In southeastern Wyoming along Interstate 80, you can’t miss several towering clusters of weathered granite. They rise about 500 feet from the surrounding terrain. From a distance, it looks as if several mountains decided to play blocks. One rectangular mass sits atop another, some leaning against other stacks. They call this place Vedauwoo; and it’s a prime spot for those who enjoy crack climbing.

A few years ago, my family and I stopped at Vedauwoo on our way to Yellowstone. The kids were climbing some boulders; and I glanced at the larger formations and discovered three red dots on the side of a cliff. The dots were also moving. Climbers, of course. I just didn’t expect them to look so tiny. But against the greatness of those formations, everything else looked small.

Studying the prophet Isaiah has made me feel like one of those tiny red dots, slowly moving up a vast rock. With 66 chapters, Isaiah is one of the longer books in Scripture. Its range of speech types and poetry will humble anyone who attempts to scale the interlocking layers of meaning. Isaiah’s prophecy is also sweeping, taking us from the dregs of corruption to the heights of new creation. But greatest of all is the God Isaiah proclaims. Climb all you want; you’ll never reach the summit of his glories.

My plan today is only verse 1. It sets the stage for the entire prophecy. We learn how the message came, who spoke it, what it concerns, and when it arose. We’ll take each of those in turn and pause along the way to see how this affects our reading of Isaiah. Toward the end, I’ll also highlight some major themes Isaiah develops. The idea is to get the bigger picture before focusing on the details in coming weeks.

So, to begin our climb of Isaiah, let’s listen now to his opening words from verse 1: “The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.”

How the Message Came

The first thing to observe is how the message came: “the vision…which he saw.” In Scripture, a prophet’s message is often called a vision. Both true prophets and false prophets had visions. The vision of false prophets was a result of things like fortune-telling or the deceit of their own minds. But the vision of true prophets was the result of God’s Spirit granting special insight to authorized individuals—to observe the divine realm, to discern the true state of things, to see the world from God’s perspective.

Most of the people were blind. They sat in moral darkness. They lacked spiritual perception. But God’s prophet could see the divine will. At times these visions allowed the prophet to see future events, whether immediate or distant. But much of the time, these visions allowed the prophet to see God’s will for his people in the present.

In doing so, they became God’s mouthpiece. That’s why verse 2 begins the vision with what God has spoken: “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for the LORD has spoken.” Or glance at 2:1—this time it’s “the word Isaiah saw.” What he sees is the word he speaks. God reveals his will to the prophet using the medium of a vision, and the prophet delivers that will in words exactly as God entrusted to him.

There was, of course, criteria to tell if a prophet was trustworthy or not. He had to speak in the name of Yahweh, Israel’s covenant Lord. The things he said had to align with the Law God already revealed to Moses. And whatever a prophet predicted, that event had to come to pass, else he was false.[i] When it comes to Isaiah, there’s no doubt his vision is of the Lord. We’ll encounter several predictions, some of which came to pass during Isaiah’s lifetime—like when Syria and Israel fail to conquer Jerusalem in Isaiah 7, or when Sennacherib’s siege is miraculously lifted in Isaiah 37. Other predictions would find their fulfillment much later, like when Cyrus treats Israel with favor, or when the Suffering Servant dies in place of sinners, or when God’s light reaches the Gentiles.

When you open the prophet Isaiah, you are encountering not simply an ancient text that helps us understand what some guy in Israel once thought. We’re encountering a revelation from the living God who makes his will and purpose plain for mankind. Give thanks that our God is not silent. Many believe that we live in a closed universe—saying that even if there was a God, we can’t know him. But this vision tells us otherwise. The true God makes himself known. He reveals his purpose in judgment and salvation; and they are so important that heaven and earth are summoned to listen up.

In Acts 28:25, the apostle Paul picks up on the divine source of this vision when he says, “through Isaiah the prophet, the Holy Spirit was right in saying…” Or we could turn to 2 Peter 1:21, “No prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” God speaks in this vision.

