God next called His people to prepare to receive the salvation that He would provide for them. They would have to lay hold of it by faith for it to benefit them.
52:1 God called Israel to awake and to be strong (in the strength that God provides). The Israelites did not need to call on Him to awake and to be strong, as they had done (51:9). He was ready to save them, but were they ready to trust Him for their salvation (cf. 40:27-31; 42:23-25; 43:22-24; 45:9-13, 15, 18-19; 46:8-13; 48:1-22; 49:14-50:3)? The Lord called the people of Zion to put on the beautiful garments of salvation that God would provide for them.556God saw His people as composing a holy city, and they needed to view themselves that way too, as holy people (cf. 4:2-6; 1 Cor. 1:2). The Lord would forbid any uncommitted and unclean people from having a part in His future for them.
"Notwithstanding the priestly house of Aaron and the royal house of David, the ideal of a royal, priestly people (Ex. 19:4-6) had never been realized, but while Zion slept (1a) a marvel occurred so that on waking she finds new garments laid out (1bc), expressive of a new status of holiness (1d)."557
52:2 Israel could not deliver herself, but she needed to rise up from her humiliated and bound condition and respond to the Lord's deliverance of her (cf. 47:1). Salvation is not by works of righteousness, but it does require faith. Humans cannot break the chains that bind us, but we must remove them, with His help, when God has promised that He will break them.
52:3 Yahweh announced that since no one forced God to sell Israel into slavery (cf. 45:13; 50:1), neither would anyone force Him to redeem her. He would free her of His own free will as He had sent her into captivity of His own free will (cf. 2 Cor. 5:19). There was, therefore, no impediment to His redeeming her.
52:4 Sovereign Yahweh further declared that the Israelites had gone down to Egypt of their own volition in the days of Jacob. Later the Assyrians had taken them captive against their will. These earliest and most recent oppressions represented all of them that Israel had undergone. The implication is that since God can freely liberate (v. 3), He could redeem His people from enemy-imposed captivity as easily as He could redeem them from self-imposed captivity.
52:5 Yahweh reflected on the present situation: What have we here? Israel was in captivity but not because God had to give her over to a superior person. Furthermore, Israel's leaders wailed because of the shame of their defeat. Finally, the victors held Yahweh's name in contempt because they concluded He was weaker than stronger gods.
52:6 The Lord's conclusion to the situation was twofold. First, He would so deliver His people that there would be no question in their minds that He was the only true God (cf. Ezek. 36:21-32). Second, Yahweh would prove that He is whom He claimed to be by fulfilling what He had predicted He would do. "In that day"anticipates a time yet future in which God would act decisively for His people to vindicate His name.
A hymn of praise ends this promise of redemption (cf. 42:10-12; 44:23; 49:13; 54).
52:7 Isaiah exulted in the good news that the Lord had just revealed. The news had reached His people through a messenger whom the prophet pictured as running across mountains with his message (cf. 40:9; 41:27; Nah. 1:15). The messenger's feet were beautiful because they carried him and his message of peace, happiness, and salvation (cf. Matt. 10:1-7; Rom. 10:15). His message is that Yahweh is the only true God, that He reigns as the sovereign over the universe and all supposed gods.
"What does God's rule entail? It entails a condition where all things are in their proper relation to each other, with nothing left hanging, incomplete, or unfulfilled (peace, shalom); it entails a condition where creation purposes are realized (good, tob; cf. Gen. 1:4, 10, etc.); it entails a condition of freedom from every bondage, but particularly the bondage resultant from sin (salvation, yeshu'a). Where God reigns, these follow. Of course, this is exactly congruent with what the Christian faith considers its good news (euangelion) to be."558
52:8 Watchmen along the walls of Jerusalem saw the messenger coming, and they joined in the rejoicing as they realized that he brought a message of Yahweh's approaching victory for Zion.
52:9 Now all the people of Jerusalem, even the downtrodden, joined the chorus and praised God for coming to comfort and redeem His people.
"To give thanks in advance is the highest form of faith. The person praising God for what he or she does not yet possess is the person who truly believes the promises of God."559
52:10 God would display His power (roll up His sleeves) before all the nations by redeeming His people (cf. 18:3). His power is holy in that it is perfect and transcendent, and it is also for a holy purpose, namely, the salvation of His people (cf. Mark 1:24; Luke 4:34). His salvation would become visible to the whole world.
52:11 In view of this salvation, the redeemed should depart from the unclean place where they had been and purify themselves. The Babylonian exiles, who would be set free, should return to Jerusalem to reestablish their holy lives in a holy city in a holy land.560The recipients of spiritual salvation, which these Babylonian exiles represent, should also respond to redemption by living lives separated from sin unto God (cf. Lam. 4:15; 2 Cor. 6:17). The vessels in view are those things needed to worship God as He prescribed (cf. Ezra 1:7).
52:12 The redeemed would not need to run away from their former captor as fast as they could or to depart as fugitives, as they had left Egypt in the Exodus. They were completely free. Yahweh would go before to lead them and behind to protect them as they journeyed to their Promised Land (cf. Exod. 13:21-22; 14:19-20).
In this section the dual implications of the prophet's promises are very clear. Babylonian captivity lay behind what he said, but he had the larger issue of slavery to sin in mind primarily. Release to return to the land was in view, but even more the opportunity to return to the Lord through spiritual redemption was his point. God would deal with the result in Israel's case, captivity, but He would also and more importantly deal with the cause, sin.
"Both the Exodus and wilderness, and in a lesser sense the Egyptian slavery, have become not only pivotal historical episodes but the photographic negatives from which the prophets, by the inspiration of their God, developed the beautiful eschatological pictures of the future."561
