Isaiah Chapter 65 verses 17 - 25
New Heavens and a New Earth
17 “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth;
And the former things will not be remembered or come to mind.
God creates - to our understanding this instance of God creating is a little different than when God created in the beginning in Genesis 1:1. It says in the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth. That was where the Lord brought the universe (the time space matter continuum) into existence out of nothing. The technical term for out of nothing is ex nihilo. You and I can create things, we can be creative, but we can’t create something out of nothing. You see how God is incomparable; he's able to speak the word and it is.
This creation of a new heavens and a new earth spoken of here in Isaiah chapter 65 verse 17 is apparently a recreation taking the existing elements, tearing them down and rebuilding the universe anew.
Verses 18-19; “But be glad and rejoice forever in what I create;
For behold, I create Jerusalem for rejoicing
And her people for gladness.
19 “I will also rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in My people;
And there will no longer be heard in her
The voice of weeping and the sound of crying.
Instead of remembering, the former things wherein was sin, failure, corruption, disease, death, evil, pain, etc., etc., etc. We will be able to bask in the joy of the Lord throughout all eternity. This new Jerusalem is also mentioned in Revelation 21 verse two and verses 10 through 27.
Revelation 21:10-27 (NASB95) 10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, 11 having the glory of God. Her brilliance was like a very costly stone, as a stone of crystal-clear jasper. 12 It had a great and high wall, with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels; and names were written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel. 13 There were three gates on the east and three gates on the north and three gates on the south and three gates on the west. 14 And the wall of the city had twelve foundation stones, and on them were the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. 15 The one who spoke with me had a gold measuring rod to measure the city, and its gates and its wall. 16 The city is laid out as a square, and its length is as great as the width; and he measured the city with the rod, fifteen hundred miles; its length and width and height are equal. 17 And he measured its wall, seventy-two yards, according to human measurements, which are also angelic measurements. 18 The material of the wall was jasper; and the city was pure gold, like clear glass. 19 The foundation stones of the city wall were adorned with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation stone was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, chalcedony; the fourth, emerald; 20 the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, topaz; the tenth, chrysoprase; the eleventh, jacinth; the twelfth, amethyst. 21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; each one of the gates was a single pearl. And the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass. 22 I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. 23 And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. 25 In the daytime (for there will be no night there) its gates will never be closed; 26 and they will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it; 27 and nothing unclean, and no one who practices abomination and lying, shall ever come into it, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Jerusalem was the capital of Israel and will be throughout all eternity.
Verses 20-24. “No longer will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days,
Or an old man who does not live out his days;
For the youth will die at the age of one hundred
And the one who does not reach the age of one hundred
Will be thought accursed.
21 “They will build houses and inhabit them;
They will also plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
22 “They will not build and another inhabit,
They will not plant and another eat;
For as the lifetime of a tree, so will be the days of My people,
And My chosen ones will wear out the work of their hands.
23 “They will not labor in vain,
Or bear children for calamity;
For they are the offspring of those blessed by the Lord,
And their descendants with them.
24 It will also come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear. 25 The wolf and the lamb will graze together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox; and dust will be the serpent’s food. They will do no evil or harm in all My holy mountain,” says the Lord.
These verses talk about the change in environment and experience during the millennium. Environment, being exemplified in nature where a wolf in a lamb will graze together. Experience being an exemplified by the lengthened lifespan of men. Reminds me of the book of Genesis chapter 5 where we get the genealogy of Adam down through Noah. Another way our experience will be different during the millennium is that we will build houses and live in them plant gardens and eat the fruit of them.
Here’s an example of building a house and not being able to live in it; my dad just passed away a little over a month ago and we have had to go through his stuff and clear out that house and it still isn’t completely cleared out, but he can no longer dwell in that house.
then the phrase “they will not bare children for calamity”, tells me two things
1. There will be childbearing in the.
2. Children won’t start out with a sin nature like we are born with.
Another way, our experience will be different during the millennium will be with regards to prayer and how, and when God answers our prayers. In the millennium, God will answer our prayers before we ask. Why is it you think God doesn’t always answer our prayers immediately.?
Chapter 66
Heaven Is God’s Throne
Verses 1-2. Thus says the Lord,
“Heaven is My throne and the earth is My footstool.
Where then is a house you could build for Me?
And where is a place that I may rest?
2 “For My hand made all these things,
Thus all these things came into being,” declares the Lord.
“But to this one I will look,
To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word.
After the peek into eternity and the millennium in chapter 65, God now turns and addresses the nation of Israel and Judah.
