We continue to explore by what means God would bless the nations according to the promises made to Abraham through the Abrahamic covenant. While our previous focus was upon the Psalms and the worship of Yahweh through the Holy Spirit traversing the entire planet, the prophets certainly also peered forward to the coming in of all the families of the earth to worship Yahweh in an expansive way. But the blessing of Abraham to the nations will not only be fulfilled in the worship of the families of the earth which includes their kings and their nations, but the blessing will also entail receiving the law of God and His justice. The blessings of Abraham extended to the nations encompass not only a pursuit of righteousness, but also adherence to the standards of justice as established by God’s law.
While most Christians have a negative view of the law of God, the scriptures tell a different story. Regarding God’s righteous statutes, the Psalmist could express that blessings come by the law for those who meditate upon it day and night (Psalm 1:2). Later, David would once again express that the law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul; The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple (Psalm 19:7). Even the New Testament writers saw the beauty and blessing of God’s law. Paul expressed this to the Roman churches in that the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good (Romans 7:12) and in his epistle to Timothy we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully (1 Timothy 1:8).
The scriptures predict a time when not only Israel would embrace the standards of God’s righteousness, but that the Gentiles would come flocking to it as well. The nations pursuing the righteous standards of God was a promise given to Abraham during his meeting with the Lord just prior to the destruction of Sodom:
since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and in him all the nations of the earth will be blessed? For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.” (Genesis 18:18-19)
As we can see from this text, a condition was placed upon Abraham regarding the fulfilling of the covenant, mainly that his descendants continue to do righteousness and justice. That way, the Lord will bring about the blessings to the nations. Righteousness and justice were largely associated with God’s standards which would come later through Moses when He would write down in His Torah. While the law didn’t exist in written form during this time, it was still a standard of righteousness that God expected from people whether Jew or Gentile. No one was exempt from this standard because of their ignorance. This was exactly why the law was a blessing, because the One who set the standard of righteousness and justice took it upon Himself to communicate it to His people.
Finding Justice in the Mountain of the Lord
The prophet Isaiah referenced a time when nations would pursue the principles of righteousness and justice that were entrusted to the physical descendants of Abraham. He envisioned a future in which all nations would seek this divine law, not out of obligation to fulfill requirements to be justified before God, but as a result of an intrinsic desire to honor Yahweh. It was going to be a time when the law wasn’t going to be a burden to them, but they would come willingly to God to receive it. This quest would be established in history in that all the nations would come and stream up to the mountain of the house of Yahweh.
Now it will come about that
In the last days
The mountain of the house of the Lord
Will be established as the chief of the mountains,
And will be raised above the hills;
And all the nations will stream to it.
And many peoples will come and say,
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
To the house of the God of Jacob;
That He may teach us concerning His ways
And that we may walk in His paths.”
For the law will go forth from Zion
And the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
And He will judge between the nations,
And will render decisions for many peoples;
And they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not lift up sword against nation,
And never again will they learn war. (Isaiah 2:2-4; See Micah 4:1-3)
The mountain is generally an allusion representing a kingdom or where God’s throne sits. To be established as the chief mountain means that the prophet was looking to a time, in the last days, when this throne would rise above all other thrones and His precepts would trump all other kingdom’s instructions. If the throne was raised above the hills, then this meant that the throne of Yahweh will be over and above the thrones of the kings of these nations. The Kingdom of God would supersede the Kingdoms of men. The result is that one day all the nations will be attracted to it and in return come to it. They will arise and make their way to this mountain to seek the law of Yahweh and His word to determine their decisions, and it would be based upon His standard of righteousness being accepted as the norm. They would no longer follow their own human standard of righteousness but come to accept a divine standard. Coming to God’s Mountain and receiving God’s righteousness will stifle arguments between men and conflict will cease because of its acceptance. It will be a time of peace when they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, And never again will they learn war. (v.4) This is so much more than a remnant that would stream to it, all nations and many peoples, a vast amount of people who would seek God’s justice. This law will go forth, it will leave Mount Zion, the holy mountain of Yahweh and God’s word would be proclaimed from Jerusalem.
Prior to moving on, we should note that the expression In the last days should not be taken as the few years prior to the end of history, but the “last days” were present during the time of the apostles (Acts 2:16-17; Hebrews 1:2). Under the New Testament, we see that the last days began after the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ (Acts 2:16-17; Hebrews 1:2; James 5:3). This was the time which the prophet Isaiah was looking towards. The mountain of the Lord is unquestionably Mount Zion. Under the New Testament, the apostles didn’t shy away from believing that those living in their day had come to that Holy Mountain (Hebrews 12:22; 1 Peter 2:6; Revelation 21:2) which was set on a hill (Matthew 5:14). But the law of God was to go from Jerusalem. This is why that the commission of the apostles started in Jerusalem (Acts 1:8, 12). Eventually God’s righteousness and word would come together in two testaments which would be taken from Jerusalem, to Samaria, to the remotest part of the earth.
The Bringer of Justice
Later in the Old Testament, the prophets begin to reveal how this would be brought in. The establishment of this future blessing would come in the form of a Servant of Yahweh, One who would bring about justice on the earth. He will bring further blessing to the nations in the form of justice. Isaiah writes:
“Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations. “He will not cry out or raise His voice, Nor make His voice heard in the street. “A bruised reed He will not break And a dimly burning wick He will not extinguish; He will faithfully bring forth justice. “He will not be disheartened or crushed Until He has established justice in the earth; And the coastlands will wait expectantly for His law. (Isaiah 42:1-4)
This special chosen Servant was One whom the Spirit of God would rest upon. That same Spirit would be instrumental in bringing about the justice to the nations and He will do so faithfully. But notice the commitment to the fulfilment of this mission. This Servant would never be disheartened or crushed until that justice would be established in the earth. This is not a sudden establishing of justice, but the development of striving to complete a task. It is an ongoing work with a day coming that the coastlands will wait for His law to come. No matter what is done to Him, He will quietly fulfill that mission.
God’s Righteousness Comes to the Nations
The fulfillment of Isaiah 42 began with the arrival of the Servant, identified as Jesus Christ the Righteous (1 John 2:1), who came as an advocate to bring justice and righteousness. Jesus is the standard of God’s righteousness and in return became our righteousness (1 Corinthians 1:30). Those who are believers in Jesus Christ and have entered into the New Covenant, live out the standard of righteousness by faith (Romans 1:17) and not merely through ceremonial standards. They naturally seek God’s righteous standards through a heart and desire towards that which is just. The people who have Jesus as their Messiah are given, not an external set of laws, but an internal inclination towards God’s law because this law is written within their hearts. This is the very essence of the New Covenant:
“Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,” declares the Lord. “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the Lord, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”(Jeremiah 31:31-34 – See also Hebrews 8:10; 10:16).
The covenant sign of circumcision would be transformed into the circumcision of the heart (Romans 2:29), a law written, not on tablets of stone but on the human heart (2 Corinthians 3:3). It is through the Spirit of God that this would be achieved (Romans 2:29; 5:5). It was being accomplished even in the days when these epistles were being written, and the expectation is that it will grow until all the nations and families of the earth come and receive God’s righteousness.
In our next segment, we will further analyze the distribution of the blessings of Abraham upon the nations by focusing our attention, not so much upon the blessings themselves, but upon continuing to look at the One who would bring the blessing!
The Moncton Herald 