Isaiah 27:1-13--The Redemption of Israel

Isaiah 27
English Standard Version

The Redemption of Israel
27 In that day the LORD with his hard and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea.

2 In that day,
“A pleasant vineyard, sing of it!
3     I, the LORD, am its keeper;
    every moment I water it.
    Lest anyone punish it,
I keep it night and day;
4     I have no wrath.
Would that I had thorns and briers to battle!
    I would march against them,
    I would burn them up together.
5 Or let them lay hold of my protection,
    let them make peace with me,
    let them make peace with me.”

6 In days to come Jacob shall take root,
    Israel shall blossom and put forth shoots
    and fill the whole world with fruit.

7 Has he struck them as he struck those who struck them?
    Or have they been slain as their slayers were slain?
8 Measure by measure, by exile you contended with them;
    he removed them with his fierce breath in the day of the east wind.
9 Therefore by this the guilt of Jacob will be atoned for,
    and this will be the full fruit of the removal of his sin:
when he makes all the stones of the altars
    like chalkstones crushed to pieces,
    no Asherim or incense altars will remain standing.
10 For the fortified city is solitary,
    a habitation deserted and forsaken, like the wilderness;
there the calf grazes;
    there it lies down and strips its branches.
11 When its boughs are dry, they are broken;
    women come and make a fire of them.
For this is a people without discernment;
    therefore he who made them will not have compassion on them;
    he who formed them will show them no favor.

​12 In that day from the river Euphrates to the Brook of Egypt the LORD will thresh out the grain, and you will be gleaned one by one, O people of Israel. 13 And in that day a great trumpet will be blown, and those who were lost in the land of Assyria and those who were driven out to the land of Egypt will come and worship the LORD on the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

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As we mentioned over the past couple of days, the Day of the LORD is a day of victory for the LORD and His people.  It is not just a day that the enemies of God and God's people lose, but a day when everything good that God has promised to His people is established and fulfilled.  Satan and his influence over the godless nations of the world will be destroyed and the vineyard of the LORD (that is the nation of Israel that put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ for their salvation and all the wild branches from the Gentiles that have been grafted into the True Vine who is Christ).  The Father is the keeper and vinedresser of this vineyard.  He will make sure that no thorns or thistles come up in His vineyard anymore, and all the branches of the Vine will produce nothing but good fruit.  The whole earth will be filled with the sweetness of the vine's blossoms and fruit

The LORD's wrath will not fall upon His people, for it has already fallen upon His Son, who took the LORD's wrath in our place.  He also took our shame and our guilt.  Sin and all of its consequences have been completely and totally dealt with forever and ever.  No longer will people worship false gods and make sacrifices on other altars.  All those things will be turned into dust.  All the peoples of the earth will be gathered together into the one place the LORD has prepared for them.  The old cities where people used to try to find protection that could not save them will be places where no one will live--they will instead be places for animals to go and graze.  The orchards and groves that used to belong to them will now be nothing but firewood for the people that live in the city of God.

There will be a sorting like the threshing of wheat.  Not everyone who is a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will enter into the LORD's rest that He has prepared for them.  Only those who are children of Abraham by faith will enter into the LORD's Sabbath reset.  The chaff will be consumed, and the good grain fill remain (this is probably the same judgment as the separation of the sheep from the goats).  Then, the trumpet of the LORD will be blown to signal a holy convocation of the LORD's people, and all of them who was "lost" during the periods of Exile will gather back together--all of His people will gather together once again to worship in Jerusalem--the city of the Great King.