Who Spoke the Vision

At the same time, God delivers the prophecy by a human author, which brings us to our second observation—who spoke it. Verse 1 says, “Isaiah son of Amoz.” The name Isaiah means “Yahweh saves,” quite fitting to many promises in the book. His prophetic ministry lasted about fifty years, starting around 740 BC. In your Bibles, his first mention isn’t until 2 Kings 19:2, during the reign of Hezekiah. But 2 Chronicles 26:22 also mentions Isaiah recording the acts of Uzziah who reigned several decades before Hezekiah. That aligns with the timeframe specified here and throughout Isaiah.

Now, the church has traditionally held to Isaiah being the sole author of chapters 1-66. But in the late 1800s, some scholars began challenging that. They pointed to things like stylistic changes in chapters 40-66. Also, those same chapters address an audience living 150 years after Isaiah’s death. And then there are prophecies that name Cyrus with unusual specificity. Surely, then (the argument goes) these later chapters belong to someone else or a school of Isaiah’s disciples.

But these conclusions are not without some underlying assumptions. For instance, who said an author wasn’t allowed to change his style? Might the vision of a dawning new age cause a stylistic change or two? Also, prophets like Ezekiel, Daniel, Zechariah—they too include prophecies that address audiences beyond their own day. It wasn’t so unusual. And with naming Cyrus, some would say there’s no possible way Isaiah could have known that. But might such specificity give even further hope for later exiles showing that God controls history even before it happens?

So, when it says, “the vision of Isaiah,” I take that to mean he’s responsible for the whole thing—at least the main substance of all of chapters 1-66. Why’s that important? Well, one is simply to urge caution when newer arguments try to overturn twenty-five centuries of treating Isaiah as the single author. Another reason is that we don’t want our conclusions about Isaiah to contradict those of Jesus and the New Testament apostles. Matthew 3:3, for instance, quotes Isaiah 40; Matthew 8:17 quotes Isaiah 53; and Romans 10:20 quotes Isaiah 65—all specifying that Isaiah himself “had spoken” these words. They treated the whole prophecy as Isaiah’s words.[ii]

But here’s something else: many of the scholars who attribute various parts of Isaiah to different authors—their methodology distracts from the book’s unifying message and purpose.[iii] That’s not to say that all they observe is unwarranted; some of their observations have forced a closer reading of the text. It’s only to say their tendency is to dissect the prophet’s words instead of allowing the prophet’s words to dissect them.

What the Vision Concerns

So, let’s now turn to what the vision concerns. It says, “the vision…which he saw, concerning Judah and Jerusalem.” Judah referred to the regions enclosed by the Southern Kingdom. At the time, you had Israel to the north, Judah to the south. [By today’s maps, draw a line from Tel-Aviv to the Dead Sea and south—that was the area.] Jerusalem was the capitol city within Judah. God chose for his name to dwell there, his king to rule there. When coupled together, Judah and Jerusalem represent the people, the inhabitants of the nation who shared a special covenant relationship with God.

Where they fail to obey God’s covenant, Isaiah corrects them. He doesn’t pull any punches either: “How the faithful city has become a whore”—1:21. Or “Woe to those who acquit the guilty for a bribe…As the tongue of fire devours stubble, and as dry grass sinks down in the flame, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom go up like dust” (Isa 5:22, 24). He also commands them back to covenant fidelity. 1:17, “Cease doing evil. Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression.” 2:5, “Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord.” “If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness” (Isa 58:10).

But more than correction and command—there was also comfort concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Isaiah’s vision wasn’t simply concerning their repentance in the present; it was also pointing to their renewal in the future. In fact, the whole book is bracketed by God’s concern with Judah and Jerusalem—what they are now because of sin and what they will be because of grace. In chapter 1, Jerusalem is besieged. It lies desolate. The city once housed righteousness, but now it’s full of murderers—just like the rest of fallen creation. But by the time we get to chapter 66 a new Jerusalem is filled with joy. Even the nations come to see her glory—the new city belongs to a new creation. It’s no wonder that 40:1 begins, “Comfort, comfort, my people…”

Thus, the whole of Isaiah is a movement from the old Jerusalem to the new, from the corruption of the old creation to the comforts of the new creation.[iv] And suddenly our own stories are caught up into this sweeping message of God’s cosmic redemption. Yes, the message concerns Judah and Jerusalem back then, but the message also speaks to us now. So, one of the things we’ll have to do from week to week is draw out these connections. How does Isaiah’s message concerning “Judah and Jerusalem”—how does that message speak to us today?