Let’s look in our Bibles into the book of acts chapter 7 verses 46 through 51
Acts 7:46-51 (NASB95) 46 “David found favor in God’s sight, and asked that he might find a dwelling place for the God of Jacob. 47 “But it was Solomon who built a house for Him. 48 “However, the Most High does not dwell in houses made by human hands; as the prophet says: 49 ‘HEAVEN IS MY THRONE, AND EARTH IS THE FOOTSTOOL OF MY FEET; WHAT KIND OF HOUSE WILL YOU BUILD FOR ME?’ says the Lord, ‘OR WHAT PLACE IS THERE FOR MY REPOSE? 50 ‘WAS IT NOT MY HAND WHICH MADE ALL THESE THINGS?’ 51 “You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did.
I personally find the Lord’s timing, fascinating that we encounter this scripture here in Isaiah 66 while we’ve been studying, and I personally have been reading the book of acts.
So what is it that impresses God?
Is it a big church building? Is it a giant cathedral? Is it a wonderful structure? Is it stained glass and a huge pipe organ? Or is it a humble and contrite heart and one who trembles at God‘s word?
1 Corinthians 2:3 (NASB95) I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling,
Hypocrisy Rebuked
3 “But he who kills an ox is like one who slays a man;
He who sacrifices a lamb is like the one who breaks a dog’s neck;
He who offers a grain offering is like one who offers swine’s blood;
He who burns incense is like the one who blesses an idol.
As they have chosen their own ways,
And their soul delights in their abominations,
4 So I will choose their punishments
And will bring on them what they dread.
Because I called, but no one answered;
I spoke, but they did not listen.
And they did evil in My sight
And chose that in which I did not delight.”
5 Hear the word of the Lord, you who tremble at His word:
“Your brothers who hate you, who exclude you for My name’s sake,
Have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified, that we may see your joy.’
But they will be put to shame.
6 “A voice of uproar from the city, a voice from the temple,
The voice of the Lord who is rendering recompense to His enemies.
7 “Before she travailed, she brought forth;
Before her pain came, she gave birth to a boy.
8 “Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things?
Can a land be born in one day?
Can a nation be brought forth all at once?
As soon as Zion travailed, she also brought forth her sons.
9 “Shall I bring to the point of birth and not give delivery?” says the Lord.
“Or shall I who gives delivery shut the womb?” says your God.
In verses 3-4 god again turns in this scathing rebuke to Israel and Judah for their trust in their religious activities and yet their religion was void of truth and genuine faith. they had no shortage of rituals they took part in but they were perverted and immoral and contradicted what God had told them to do or or what God had said not to do.
Verses 5-6 we trust in God’s word do we also trust in his justice. Are we vindictive? Do we seek our own vengeance? I’m speaking to myself here.
Verses 7-9 this is weird. How can a baby be born without labor? We know that when the pain comes the contractions start, what if without any of these warning signs the birth came. This happens to be true about the nation of Israel, who was born in a day on May 14, 1948. For 1947 years Israel was written off as a nation and her people were scattered throughout the continents of the entire planet. Oddly enough, the labor pains for the birth of Israel started right after the nation was founded. They were attacked from all sides.
Joy in Jerusalem’s Future
10 “Be joyful with Jerusalem and rejoice for her, all you who love her;
Be exceedingly glad with her, all you who mourn over her,
11 That you may nurse and be satisfied with her comforting breasts,
That you may suck and be delighted with her bountiful bosom.”
12 For thus says the Lord, “Behold, I extend peace to her like a river,
And the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream;
And you will be nursed, you will be carried on the hip and fondled on the knees.
13 “As one whom his mother comforts, so I will comfort you;
And you will be comforted in Jerusalem.”
14 Then you will see this, and your heart will be glad,
And your bones will flourish like the new grass;
And the hand of the Lord will be made known to His servants,
But He will be indignant toward His enemies.
Verses 10-14 I can honestly say I rejoice over Jerusalem and yet at the same time I grieve for her. My heart breaks at the thought of the Jewish nation in large part rejecting their Messiah Jesus Christ. I can honestly say I have a love for Jerusalem in Israel firstly because God loves them and he is not done with them yet. But also because we received our Bible through them, and our Christian faith is born out of their book. We truly feed off the foundation that was laid for them in the Old Testament. A foundation of justification by faith in God think of Abraham. He was counted righteous because he believed God. Another foundation of our beliefs is that God is eternal and infinite in nature, and that came through the Jewish Bible.
Do you guys remember what the Jewish people today? Call their Bible besides the Bible? They call it the Tanach. That is an acronym TNK. It stands for Torah, which means law. Neveim which means prophets, Ketuvim which means writings. We can truly drink deeply of the word of God and delight in the abundance of its glory because of the nation of Israel because they preserved it and transmitted it down through the ages to us.
