophets” are disciples of the prophets, people who adopt this lifestyle. It’s always first literal, as well allegorical. “As for you, come here.” So there’s going to be a confrontation between the Lord and these wicked people.

57:4  At whose expense do you amuse yourselves? At whom do you open wide the mouth and stick out the tongue?

These wicked people are oppressing another people. Who do they oppress? It doesn’t take much to answer that question. It’s the Lord’s righteous people who are oppressed and made a mockery of, by the wicked. We read about them in chapter fifty-four: Reproach, fear, and shame were their lot, for a time, until the Lord turns the tables. They have to go through humiliation. And who humiliates them? The wicked do.

“At whom do you open wide the mouth and stick out the tongue?” Mouth and tongue are also metaphors, in this context, are describing the king of Assyria. And he mouths off against the Lord’s people. And he is a mouth, or a tongue, speaking great things against God, and against the people of God, and as it is mentioned in the book of Daniel, also. There’s an allegorical or metaphorical level in which you can read that message. These people themselves are mouthing off and scorning them and sticking the tongue out, but also it’s the king of Assyria who’s doing that. And the king of Assyria is the paradigm, or model, for the wicked, even as the Lord himself is the exemplar and model of the righteous. All those who are wicked are following, more or less, the paradigm set by the king of Assyria who’s the extreme example of wickedness. Everything that he does, they do, more or less. And everything that the Lord does, the righteous do, more or less. They emulate him, and the wicked emulate the king of Assyria, the king of Babylon.

57:4–5  Surely you are born of sin, a spurious brood, who burn with lust among the oaks, under every burgeoning tree, slayers of children in the gullies under the crags of rocks.

They’re a cult group. They’re sacrificing children in hidden places—up in the canyons, in the gullies, out in the woods where nobody can see them. And there they indulge in their orgies. They burn with lust and among the oaks. We’ve already seen several forms of that, in the book of Isaiah. Nature cults, have word links in chapter one, for example, about the oaks: “Be ashamed of the oaks you cherish; blush for the parks you were fond of.” The word cherish and being fond of, there, indicates lust, as it is here. And they sacrifice to their false god. They enjoy their works for a season and then their god proves to be no god. He doesn’t deliver them. [transcriber’s question: How come this is literal when there are so many linking words that show it’s metaphorical, such as oaks, burgeoning tree, children, gullies, crags and rocks, spurious brood?]  
   
57:6  Among the slippery stones of the ravines shall be your fate; they indeed are your lot. To them you pour out libations and make offerings. How shall I be appeased of such things?

Stones, of course, are common stones, versus precious and semi-precious. And your
“fate,” or your destiny, slippery, at the bottom of the ravine-- the ravine, of course, indicates a low place. And the stones of the pit is the place to which the king of Babylon, the king of Assyria, is cast. He’s cast to the rock bottom of the pit, and the wicked end up there, too, and other similar places.

“To them you pour out libations and make offerings. How shall I be appeased of such things?” Over in chapter fifty-six, you have the righteous, there, making acceptable sacrifice and offering to the god of heaven and earth, to the God of Israel. And here you have these other characters, making offerings to their false gods, and yet they’re from among the covenant people of the Lord. He says, “How shall I be appeased of such things?” He’s particularly offended because they’re from among his people. But he doesn’t call them such, he just says that, “As for you, come here, you!”

57:7–8  On a lofty mountain you have made prominent your bed, and there you ascend to offer sacrifices. Behind doors and facades you have put up your emblems, and have exposed yourself to others than I: mounting your bed, you have laid it wide open. And you bargain with those with whom you love to lie, your hand on their nakedness.