Here’s the path we’re going to take. If, last Spring, you were part of the class Interpreting the Bible, we used this diagram a lot.

Follow the white line. Step one is understanding what Isaiah’s words mean for Judah and Jerusalem. Step two is interpreting them in the light of Christ and the new age. If that was the meaning for God’s people under the old covenant, how does the new covenant further our understanding? Then, step three, we’ll learn how Isaiah’s words apply to us now. The New Testament will be especially helpful on these last two arrows. Jesus quotes Isaiah, the apostles quote Isaiah. Not only do they interpret prior revelation in light of later revelation; they also give us the implications: if these things are so, now live this way.   

When the Vision Arose

Last observation for verse 1—and this helps us a ton with the first arrow of that pathway diagram: when Isaiah’s vision arose. What were the circumstances into which he was speaking? End of verse 1: “concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.” Now, the content of Isaiah’s prophecy will give us plenty material that explains what those days were like. But we also get some help from places like 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles. Both books narrate the historical backdrop for understanding the context of Isaiah’s prophecy.

What was that time like? Well, Uzziah was a better king in Judah. For a while, he did “what was right in the eyes of the Lord” (2 Kgs 15:3); and God prospered him. He built all kinds of things—towers, cisterns, engines invented by skillful men, a great army (2 Chron 26:1-15). But the high places—the places where Israel bowed to their idols—they weren’t taken away (2 Kgs 15:4). And “when he was strong, [Uzziah] grew proud to his own destruction” (2 Chron 26:16). He was too arrogant to listen; he desecrated the altar by offering incense, something only priests were supposed to do. And then God struck him with leprosy until the day of his death (2 Chron 26:14-23).

In the meantime, to the north, the kings of Israel were also leading God’s people into horrible patterns of sin; and parts of Israel had already been captured by Assyria (2 Kgs 15:29). Assyria was God’s instrument in judgment and a warning to the people in Judah: “If you continue rebelling, this too will be your end.”

Back in Judah, Jotham followed Uzziah. Like his father, he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord. Yet still, the high places remained (2 Kgs 15:35); and the Lord began to send Syria against Judah—again as a warning for their lack of repentance.

Ahaz reigned next. He didn’t even try to do what is right in God’s eyes. Just like the pagan nations, Ahaz burned his son(s) as an offering to the gods. He sacrificed on the high places and under every green tree (2 Kgs 16:4). Instead of trusting God, he formed an alliance with Assyria to get himself out of trouble. Get this: he paid off the king of Assyria with treasures from the Lord’s house (2 Kgs 16:8). Then he replaced the Lord’s altar with his own altar and made sacrifices saying, “I will sacrifice to [the gods of Syria] that they may help me” (2 Chron 28:27).

The last king listed in verse 1 is Hezekiah. He really tries to turn things around for Judah. He removes the high places (1 Kgs 3:8). He cleanses the temple (2 Chron 29:3-19). He restores worship (2 Chron 29:30-36), attempts Passover (2 Chron 30), organizes the priests (2 Chron 31:1-21). It says, “he trusted in the Lord so that there was none like him among the kings of Judah” (2 Kgs 18:5). But even his reforms weren’t enough to turn things around permanently. Hezekiah himself ends up failing a test by accepting gifts from Babylon. Then he dies. King Manasseh enters the picture and things fall apart.

These are the days when Isaiah was prophesying. 2 Kings 17:19 says, “the Lord warned Israel and Judah by every prophet and every seer saying, ‘Turn from your evil ways…’ But they wouldn’t listen. They despised his covenant…Judah also did not keep the commandments but walked in the [pagan] customs that Israel had introduced.” That’s the backdrop—a nation largely given to their idolatrous impulses, a nation ruled by a mixed bag of kings, a nation that despised God’s covenant.

Themes across Isaiah

Into that setting, Isaiah delivers a message about majesty. That’s a big theme of Isaiah’s prophecy—people need to see God’s majesty. Even the good kings couldn’t keep their nation together. But the King of heaven—well, before him all nations are like a drop in a bucket, like dust on the scales. They are nothing before God’s majesty. The inhabitants of the earth are like grasshoppers beneath him. He wields nations like a lumber jack swings his axe. God brings princes to nothing; he makes rulers as emptiness. He stretches the heavens like a curtain. He measures the waters of the earth in the hallow of his hand. He weighs the mountains in scales.[v] You can find these in Isaiah 40.

