God has raised up the heavenly Cyrus

Sermon for Midweek of Easter 2

Isaiah 45:1-13

On Sunday, we heard the Gospel about Jesus as the Good Shepherd. That title fits Jesus, not only because it describes so well His relationship with believers, but because it identifies Him as the Son of David, the great Shepherd-King of Israel, and as the LORD God Himself, as He reveals Himself in Psalm 23: The LORD is my shepherd. The title of shepherd is also most fitting for Jesus, because He is the true deliverer of Israel of whom Cyrus was a symbol. If you recall from last week, Isaiah 44 ended with a prophecy about the Lord’s “shepherd” named Cyrus, whom we identified as Cyrus II, also known as Cyrus the Great, king of Persia, whom God chose and sent before he was even born to return captive Israel from Babylon to Judea. We meet Cyrus again here in Isaiah 45:

“Thus says the LORD to His anointed, To Cyrus, whose right hand I have held— To subdue nations before him And loose the armor of kings, To open before him the double doors, So that the gates will not be shut.  So God referred to Cyrus as His “shepherd” in the previous chapter. Here, you noticed what He called him? The Lord’s “anointed.” And you know what the Hebrew word for anointed is, don’t you? It’s Messiah. The Lord says to His Messiah, Cyrus. Now, that word Messiah is used for several offices in the Old Testament. It’s used for prophets, priests, and kings, and it’s also used for the furnishings of the temple, which were anointed with the special anointing oil prescribed in the Law of Moses. But here the Gentile ruler named Cyrus is called the Lord’s anointed—anointed, not literally, but figuratively. That is, he was solemnly chosen by God and set aside for the special purpose of delivering His people from captivity.

You can see, then, how Cyrus was a type or a pattern of the coming Messiah, the Christ, the true Anointed One of God, sent to be both Shepherd and Conqueror, to deliver God’s people from our captivity to sin, death, and the devil and to shepherd us safely through this life. Some of the prophecies in this chapter are specific to Cyrus and Old Testament Israel, but most of the prophecies here also apply to Christ and the New Testament Church.

God promises to go before Cyrus and make the crooked places straight, removing all the obstacles to his conquest of Babylon. That’s the exact same thing God promised to do for the coming Christ by sending the forerunner, John the Baptist, to make the crooked places straight through the preaching of repentance. God promises to break in pieces the gates and the bars of Babylon. But in Daniel’s prophecy about the statue Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream, it’s Christ’s kingdom that breaks in pieces all the kingdoms of the earth. Here God says that he holds the hand of Cyrus and has called him by name. But in Isaiah 42 those same words were spoken, not about Cyrus, but directly about the coming Christ, “I, the LORD, have called You in righteousness, and will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, as a light to the Gentiles.”

The only thing said here that can’t be applied to the Christ is the phrase, “though you have not known Me.” Cyrus didn’t know the God of Israel. He didn’t serve the Lord intentionally. But Christ certainly knew the Lord as the eternal Son of God, as the one who is, as John writes, “in the Father’s bosom,” who is true God by nature. And He did serve the Lord intentionally, as we heard just this last Sunday, “I lay down My life for the sheep.” And a few verses later, “No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.”

Rain down, you heavens, from above, And let the skies pour down righteousness; Let the earth open, let them bring forth salvation, And let righteousness spring up together. I, the LORD, have created it. You may not remember this, but that verse serves as the Introit for the 4^th Sunday of Advent. Rain down, you heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness. Let the earth open and bring forth salvation. It’s a picture of Christ, isn’t it?, who both came down from heaven as the Lord our righteousness, and who was also born from the earth, born of a woman, to be the salvation of mankind.

“Woe to him who strives with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth! Shall the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’ Or shall your handiwork say, ‘He has no hands’? Woe to him who says to his father, ‘What are you begetting?’ Or to the woman, ‘What have you brought forth?’ ”

Here God scolds Israel for all their past doubt, all their disagreement with how He rules the world, including His plan to allow them to be conquered by the Babylonians and taken into captivity. It really is arrogant for the created thing to criticize the Creator, like a lump of clay that thinks it’s smarter than the potter, that thinks it has the right to know the potter’s plans. It doesn’t. The Creator has every right to make what He wants and to use it how He wants to. This text serves to humble us all and to expose our arrogance for thinking that we should have some say in God’s plans, or, even worse, that we have the right to criticize His plans.

In His mercy, God has revealed many of His plans to us. He didn’t have to, but He did. He revealed to Israel the reason for their captivity and the general outline of His plan to rescue them from it. He has revealed to us the general reason for the suffering and death that we endure. But He has also revealed much of His plan to save us through Christ. As for the present chaos of this world, we don’t need to know God’s plan. We just need to trust that it’s good. And as for the future, God has revealed enough of that, too, to give us hope and sustain our faith. Let that be enough.

Thus says the LORD, The Holy One of Israel, and his Maker: “Ask Me of things to come concerning My sons; And concerning the work of My hands, you command Me. I have made the earth, And created man on it. I—My hands—stretched out the heavens, And all their host I have commanded. I have raised him up in righteousness, And I will direct all his ways; He shall build My city And let My exiles go free, Not for price nor reward,” Says the LORD of hosts.

Even though God doesn’t have to reveal His plans to us, His creatures, He tells us to ask Him, in this case. He wants us to know. The one who designed and stretched out this universe has chosen to focus His attention on His chosen people, to raise up an earthly savior for Israel—Cyrus, who would decree freedom for the captives. But as we’ve seen, that earthly savior was a symbol of the heavenly Savior, of Jesus Christ, who has decreed freedom for those held captive by sin, death, and the devil. The Lord designed and maneuvered the first four thousand years of human history to bring about Jesus’ birth, suffering, death, and resurrection, and has been working tirelessly for these last two thousand years to make sure that you and I had our part in the Savior’s kingdom and in His work of building it. God has raised up the heavenly Cyrus to save His people and has given you a place in His kingdom. Now trust the rest of the Lord’s plans for you and for this world, and know that the heavenly Cyrus will soon return to deliver God’s people from every form of captivity. Amen.