This sounds like a harlot, with this pornographic imagery, “behind doors and facades,” there she’s exposing herself on her bed, to whoever will buy her, or hire her out. “On a lofty mountain,” however,  implies an elite people or an elite nation, those who were the elite of the earth, who were the covenant people of the Lord. And here, the covenant people of the Lord, are in their corrupt state. And that goes back, again, to the idea at the beginning of chapter fifty-four, about the espoused wife. The one wife was cast off , who’s received back because she renews her allegiance to the Lord. And the other one, who is the espoused wife, who now turns adulterous is cast off. So she’s the one who qualifies as this person here. She’s become a harlot. She’s committing adultery. “And you bargain with those with whom you love to lie, your hand on their nakedness.” She does it for money. But the word, hand, is also the metaphor describing the king of Assyria. Again, the link to him as the paradigm of wickedness. Now, when you think of the elite peoples of the world today, the Christian nations, by and large, in western Europe and America, and the lofty mountain, or the elite nation, here, could refer to any one of those.

57:9  You bathe with oil for the king and increase your perfumes; you send your solicitors far abroad and debase yourself to the depths.

 “You bathe with oil for the king and increase your perfumes.” Which king is this? The Lord? No. It’s the one who displaces the Lord who would be the king of Assyria, the king of Babylon, the same individual. The woman has shifted in her allegiance from the Lord, to him. That’s what happens when the people become wicked; they’re following the paradigm of wickedness, which is the king of Assyria, the king of Babylon. He provides the paradigm for the wicked to follow.
There are two kings in the book of Isaiah. The king of Zion and the king of Babylon who exemplify the two spiritual extremes—the one of righteousness and the one of wickedness.
She’s bathing with oil. Oil alludes to a covenant, sealed with oil. She’s really into the hedonistic, adulterous lifestyle. You can find that anywhere, nowadays, if you look for it. “Increase your perfumes.” The Lord’s people also worship with incense. In each case of wickedness or apostasy there is a counterfeit version of everything that is true and good.

“You send your solicitors far abroad and debase yourself to the depths.” You’re not content to just entertain passersby, but you also send your pimps out to get work for you. That’s debasing. We saw earlier, in chapter two, verse nine: “ Mankind is brought low when men thus debase themselves.” When people act this way they bring the whole society down with them; they condemn the whole society. That’s why the Lord has to bring the righteous out from among them, before he destroys the wicked when they have nothing left to prevent them from being destroyed.

57:10  Though wearied by your excessive ways, you have not admitted despair; you have found livelihood, and therefore have not slackened.

Your business has been profitable for a time, even though it’s been excessive and aberrant. And you know that there’s something wrong with it, but you just ignore that part of it. Let’s carry on; this is good!

57:11  Yet on whose account are you uneasy and apprehensive, that you pretend and do not mention me, nor even give me a thought? Is it because I have so long kept silent that you no longer fear me?

Even though you carry on this way, you know there’s something wrong; your conscience tells you that it’s not right. God enlightens every man and woman who comes into the world, and they have their conscience and they know, intuitively, what’s right or wrong. Especially since they have been the covenant people of the Lord and have been his spouse, in the past, and they know how it was then. Now they pretend he doesn’t exist. They don’t even think about him. They shut them out of their mind, thinking that will, somehow, make him go away. They’re a little uneasy and apprehensive about that, though. The Lord asks, “Is it because I have so long kept silent, that you no longer fear me?” He has just been very patient and long suffering and let this happen and has not said very much about it. He’s just kind of lets it be, because he lets people have their free agency to choose right or wrong. But they are his covenant people, and there are consequences to covenant breaking. He is the God of justice; there has to be an accounting.

57:12–13  But I will expose your fornication and the wantonness of your exploits. When you cry out in distress, let those who flock to you save you! A wind shall carry all of them off; a vapor shall take them away.