But likely the most majestic scene is the vision of 6:1: “I saw the Lord,” Isaiah says, “sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: ‘Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!’ The foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called; the house was filled with smoke.”

Seeing this, Isaiah responds, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” (Isa 6:5). When Isaiah beholds God’s majesty, he sees how awful, how horrific is their mutiny—both his own and the people’s.

That’s another theme Isaiah develops—mutiny against God’s majesty. God had set Israel apart. God made a covenant with them. God told them how to live. But they rebelled. Isaiah says that “everyone loves a bribe.” “There’s no justice for the fatherless.” They know God exists; they’ve seen his glorious works in Israel. Yet they keep bowing to the works of their hands. They trust their own strength. They partner with godless nations. They defy the Lord’s glorious presence, he says. They drink at feasts, laughing it up, but have no regard for the deeds of the Lord.[vi]

They call evil good and good evil. They have rejected God’s law. Everyone is godless, he says, every mouth speaks folly. Even the people who maintain the ritual of worship, their hearts are far from God.[vii] Because of this mutiny, God drops on them the curses of the covenant: armies overrun their cities, fields suffer desolation, sieges cause famine, displacement rips families apart. On their own, Judah and Jerusalem had no hope.

In some ways, they become a miniature picture of what all humanity deserves for their mutiny against God’s majesty. To learn about Israel’s predicament will teach us a lot about our predicament. God judges covenant breakers; and in Adam we are all covenant breakers. We all have unclean lips. We all fall short of the glory of God. Thus, we all deserve his curse, his judgment, his condemnation—something that Isaiah describes in 66:24 as fire that isn’t quenched and a worm that never dies.

We cannot get ourselves out of this. We lack the ability, just like Israel lacked the ability. We need someone else to come and save us; and that’s another theme Isaiah proclaims. In the middle of these dreadful times, he announces a Messiah, a Savior.

4:2 mentions “the branch of the LORD.” He “shall be beautiful and glorious.” In 9:7, a son would come to rule on the throne of David. Among all the kings of Judah, he would surpass them all. He would be called “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” 11:1-6 says, “The Spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding.” “His delight shall be in the fear of the LORD.” “Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist.”

Israel had been an unfaithful servant. But this Messiah would be a faithful Servant—so faithful that he too, like God, would be “high, lifted up, and exalted.” But before he’s exalted, he’s humiliated. Isaiah 53, “He had no form or majesty that we should look at him…no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” The people would esteem “him stricken, smitten by God, afflicted.” Why? Why would someone so glorious, so special, so chosen by God—why would he stoop to this sort of mistreatment?

Isaiah goes on to explain: “he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” The Majesty sent a Messiah to die for our mutiny—to take away all our sin and guilt.

Not only that, but this same Messiah would also rise from the dead. “The will of the Lord would prosper in his hands,” Isaiah says. With his enthronement a new day would dawn, a new age of plenty and comfort—which leads to one last theme Isaiah develops: God’s mountain. It might sound strange to announce a mountain. But for Judah and Jerusalem, it carried great significance. Mount Zion was there. It hosted the temple, where God revealed his presence.[viii] God’s anointed king ruled from Zion. So, Mount Zion became known as God’s mountain. Zion portrayed God’s reign on earth.

But the earthly Zion never lived up to those ideals. The earthly Zion was torn down when God poured out his covenant curses. In the new age, however, God would replace it with a far greater mountain. Seven times he takes us to this mountain.[ix]

The first is 2:1-4, “In the latter days…the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established as the highest of the mountains and shall be lifted up above the hills; and all the nations shall flow to it.” Verse 4, “they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.”

The next is 4:2-6. For those who dwell on Mount Zion, God has washed away their filth to the extent that God dwells with his people. His glory cloud isn’t limited to the temple; he spreads his canopy over all the people in Zion. Next is chapters 11 and 12, where the rule of God’s Messiah creates a mountain of total peace: “the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the young goat.” Point being verse 9: “they shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain.” And this salvation causes the inhabitants of Zion to break forth in song. 12:6, “Shout and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.”

