61:1  The Spirit of my Lord the Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me to announce good tidings to the lowly; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the eyes to the bound,

Of course, it says “the Lord my Lord” in my new translation. The Lord, in Hebrew, is Jehovah, but Jehovah is not the proper pronunciation, as we’ve discussed; it’s just one pronunciation, nor is Yahweh. No one really knows how Jehovah is suppose to be pronounced because it consists of four consonants, without vowels, and there’s any combination of vowels that could go with them, and there’s other questions about how to pronounced those consonants exactly, anyway.

1. The spirit of my Lord Jehovah is upon me. We saw this in chapter forty-two, where the Lord’s Servant is endowed with the spirit of the Lord. So that’s a word link that identifies the Servant, there, or connects these two passages, for one thing. It says in chapter forty-two, verse one: “My Servant whom I sustain, my chosen one in whom I delight, him I have endowed with my Spirit; he will dispense justice to the nations.” The spirit of my Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me. That’s another word link. The anointing of the Lord’s Servant happens, in chapter forty-five, verse one: “Thus says the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whom I grasp by the right hand to subdue nations before him.” That’s the political aspect of the Lord’s Servant. We discussed chapter forty-five, verse one and showed that it’s a composite of king David and Cyrus.
2. To announce good tidings to the lowly. That, again, connects with chapter forty-two and forty-nine, where the Lord’s Servant is to announce good tidings, and also connects to chapter fifty-two: “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good tidings.” There’s all these word links here, all these connections. To interpret this passage, here, you have to connect them to all those other passages. To interpret them you have connect them to this passage. It’s like a domino effect; it’ll say one or two things in one place—to connect those two or three ideas-- and then in another place it’ll take one or two of those ideas and connect them to a couple more ideas, and so forth. This shows how the book of Isaiah is all integrated and woven together through these word links. You can’t isolate one passage from another.
3. But in the New Testament account, Jesus read this passage from Isaiah, in the synagogue. He said, “this day are these things fulfilled in your ears.” So he was applying this scripture to himself. And why should he not? Because on Isaiah’s spiritual ladder the Lord is at the head, and his servant, or servants, are on levels below him. And those servants or servant are all emulating the one above, which is the Lord, in this case. The Lord, in his reading of the passage of Isaiah, in the synagogue, did not go on to verse two, to “herald the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God,” because that had not come in his day. Now, in Isaiah, the Lord and his Servant are always acting in consort, or together. They’re acting in parallel, together. We saw that, very graphically, in chapter forty-one.
4. So the Messianic attributes, if you like to call them that, of the one, are also the Messianic attributes of the other. What the Lord does, himself, the Servant does. When Jesus came to the earth he said he does nothing but what he has seen his Father do. So the Servant does what his Lord does. And those who respond to the Servant’s mission and do what the Servant does. Each one does what he sees the one above doing. And that way they grow into higher functions on the spiritual ladder. And the Lord can apply this to himself, of course. The Servant is a warrior, the Lord is a warrior. The one emulates the other. The Lord is filled with the Spirit, and the Servant is filled with the spirit by his Lord. Each one has his Lord above him. The Lord himself has his Father he spoke of.
5. Through a series of word links Isaiah makes it very plain who the Servant is. You can actually pin it down, through these internal checks and balances that Isaiah has built into his book. The Spirit endowment applies to the Servant. The anointed status applies to the Servant. His mission of preaching good tidings applies to the Servant. Binding up the broken heart, liberty to the captives, opening the eyes of the blind, the bound—all of these things are word links to other parts of Isaiah, describing the Lord’s Servant. Does the Lord himself do this? Of course he does. He liberates the Servant. He anoints him, and so forth. The Lord himself is anointed of his God. But, in a very specific sense, pinning it down to an actual time frame, we’re talking about a latter-day, or last-days scenario. Not the time of Christ’s first coming. In Isaiah, as with any Old Testament prophet, there are levels of interpreting any given prophecy. To say it says this, because Christ applied it to himself, and that’s ALL it means would be limiting everything way beyond what the prophets’ intentions are.
6. Matthew, in the New Testament, applies several scriptures, there, to Christ which don’t, necessarily, apply to Christ. Or these types of scriptures appear in the Old Testament. For example he says, “I have called my son out of Egypt,” and he applies it to Christ coming back when Joseph and Mary come back to the land of Palestine and settled there after the threat is past, from Herod who killed the little babies. And he says, see this fulfills the prophecy “I’ve called my son out of Egypt.” Does it? That same prophecy appears in the book of Hosea, the Old Testament prophet. And it refers to Israel coming out of Egypt, on the Exodus.
