1. Celebrating the Servant-Savior
The Gospel of Isaiah
Jason S. DeRouchie, PhD
Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Theology
Bethlehem College & Seminary
Bethlehem Baptist Church, 2017

2. The Structure of Isaiah 51:1–8
A Charge to Consider How God Can Make Much from Little (51:1–3)
The Call (51:1a)
The Content (51:1b–3)
A Charge to Look through Global Punishment to Eternal Salvation (51:4–6)
The Call (51:4–5)
The Content (51:6)
A Charge to Not Fear Man’s Reproach (51:7–8)
The Call (51:7a)
The Content (51:7b–8)

3. A Charge to Not Fear Man’s Reproach (51:7–8)
A Call for Those Knowing Righteousness to Listen (51:7a)
“You who know righteousness”
Those who pursue righteousness by faith (v. 1)
Those who know the righteous one (50:8; 53:11)

4. “The people in whose heart is the law”
The majority of Israel’s call and experience:
Deut 6:6. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
Jer 17:1. The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron; with a point of a diamond it is engraved on the tablet of their heart.

5. The promise and fulfillment:
Jer 31:33. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts.
Rom 2:14–15. For the when Gentiles, who do not have the law by nature, do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts…. 26 So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? 27 Then he who is physically uncircumcised but keeps the law will condemn you who have the written code and circumcision but break the law. 28 For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. 29 But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not be the letter.

6. The proclamations of the messianic psalmist:
Ps 37:30–31. The mouth of the righteous [one] utters wisdom, and his tongue speaks justice. 31 The law of his God is in his heart; his steps do not slip.
Ps 40:8. I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.
Ps 119:11. I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.

7. The Content: A Charge to Not Fear Man’s Reproach (51:7b–8)
The Charge Not to Fear (51:7bc)
Isa 35:4. Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.”

8. The Reason to Not Fear: Justice Matched by Eternal Salvation (51:8)
The certainty of God’s justice
See v. 4
Isa 66:24. And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh.
Mark 9:47–48. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, 48 “where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.”

9. What is true of the Messiah is true of us (see 50:10)
Rom 8:33–34. Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.