The time comes when that which was hidden is exposed. All of the evils of the world are brought out into the open and declared from the housetops, the New Testament tells us. And the exploits, here, are in parallel with fornication. The departing from the ways of God, anyway, was likened by the prophets to adultery and fornication; it signified the apostasy of the Lord’s people. Now, also, this is allowed to happen to show what happens when people do that. The consequences of that kind of lifestyle will be there for all to see-- as, for example, in the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. We saw what happened to that people. They were not always a wicked people. They were, at one time, when Lot came to dwell among them, apparently okay. But over time they became more and more wicked, until their iniquity was full, and then the Lord destroyed them. Their wickedness was so much so, that when the angels came to Lot, those people wanted to commit abomination with the angels. Their sin reached an all-time low. And all of that will be exposed for people to see and point to, as paradigms for learning lessons, things to learn from, so that others in the future will not make the same mistakes. It’s not just a personal vendetta against these people. The Lord allows everything in the world, virtually-- all the imaginations of men’s hearts-- to run their course, to show what happens in each case, whether for good or for evil.
“When you cry out in distress”—distress comes as a consequence of wickedness. It’s a covenant curse. “The enemy from without--” the king of Assyria comes and burns the land and destroys it with fire and with the sword. And what are you going to do then? He kind of mocks her, here, and says, “Well, those who flocked to you, and used your services, let them help you. Let them save you now; they saved you then. They provided you with a living. Now let them be your savior.” “A wind shall carry all of them off, a vapor shall take them away.” Those are chaos motifs. Those people, themselves, are going to evaporate. They’ll be carried off as chaff in the wind. They will be reduced to nothing; they’ll cease to exist, just like you.

57:13  But they who seek refuge in me shall possess the earth and receive an inheritance in my holy mountain.

This shows two opposite fates of the wicked and the righteous. The righteous are those who seek refuge in the Lord. When? In that time of distress, in that time of calamity, and also before; they will seek refuge in the Lord, from the oppression, from the wickedness around them. They will possess the earth. They will “receive and inheritance in my holy mountain,” or his holy nation. They will be his holy nation. They will receive lands of inheritance, as we saw in chapter fifty-four. They will possess the earth when the wicked are destroyed from the earth. They’ll possess the whole of the earth. They’ll dispossess the nations and resettle the desolate estates, as we read earlier, the ones made desolate when the earth is destroyed.

57:14  It will be said: Excavate, pave a road! Prepare the way; remove the obstacles from the path of my people!

(Con’t) ….The context for that excavation and paving is the coming of the Lord. And the preparing of the way is done by the Lord’s Servant, who comes before him. He’s a forerunner and makes the way smooth for the coming of the Lord, by preparing a people to meet him, a people who have no more obstacles and stumbling blocks that they are dealing with. Prepare the way; remove the obstacles from the path of my people!

57:15  Thus says he who is highly exalted, who abides forever, whose name is sacred: I dwell on high in the holy place, and with him who is humble and lowly in spirit—refreshing the spirits of the lowly, reviving the hearts of the humble.

The one who is highly exalted, of course, is the Lord himself. But He himself went through humiliation, and in that way established a paradigm or a model for us to follow. We too can become highly exalted. Chapter 52 talks about his servant being highly exalted: My Servant, being astute, shall be highly exalted. Chapter 52 verse 13. His people, Zion, are exalted. They arise from the dust and sit upon their thrones. In Chapter 52 verse 1, He is a model of exaltation, and we can follow that model by suffering humiliation patiently.

Thus says he who is highly exalted, who abides forever. And we can abide forever, in Him. And the Lord’s covenant with us prepares the way for us to do so. whose name is sacred: or holy: He is the Holy one of Israel. He has a sacred name, and also the names of those whom he exalts are sacred. Remember they are endowed with the everlasting name that shall not be cut off, Chapter 56 verse 5. I dwell on high in the holy place, and with him who is humble and lowly in spirit—
The holy place has been high, in other words, in His temple on high, but He doesn’t confine himself to living there. He is not this intractable god in His ivory tower who is so separate from us that we can’t even speak to Him or know Him. He dwells there, yes, but also with him who is humble and lowly in spirit. He dwells with us. Not with everyone, just those who are humble and lowly in spirit. refreshing the spirits of the lowly, reviving the hearts of the humble. Repeats it.
I will not contend forever, nor always be angry; the spirits and souls I have made would faint before me. If people would humble themselves before Him, He will dwell with them. This idea of the temple occurs again: Chapter 66 verse 1. It talks about: What house will house build me?
What would serve me as a place of residence? And the answer is: … yet I have regard for those who are of a humble and contrite spirit who are vigilant for my word. Yes, the Lord dwells in a house, but He also dwells with those who are humble. The same idea is in this chapter. In Chapter 40 we also saw how He refreshes and revives. He supplies the weary with energy and increases the vigor of those who lack strength. Those who hope in the Lord shall be renewed in strength : and shall ascend as on eagles’ wings; they shall run without wearying, and they shall walk and not faint. Chapter 40, verses 29 and 31.