7. How then, could Matthew apply it to Christ? Well, he can, because the individual king of a nation or father of a people, or father of a family, goes through the same motions, individually, that a nation, as a whole, does. We saw, a moment ago, how the Servant was abhorred as an individual, and his people, or the people of God, are abhorred as a people. Each one goes through, individually—if he stands at their head-- what they go individually, they go through collectively. They all go to show that the scriptures are far more broad in their interpretation than we have been used to giving them credit for. According to Isaiah’s word links, this passage refers to the Servant. On another level, of course, it can apply to the Lord himself, because he’s even higher on the spiritual ladder than the Servant.
8. These things that we see here, we’ve seen before in other parts of Isaiah. That this is a kind of synopsis of some of these ideas, bringing them all together. It also puts the Servant in the role of Moses who clothed and anointed Aaron, because that’s what’s going on here. These very people who were blind, who were captive, to whom he preaches good tidings—these very people he also clothes in the robes of the holy priesthood, in verse three. This implies that these people are progressing from one stage to another, through the ministry of the Lord’s Servant. He preaches the gospel to them, or he preaches the law of the covenant to them. Do they just remain where they are? No.
9. They go on and become illustrious, as we read a minute ago, because they keep the law of the covenant, they prove loyal to the Lord through various tests and challenges. And because of that the Lord blesses them with more. They progress even to where the Servant, himself, is. Because they progressed to that level. They go up the spiritual ladder, emulating the one above. They emulate the Servant, as the Servant emulates his Lord.
10. The Spirit endowment and the anointing are two ideas, here, that appear together. But as we just read, they appear separately. In chapter forty-two the Servant is endowed by the Spirit. In chapter forty-five he’s anointed. That idea has been separated, there. But, in the Old Testament when King David is anointed, (King David is a type of one who is anointed), it says in the book of Samuel that when David was anointed by Samuel the prophet the Spirit of the Lord came upon him. The two ideas go together—the physical anointing by oil, and the Spirit endowment that follows. Isaiah separates them. Why? To show the political and spiritual aspects of the Lord’s servant, in two different places. He separates the ideal. He divides the ideal to show that every time he mentions the political and spiritual ideal it’s not complete. Because you have to be both political and spiritual. I think we’ve discussed that. Just the anointing by itself is incomplete. A spirit endowment by itself is incomplete. You have to consider that they’re two halves of the same coin.
11. In chapter sixty-one, here-- verse one-- it does that. It puts them both together. That’s the proper thing to do. It also links those two different passages, chapter forty-two, verse one, and chapter forty-five, verse one. It shows that they belong together. The Cyrus figure, spoken of there, the political aspect of the Servant, is also the Servant figure spoken of in chapter forty-two, verse one, the Spirit-endowed Servant.
12. The Spirit of my Lord, Jehovah, is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me. Whenever someone is endowed, or is authorized like that, it’s for a purpose. It’s not to consume on his own pleasures and his own lusts, or for his own ambitions. It’s so that he can administer to others. And what does he administer? He “announces good tidings to the lowly, he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted.” Being sent of God; he’s an apostle, which also means “one sent,” or a messenger. And his job is to preach, to announce good tidings—tidings are those terms of the covenant, renewal of the covenant, of repentance; blessings that come, the heralding of the coming of the Lord, a deliverance of his people from bondage from oppression, from darkness, and so forth. Who does he mainly address? Does he go to the wealthy? No. He goes to the lowly and the broken-hearted, the ones who are oppressed, the ones who are not proud. The proud ones who are hewn down, as we saw in chapter two.
13. So he goes to those who will receive his message, those who are broken-hearted because of all the difficulties they’ve been experiencing, all their afflictions and tribulations. These are the ones who will respond to his preaching. They were captives; they were bound. They were living under the yoke of Babylon, to which the Servant now comes to release them. They were subject to the power of the king of Assyria. They were blind because of their idolatries and their own wickedness in the past, of which they now repent and their eyes are opened. Their eyes are opened to the truth. The wisdom of men and their learning is overshadowed, as we saw in chapter twenty-nine, by the light of truth.