A fourth time comes in 25:8-9, “On this mountain, the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.” On this mountain God will “swallow up death forever; and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces.” In 35:1-10, by trusting in themselves, humans have turned the earth into a barren wilderness. But in mercy God transforms this desert into a new Eden. “The blind shall see, the ears of the deaf unstopped. The lame shall leap like the dear.” “The ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to [Mount] Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads…”

In chapters 54-55, we find the same portrait of a new Eden. But it seems now to encompass the whole earth: the mountains sing, the trees clap their hands, and Zion no longer has room for all the peoples. Isaiah has to say, “Enlarge the place of your tent…don’t hold back.” Zion will possess the nations. Then, finally, the seventh picture of God’s mountain comes in chapters 65-66. The new heavens, the new earth, the new Jerusalem. All who oppose God will be cast out and judged; but all who worship God will enjoy his holy presence. “Behold,” God says, “I will extend peace to her like a river, and the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream” (Isa 66:12).

Essentially, the heights of God’s mountain bring heaven on earth. The Majesty sent a Messiah to die for our mutiny, so that we can dwell on his mountain. Hebrew discourse loves to repeat things. So, we’ll return to these themes again and again; and we’ll find that the New Testament does as well. More than sixty times they quote from Isaiah to connect God’s promises to Jesus and the new age. And by some counts, the number of allusions to Isaiah is even higher—more than three hundred. Some have even called Isaiah “the Fifth Gospel” as it so often proclaims the good news.

Do you have questions that sound like this? “Lord, where are you? Why does injustice persist? Will you do anything about this? What hope for peace do we have if nation keeps rising against nation? Are you still in control?”

Or maybe you have prayers that sound like this? “Father, our leaders have traded your glory for idols. They have called evil good and good evil. Frustrate their plans and humble them before your law.” Or “Lord, my friend sits in the darkness of his corruption. But I know that your arm is not too short to save.”

Do thoughts like this hound you? “O my, I’ve done it again. I’ve really messed up. I regret that I said that. I should’ve just listened to them. But once again, here I am in my guilt. I’m so ashamed.” Or what about your longings—do they sound like this? “I wish God’s people would shine like a light. I wish the blind could see and the lame would leap like the deer. I wish the oppressed would find freedom and the outcast would find a home. I want a place where sadness is over and the songs never end.”

If any of those describe you, Isaiah is your book. It’s a long journey. At times it’s challenging to understand. You’ll feel like you’re scaling a great mountain. And Isaiah tells the story of a great mountain—the mountain where God dwells in all his majesty. Climb all you want; you’ll never reach the summit of his glories. But I hear some good views are possible by the wings of eagles.

________

[i] E.g., Deut 13:1-5; 18:14-22.

[ii] G. K. Beale, “‘Isaiah the Prophet Said’: The Authorship of Isaiah Reexamined in the Light of Early Jewish and Christian Writings,” in Bind Up the Testimony: Explorations in the Genesis of the Book of Isaiah, eds. Daniel I. Block and Richard L. Schultz (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2015), 81-113.

[iii] Richard L. Schultz, “How Many Isaiah’s Were There and What Does It Matter? Prophetic Inspiration in Recent Evangelical Scholarship,” in Evangelicals and Scripture: Tradition, Authority, and Hermeneutics, eds. Vincent Bacote, et al. (Downers Grove: IVP, 2004), 150-70; Peter J. Gentry, “The Macrostructures of the Book of Isaiah and Authorial Intent,” in Bind Up the Testimony (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2015), 227-54.

[iv] Barry G. Webb, The Message of Isaiah, BST (Downers Grove: IVP, 1996), 8.

[v] Isa 10:15; 40:12-23.

[vi] Isa 1:2, 23; 2:8; 3:8; 5:12; 31:1.

[vii] Isa 5:20, 24; 9:17; 29:13.

[viii] Isa 8:18; 18:7; 24:23.

[ix] Barry G. Webb, “Zion in Transformation: A Literary Approach to Isaiah,” in The Bible in Three Dimensions: Essays in Celebration of Forty Years of Biblical Studies in the University of Sheffield, eds. D. J. A. Clines, et al., JSOTSS 87 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1990), 65-84.