And also we saw in Chapter 38 how the Lord refreshes and revives King Hezekiah, when he goes down into that low condition where he is on his deathbed and is offering up his life to god and submitting himself, humbly to god’s will. There is humility. And there is lowliness. My Lord, by means of such trials comes a newness of life, and throughout them all the renewal of my spirit. Says Hezekiah. So trials bring a rebirth. And the Lord does that when people humbly and lowly submit to His will. I will not contend forever, nor always be angry; the spirits and souls I have made would faint before me;

57:16  I will not contend forever, nor always be angry; the spirits and souls I have made would faint before me.

The Lord does contend and He does hold the wicked up. He does confront them with justice, but there does come an end. There is only so much the Lord can do with people. If He chastised them forever they would faint. They would see no light at the end of the tunnel. They would lose hope. And so He assigns people to different categories: precious and not precious, common; where they want to be. He will contend with them with His spirit or through His prophets, His servants. But there comes a time when they must make a choice.

57:17  By his sin of covetousness I was provoked; I struck him and hid my face in anger when he strayed by following the ways of his heart.

Suddenly it’s talking about the Lord’s Servant, right in the middle of nowhere. He too was one with whom the Lord had to contend. And that’s the context here. And he too was one who humbled himself. But he too sinned. This verse, 17, could have gone at the end of Chapter 52. This whole passage in verses 17 to 19 could have gone at the end of Chapter 52 where it talks about the servant: where the servant is marred and then he is highly exalted and is healed. But it doesn’t say that there, it puts it over here in another context. By his sin of covetousness I was provoked; Covetousness is akin to idolatry. It is wanting something so badly that you keep coveting it or inordinately desiring it. And it can be covetous of things: In the Ten Commandments, Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife or anything that is of thy neighbor. It can be coveting material things or it could be coveting other things. By this the Lord was provoked because he was supposed to be His servant and he didn’t pay enough attention to what he was supposed to do. So he was struck I struck him and hid my face in anger when he strayed following the ways of his heart.

On the other hand, there are several ways of looking at it. The servant could also be and is a representative of the people. He represents them before the Lord. If he is fulfilling a proxy role, then sin could be his people’s sin, rather than his own sin. You are never quite sure whose sin it really is. Where the servant was himself covetous and the Lord smote him, or brought about covenant curses in this life. Or whether he got passed that point and became like King Hezekiah and took upon himself the sins of his people and merited his people’s deliverance from the Assyrians and there he became a proxy. And the sin of the people and their unfaithfulness, he answered for, even as Christ answered, or the Lord answered in Chapter 53 for the sins of His people on a higher level. You don’t really know. It doesn’t really say that. But you might say that it could be both because, first of all, usually in Isaiah things are literal and then they have other meanings as well. I struck him and hid my face in anger So the King of Assyria there has something to do with it. Perhaps the King of Assyria or those who are of that side or of his side of things are the ones who are marring him here. The striking undoubtedly is the marring Chapter 52 mentions. when he strayed by following the ways of his heart. He has a weakness. Every man of He ut you might say that it cougod, it seems like, anyone who comes to this earth, is a flawed vessel of one kind or another and has something to repent of. Moses had a weakness he struck the rock instead of speaking to the rock. You name anybody in the Old Testament and, like Paul says, even with the prophets He was ill-pleased with most of them. They didn’t all fulfill perfectly. The only one who did that was the Lord himself when He came.