61:2  to herald the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn:

There, we have the two-fold aspect of the Lord’s judgment, his coming. Favor, or grace, or mercy, or deliverance for the righteous, and vengeance for the wicked. It’s the day of judgment when the king of Assyria does his thing. He personifies God’s vengeance. It’s also the Day of the Lord. How can one be the same as the other? When Jesus was predicting his Second coming he said it would be like a thief in the night. But he’s not a thief, nothing like a thief. It’s like a thief because it’s unexpected. And it has a two-fold aspect. If the good man had been watching, he said, he would not have let his house be broken into. He wasn’t watching, and so the thief broke into the house and caught the wicked unawares. Not the righteous; their eyes will have been opened by the Servant, and they will have been prepared for what was coming. They will be watching. There are Watchmen appointed over them.

1. “To herald the year of the Lord’s favor.” That is, not just a day, it doesn’t just pass, but it goes on. The Millennial year of the earth’s existence, the seventh thousand years is like a year to the Lord. A thousand years is like a day, to the Lord. It is a prolonged period of time. “To comfort all who mourn.” Again, implying the reversal of circumstances. “blessed are they who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” This is going back to the beatitudes of Christ. What do they mourn for? They mourn for their own sins, first of all. In Isaiah, and elsewhere, they also mourn for the Servant, chapter fifty-seven. It’s a word link. “ I will amply console him, and those who mourn for him,” in chapter fifty-seven, verse eighteen.

61:3  to endow those who mourn in Zion, bestowing upon them a priestly headpiece in place of ashes, the festal anointing in place of mourning, a resplendent robe in place of a downcast spirit. They shall be called oaks of righteousness planted by the Lord for his glory.