Versus 12 and 13, talking again about the millennium, God’s purpose in that is not only that the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob will have a relationship with him, but also that all the nations will. There is comfort and peace and wholeness in the Lord, and that will be experienced by us in the millennium.
Verse 14 I wanna focus in on this phrase. “The hand of the Lord will be known by his servants.” The hand of the Lord, represents his actions, his activity, God doing things. There are those who believe that they can move the hand of the Lord by prayer by righteousness by faith. In other words, we can get God to do what we want. Sort of as if God is our divine Butler. No. Just no. What we should want is to know God’s will, and do his will, and be his hands and feet. We want the Lord to move us in whatever direction he wants by his spirit. We want to be pliable, we want to be movable. We think we know how things should be, but we don’t have the full picture. We are not all knowing like he is.
15 For behold, the Lord will come in fire
And His chariots like the whirlwind,
To render His anger with fury,
And His rebuke with flames of fire.
16 For the Lord will execute judgment by fire
And by His sword on all flesh,
And those slain by the Lord will be many.
All I can say here is let’s look at second Thessalonians chapter 1 versus five through 10
2 Thessalonians 1:5-10 (NASB95) 5 This is a plain indication of God’s righteous judgment so that you will be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering. 6 For after all it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, 7 and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, 8 dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. 9 These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, 10 when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed--for our testimony to you was believed.
Also let’s look at the book of Revelation chapter 19 verse 15 through 21
Revelation 19:15-21 (NASB95) 15 From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. 16 And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, “KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.” 17 Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out with a loud voice, saying to all the birds which fly in midheaven, “Come, assemble for the great supper of God, 18 so that you may eat the flesh of kings and the flesh of commanders and the flesh of mighty men and the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them and the flesh of all men, both free men and slaves, and small and great.” 19 And I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army. 20 And the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image; these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone. 21 And the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh.
Back to Isaiah 66 verse 17-21 “Those who sanctify and purify themselves to go to the gardens,
Following one in the center,
Who eat swine’s flesh, detestable things and mice,
Will come to an end altogether,” declares the Lord.
18 “For I know their works and their thoughts; the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and see My glory. 19 I will set a sign among them and will send survivors from them to the nations: Tarshish, Put, Lud, Meshech, Tubal and Javan, to the distant coastlands that have neither heard My fame nor seen My glory. And they will declare My glory among the nations. 20 Then they shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as a grain offering to the Lord, on horses, in chariots, in litters, on mules and on camels, to My holy mountain Jerusalem,” says the Lord, “just as the sons of Israel bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the Lord. 21 I will also take some of them for priests and for Levites,” says the Lord.
Look at what is going on here, people who sanctify and purify themselves? But they go to the gardens and eat non kosher things. For us, let’s not take God’s grace for granted let’s not presume upon God’s forgiveness let’s live differently.
Romans 6:1-18 (NASB95) 1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? 2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; 7 for he who has died is freed from sin. 8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, 9 knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. 10 For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. 11 Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts, 13 and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. 14 For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace. 15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be! 16 Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
Isaiah 66: 22-24“For just as the new heavens and the new earth
Which I make will endure before Me,” declares the Lord,
“So your offspring and your name will endure.
23 “And it shall be from new moon to new moon
And from sabbath to sabbath,
All mankind will come to bow down before Me,” says the Lord.
24 “Then they will go forth and look
On the corpses of the men
Who have transgressed against Me.
For their worm will not die
And their fire will not be quenched;
And they will be an abhorrence to all mankind.”
So Isaiah got to see into the very throne room of God and view God in all his majesty. He also got to see what God would do in terms of sending the children of Israel into exile and captivity captivity and then calling them out of exile and captivity. Isaiah showed us about God‘s mercy and God‘s kindness and God‘s tenderness, and he also showed us about gods fury, wrath, justice, and judgment. Don’t forget even to the end of Isaiah here in context he’s speaking to Israel but it applies to us as well.
Mark 9:42-50 (NASB95) 42 “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe to stumble, it would be better for him if, with a heavy millstone hung around his neck, he had been cast into the sea. 43 “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life crippled, than, having your two hands, to go into hell, into the unquenchable fire, 44 [where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED.] 45 “If your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame, than, having your two feet, to be cast into hell, 46 [where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED.] 47 “If your eye causes you to stumble, throw it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, than, having two eyes, to be cast into hell, 48 where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED. 49 “For everyone will be salted with fire. 50 “Salt is good; but if the salt becomes unsalty, with what will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”