57:18  Yet I have seen his conduct and I will heal him; I will guide him and amply console him and those who mourn for him,

He apparently cleans up his act and that’s good. But if he is serving as a proxy then the Lord is accepting of his sacrifice and  recovers him or heals him. Recover and heal is the same word there. I will guide him and amply console him and those who mourn for him, The Lord guides people by his spirit. We’ve seen that already, enlightening them by his spirit, give them revelation. So that’s what He is going to do for him and console him. And after the humiliation and after the suffering, if the person is suffering those in all humility and submissiveness to the Lord, in a spirit of sacrifice. Then the Lord turns things around and there is a reversal of circumstances, there is consolation. As we read a moment ago in Chapter 40, where it says: Comfort and give solace to my people, …speak kindly to Jerusalem. This is at the reversal of her circumstances. Announce to her that she has served her term, …her guilt has been expiated. It is finished now, move on. [40:1] I will guide him and amply console him and those who mourn for him, So there are some who are mourning for this individual, because of all the things he has suffered and that this person will suffer in the future. There will be those who care for him: that those things happened. And they too will be consoled with him, and no doubt they will be healed, too. If there is healing to be involved there. This kind of gives you a little insight into this servant.

57:19  who partake of the fruit of the lips: Peace, well-being, to those far off  and to those who are near, says the Lord who heals him.

Peace, well-being is another translation, is synonymous with salvation and healing anyway. Where are these people? Far off and near. The idea of those at home and those abroad. Those who are near are living in the Promised Land. Those who are afar off are those who are still in exile, who ready to come, perhaps, from exile and to be received by those who are already there. We saw that in Chapter 26, that same idea, where it says: Open the gates and let in the nation Righteous because it keeps faith. Those whose minds are steadfast, O Lord, thou preservest in perfect peace, for in thee they are secure. [26:2, 3] There are those already in the city, who welcome others from abroad into the city where they are protected by the Lord in the Day of Calamity. All of these people are partaking of the fruit of the lips. What does that mean? They accept the servant’s preaching. The fruit of the lips is to convey the truth in messages of god, revelations of god, prophecy. And the servant preaches to them in Chapter 50: My Lord Jehovah has endowed me with a learned tongue, that I may know how to preach to those grown weary a word to wake them up. Morning by morning he wakens my ear to hear, as at study; My Lord has opened my ear, [50:4, 5] He opens his ears and receives revelations from God, and he passes them on by way of preaching the word of God to them. That there are “those who partake,” implies that there are those who don’t partake. There are those who mourn for him, as there are those who don’t mourn for him and couldn’t care less. And it implies that some are righteous and some are wicked. Peace… to those far off and those who are near… But the wicked are like a raging Sea, unable to rest,

57:20  But the wicked are like the raging Sea, unable to rest, whose waters heave up mire and mud:

At that time, a dichotomy happens: the time of the Lord’s Servant’s mission. There is a dichotomy among the people: some attain peace and some get no peace. When it says:

57:21  there is no peace, says my God, for the wicked.

it really means: no peace; a state of no peace. In other words, a state of turmoil; of confusion; darkness; upheaval; whatever is the opposite of peace. Like waters heaving up mire and mud: those are chaos motifs. The wicked are left in a situation of chaos, where everything is topsy-turvy. They are unable to rest. They are like the raging sea, dragging up mud from the bottom and weeds and debris. And that’s their lifestyle. That’s how they are. That’s how they’ll continue. “A raging Sea,” too, alludes to the King of Assyria, who personifies the Sea and the River: the sea in commotion; the river in flood. These are the one that destroys the wicked. He’s likened to the new flood that floods the earth. The wicked, in other words, come into his power. He has power over them. The Lord assigns him commission to destroy them, in fact, in Chapter 10.