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2. Identifying these people with Zion, even though they don’t become Zion overnight. Zion is a spiritual category, in the book of Isaiah. If they were, indeed, blind and captive it was because, Isaiah say, because they brought these things upon themselves, through their own wickedness, through having suffered covenant curses. But having repented, they go up a step, up the spiritual ladder, from the Israel level to a Zion level. And when they reach that level they are worthy to be endowed in this way. When they reach that spiritual level they become like Aaron his sons.
3. “To endow those who mourn in Zion, bestowing upon them a priestly headpiece in place of ashes, the festal anointing in place of mourning, a resplendent robe in place of a downcast spirit.”
4. Moses did that for Aaron. He anointed him with oil upon his head and it dripped down into his beard, and so forth. He put the robe on, and the priestly robe . So these people assume a function of priestly ministers. To whom? To others of the Lord’s people, like Aaron did. This is a very privileged group of people whom the Servant empowers to minister to others.
5. And we saw in chapter forty that the category of Zion, or Jerusalem, is commanded by the Lord to minister to the Jacob or Israel category. Just as the Lord’s Servant is anointed, now he anoints, and empowers, God’s people, as the Lord empowered him. They are not to consume this upon their own ambitions or on their pride. They are to minister to others on a category lower than themselves, now. It’s a new commission that they receive here, a priestly commission. They receive the priesthood to minister to others that need them, so that they, too, might go higher. So that in the process of ministering to them they, themselves, go higher, to a higher category. It’s that kind of service that lifts one up to the next level. And it lifts those below to the next level. That’s what it’s all about. These people can appreciate that ministry because they need administering to; they were ministered to by the Servant. They were in a state of mourning and sorrow. And now they’ve gone through that, and they see what it’s all about, and so they can do the same for others. They’re better equipped to do so. But, again, notice the tremendous reversal of their circumstances. Those who mourn in Zion are endowed, “ a priestly head piece in place of ashes.” Ashes is a chaos motif, so they were in a situation of chaos; they were low. They were like Zion being raised from the dust, “to sit on a throne,” in chapter fifty-two, verse one. Dust is a chaos motif.
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7. “The festal anointing in place of mourning.” Such a happy occasion. “A resplendent robe in place of a downcast spirit.” That robe is a word link to chapter fifty-two, verse one: “Awake! Arise! Clothe yourself with power, O Zion. Put on your robes of glory, O Jerusalem the holy city. Shake yourself free. Rise from the dust. Sit enthroned. Loose yourself from the bands around your neck, O captive daughter of Zion.” That kind of encapsulate the very thing we’re talking about here. “ A resplendent robe in place of a downcast spirit.” It’s a downcast spirit because of the oppression of living in Babylon and all the injustices that are foisted upon you that came because of transgression and iniquity, covenant curses in the first place, generational covenant curses.
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9. “They shall be called the oaks of righteousness planted by the Lord for his glory.” Here again, very forthright people are compared to trees. But these trees experience the exact opposite of what the wicked trees experience. Remember, in chapter one, “you’ll be ashamed of the oaks you cherish who lust for the parks you were fond of. You’ve become like an oak whose leaves wither.” “This day of the Lord,” in chapter two, verse thirteen comes against “all the lofty cedars of Lebanon that lift themselves up high, against all the Oaks of Bashan.” And the king of Assyria is called an ax and a saw that does the hewing, in chapter ten, and in chapter fourteen.
10. But these people experience the exact opposite. They are planted by the Lord because they responded to him and he nurtures them; he blesses them. They become the oaks, or pillars, of society, but they’re linked to righteousness. Because of their righteousness they become illustrious and mighty. But also, because of the mission of the Lord’s Servant who personifies righteousness. He IS righteousness personified, the one who prepares the way for the coming of the Lord, who personifies salvation. They’re properly called the Oaks of Righteousness because those who respond to the Servant are called the followers of Righteousness, Seekers of the Lord, in chapter fifty one, verse one. And in chapter fifty one, verse seven, it talks about those who know Righteousness, “the people in whose heart is my law.” Being called the Oaks of Righteousness is alluding to the fruits of the Servant’s labors among these people.
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61:4  They will rebuild the ancient ruins, raise up the old waste places; they will renew the desolate cities demolished generations ago.

1. Again, this implied they have received inheritances of land, in the places that were destroyed before because of covenant curses. Now there’s a regeneration, here, of the land and of the buildings. Their whole society goes through a rebirth. As the wicked are destroyed from the earth, who are, by far, the majority-- maybe ninety percent, according to Isaiah’s imagery-- and all of their places are destroyed, as the people of Zion spread, in the Millennium, and inherit the whole earth they will be rebuilding much of the earth, much of those places that were destroyed, they will eventually rebuild as the earth is populated again, completely, during that thousand years. Reconstruction is a creative thing. The king of Assyria is the one who does the destruction. He makes himself the god of this world, but he’s not a god who gives life or creates. He’s a god who destroys. He’s a false god, the power of chaos. The Servant is a power of creation, as the word “light” suggests, a creative force. “They will rebuild the ancient ruins, raise up the old waste places; they will renew the desolate cities demolished generations ago.”
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61:5  Aliens will tend and pasture your flocks; foreigners will be your farmhands and vinedressers.

1. Now we discussed in chapter fourteen that there is a lower category than these. These are the people who are in the category of Moses and Aaron who are priestly ministers to the people. And there is another category over them. So we end up with two categories in that day. Prior to the day of judgment, prior to the Millennium, there are three categories of people: the precious, the semi-precious and the common-- the elect--the people of God who keep his law but who have not yet proven faithful under all conditions, and then there are the wicked. The wicked disappear so we only have two categories left—the people of God who keep his laws and who are righteous but they don’t prove loyal in every sense, or maybe they’re in the process of doing so—and then there is that category of the elect, in this case the people of Zion, or the paid ministers who do prove faithful to the Lord, under all conditions. Maybe that’s why they were in mourning. Maybe that’s partly why some of them were in a state of mourning, because they were so oppressed in the process of proving faithful that they became objects of persecution. We have one category, here, serving the other.
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61:6  But you shall be called the priests of the Lord and referred to as the ministers of our God. You shall feed on the wealth of the nations and be gratified with their choicest provision.

1. Just like wealthy people have servants, or they did in the old days, in the South. Not that the ones who serve them are slaves, they’re not. They’re free, but they choose to minister to them. It’s a good situation for both categories of society. Both levels of society are helped by this.
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61:7  Because their shame was twofold, and shouted insults were their lot, therefore in their land shall their inheritance be twofold and everlasting joy be theirs.

1. Again, this is alluding to the reversal of their circumstances. They were humiliated. They were insulted. They were the victims of every joke and every evil feeling that the wicked people foisted upon them. Just like Christ was humiliated, just like the apostles were. Christ said to them, “as they have done to me, they will do to you.” We saw that the Servant was abhorred; they were abhorred. He was insulted; they were insulted. That’s humiliation before exaltation. That is the test of faithfulness to the Lord. Are you willing to pay the price? Are you willing, when you make covenant with the Lord, to go through this? If you are, you will pass the test and he will exalt you in the end. If you’re not willing to then you will have to end up on one of the lesser levels of the spiritual ladder. This is, again, very similar to the fairy stories. All these fairy stories have a similar kind of plot to them. There is Cinderella who is really a princess., and Snow White, Sleeping Beauty; in each case, the hero or heroine is insulted or humiliated, or made to serve in hard bondage, or something where they are totally under subjection to some kind of wicked female, usually, which is the harlot, Babylon in Isaiah. And the heroine is the virgin daughter of Zion. And the one subjects the other, to horrendous humiliation, oppression, tribulation, and afflictions. But if she bears it, faithfully, what happens in the end? If she submits to the higher wisdom that is given her through the messengers, through the “fairy Godmother” in the fairy tales, the Lord’s Servant and servants in the Book of Isaiah? They come and intervene at critical times and offer a higher wisdom. “Follow this, and do this.” They come and provide ways of getting them out of there, in reversing their circumstances.
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3. The wicked ogre, or giant, is the king of Assyria. He tries to kill the people of God and ends up dead, himself. If people are not willing to submit to this, people are not willing to pass the test. They end up as ugly step sisters, or other lesser characters in the story. That’s life. That’s a wonderful thing that children can be indoctrinated, if you will, with these fairy stories at a young age when they are very impressionable, because it establishes the paradigm of life, God’s paradigm of life, perfectly for them, in a nutshell. And if that’s all they learn while they’re young, then great! Isaiah says the same things, only with a lot more detail. It’s the same paradigm, because their shame was two-fold. Why? Because they were ridiculed and scorned and mocked and ostracized and persecuted. Not because they were bad, but because they were good. Not because they did wickedly, but because they did righteously. Have the wicked ever loved the righteous? What do they do with the prophets of God? They stoned them and killed them. They slandered them. They spoke evil about them. Read “The Ascension of Isaiah” and see what they did to him. There was a false prophet, Beliar, who was continually hurling insults and spreading disinformation about Isaiah, things that were not true. Nowadays when I hear slanders, or slurs on somebody I don’t take it seriously until I learn for myself if in fact that anything like what I hear is true.
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5. The prophets, and God’s people were subjected to two-fold shame. Because of their allegiance to God’s covenant they were persecuted. They were dealt with as if they were wicked, as was Christ on the cross. He was persecuted and crucified. He was condemned, not because he was wicked, but because he was righteous. He was falsely accused. He was numbered with criminals. “Because their shame was two-fold, and shouted insults were their lot.” When I said that the Holy One of Israel was the paradigm, or the exemplar for those below him on the spiritual ladder, that includes him. That they do that to Christ, the Lord. Christ, in Isaiah,chapter fifty-three, IS the Lord himself, the Lord God of Israel. He goes through greater humiliation and shame, and suffering, than any of the others. The higher you go on the spiritual ladder, the more you suffer, the more you are humiliated to be exalted higher. There’s always humiliation before exaltation. There’s always suffering before salvation. There’s a descent before the ascent. And Christ descended below them all, to be exalted above all.
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7. “Because their shame was twofold, and shouted insults were their lot, therefore, in their land shall their inheritance be twofold, and everlasting joy be theirs. Therefore in their land shall their inheritance be twofold and everlasting joy be theirs.” They’re not without reward. Humiliation is the test of their loyalty, to show that they will remain faithful under all conditions. Then the Lord comes through for them. He doesn’t abandon them. The devil abandons those who are his. He promises them things, he exalts them now, and then they end up humiliated, without recourse. The righteous receive a double inheritance in their land. Inheritance, here, is paralleled with joy.
8. “Therefore in their land shall their inheritance be twofold and everlasting joy be theirs.” Their joy is synonymous with inheritance, and inheritance is synonymous with joy. In other words, they’re going to be happy. They were sad before. They had a downcast spirit. They were depressed. Sure, it would depress anybody to go through what they go through. But is it worth it? It’s only momentary. This joy is everlasting. Again, the reversal of their circumstances. The same thing goes for the Servant as goes for the Lord, himself. When the circumstances are reversed the glory is greater than it could have been without going through that. When Christ was resurrected, his resurrection was glorious. It facilitated and brought forth all those who gave him their allegiance, according to the terms of the covenant. He became the Savior of all mankind, for whoever would give him their allegiance.
9. “Therefore, in their land shall their inheritance be twofold.” That twofold inheritance is also the inheritance of the birthright son. He has a twofold inheritance. It’s the full inheritance, is what it means. They receive that which the Father would give them. The Father would give the Son his own inheritance. And he takes the place of the Father, and that’s what these people do as they go up the spiritual ladder. They become like the one who ministered to them.
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61:8  For I the Lord love just dealings—but I abhor extortion in those who sacrifice—and I will appoint them a sure reward; I will make with them an eternal covenant.

1. We saw that in chapter one, with people going to offer sacrifice at the temple, but their lives are out of order and so the Lord doesn’t regard their sacrifice. It means nothing. But what is this saying? We talked about extortion. In chapter fifty-nine, verse thirteen talks about those who willfully deny the Lord, and “back away from following their God, perversely planning ways of extortion, conceiving in the mind and pondering illicit transactions.” Who are those people? They are people going to the temple, offering sacrifice at the temple. Isn’t that what people do at the temple? What a paradox that is, of wicked people who are into extortion, making a pretense of worshiping God and being counted among those people of God and the eyes of their fellow human beings.
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3. “I the Lord love just dealings.” The just dealings implies that those who are being exalted, here, whose shame is being reversed, who are the ones who love just dealings. And we’ve seen that idea before. We seen it about those who escape destruction. In chapter thirty-three it asks, “Who among us can live through the devouring fire? Who among us can abide eternal burning?’ And the answer is, “They who conduct themselves righteously, and are honest in word, who disdain extortion and stay their hand from taking any bribes, who stop their ears at the mention of murder, who shut their eyes at the sight of wickedness. They shall dwell on high; the impregnable cliffs are their fortress. Bread is provided and their water is sure.” This is the same people. These are word links to the people here who pass the test.
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5. “ I will appoint them a sure reward;” continuing with 61:8, “ I will make with them an eternal covenant.” We’ve already seen part of that covenant which has to do with spirit endowment, at the end of chapter fifty-nine. The sure reward that the Lord appoints them, here, is parallel with the eternal covenant. The eternal covenant is an unconditional covenant. It has to do with land, and offspring-- land that is regenerated to a paradisiacal state, and offspring that are endowed by the spirit of the Lord. It has to do with protection from the Lord himself, with every covenant blessing that has ever existed, all rolled into one. Particularly in chapter fifty-four, those covenant blessings are enumerated. But they also appear, sporadically, throughout Isaiah, as we’ve already been seeing. “ I will appoint them a sure reward, I will make with them an eternal covenant.”
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61:9  Their offspring shall be renowned among the nations, their posterity in the midst of the peoples; all who see them will acknowledge that they are of the lineage the Lord has blessed.

1. So we have their land, and we have offspring, here, and we have the priestly endowment—the spirit endowment--, and we have exaltation. These people are acknowledged by others as an especially blessed people. Which implies, there, that there’s a category of people not as blessed as they are. There’s the two categories.
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61:10  I rejoice exceedingly in the Lord; my soul delights in my God. For he clothes me in garments of salvation, he arrays me in a robe of righteousness—like a bridegroom dressed in priestly attire, or a bride adorned with her jewels.

1. This is reiterating what we saw earlier, where these people are endowed with priestly authority and are arrayed in the priestly robe. This reiterates that, but does more. It talks about rejoicing and delighting in the Lord. And we saw that everlasting joy would be theirs. But here, it personalizes the whole thing, because it is only individuals that experience this. They got their by being individuals. Yes, collectively there are the people of Zion. But, by personalizing it, it implies the personal victory of each one that attains that status. “It’s because I as an individual passed the test. I went through this ordeal myself. And whether there were comforters there, or not, I went through a horrendous test to get there.” The fact that there were others who failed could also mean you are in a better position to minister to them, to get them there also.
2. In the book of Psalms, we have this kind of spontaneous joy and delight that pops up when a person has gone through these kinds of trials, these horrendous tests and trials of life, and who prevailed and won the battle, who have won the victory. This spontaneous feeling is expressed when the Lord reverses their circumstances, to praise him, to thank him, to glorify God, to delight and rejoice in God.
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4. “For he clothes me in garments of salvation, he arrays me in a robe of righteousness,” alludes to how he got there. Because of his righteousness he experiences salvation. It also alludes to the fact that the Lord and his Servant, Salvation and Righteousness, are still around. They’re ongoing principles, as we saw before. In chapter fifty-one, verse six says, “My salvation shall be everlasting, my righteousness shall never fail.” Fifty-one, eight says, “My righteousness shall endure forever, my salvation through endless ages.” They’re always going to be around. They’re the two arms of God. They define God’s intervention. Then it says, “like a bridegroom dressed in priestly attire, or a bride adorned with her jewels.” That is the first time male and female are mentioned together. It’s not just a male experiencing this, or a female by herself. It’s together they experience this. And this implies that those on the highest level of the spiritual ladder, the elect category, are not single people. It’s married people that experience this, bride and bridegroom. It may also imply newly-married, because it also happens that bride and bridegroom are at the marriage feast themselves. To attain this status of becoming priestly ministers to the Lord’s people coincides with entering the marriage covenant, as well. The one is not without the other. This priestly endowment of the kind that Isaiah’s talking about is both male and female together. And it implies that that male/female union is a precondition for this covenant, for being endowed in this priestly manner. You don’t get to be endowed with the priestly power, this priesthood authority, or this ministry without having entered into the marriage covenant. The bride “adorned with her jewels--” What does that imply? Jewels is a precious category, precious stones. It implies an elect category of people, or offspring.
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61:11  For as the earth brings forth its vegetation, and as a garden causes what is sown to spring up in it, so will my Lord the Lord cause righteousness and praise to spring up in the presence of all nations.

This implies covenant blessings because of the fertility, the yield of the land, its produce, but more than that. It shows the whole process that now has born good fruit. The whole process of what these people have gone through started with a seed. Then the Lord watered the seed. If the seed responds it will be watered and grow. And eventually what does it lead to? To the high and exalted status of these people, these servants of God, these ministers of our God. It also parallels the Garden with the earth.

1. “As the earth brings forth its vegetation, and as a garden causes what is sown to spring up in it,” and so on, we know the whole earth is going to become like the Garden of Eden. And the whole earth will become fertile and beautiful. Righteousness is something that shines; it’s what makes the people illustrious. But it’s also a person, the Servant. He will become illustrious. “So will my Lord cause righteousness and praise to spring up in the presence of all nations.” The Servant’s mission is to all nations of the world, to call them to repentance, to bring out the righteous people out of the nations, to Zion so they might be blessed. At the time the earth is being destroyed by the king of Assyria, the wicked are being destroyed and the righteous are being taken out, like Lot out of Sodom. And when the destruction is over, they’re the ones who are left alive, and they go back and inherit the desolate places.