“God chose a people and made a covenant”

Article for January 18, 2026

Isaiah 49:1–2 1Listen to me, O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother he named my name.  2He made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand he hid me; he made me a polished arrow; in his quiver he hid me away.

According to the “Peoples Bible Commentary,” this, Isaiah 49:1–7, is a conversation between God the Father and God the Son.  These verses follow what is written in Matthew 1:18–2:23. The Son, Jesus Christ, seems to be talking to the Father in summery of His life as Jesus Christ. 

It appears as if Jesus is recollecting His birth, His families escape to Egypt and up to the time He was to leave to journey from Egypt to Nazareth.  These verses written by Isaiah are about 700 minus years BC.  How could Isaiah know this except through the intervention of God.

It is the naming of Jesus as was given to Joseph by an angel in His dreams that shows us the start of this prophecy of the coming Savior.  And the “polished arrow” hidden in the Father’s quiver.  This is the time Mary and Joseph had to hide Jesus in Egypt until an Angel spoke to Joseph to tell him it was safe to take Jesus back to Isreal.  One might include the boyhood of Jesus in this hiding the polished arrow.

Isaiah 49:3–4 3And he said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”  4But I said, “I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity; yet surely my right is with the Lord, and my recompense with my God.”

As the Father makes His Son His servant and this will glorify the Father, the Son laments that He feels He has failed His Father.  All the labor through the ministry of Jesus is culminated into the Son being crucified by the very people He the Son was to save from their sins.  And now the Son seems to ask the Father to compensate Him.

This compensation from The Father is not a monetary compensation but rather the request for the Father to bring forth the salvation that He the Son labored to achieve.  This was the plan from the start, that is, to make a people God’s own possession and to save His people from sin and death.  Not just the first chosen but also those around the very world He created.

Isaiah 49:5 5And now the Lord says, he who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him; and that Israel might be gathered to him— for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord, and my God has become my strength—

Comfort comes from the knowledge of God and the grace and mercy He disperses.  We should all be honored to have a God that wants to save His creations rather than throw them away like some child’s toy that is tossed out of boredom. 

Here Jesus seems to say that His Father honors Him whom He made to be a servant.  This Father is the servant’s strength, and we can glean from this that God honors all who follow Him.  And God is the strength of all who follow Him as well.

God chose a people and made an everlasting covenant with them.  This covenant God made with His people is that He would never forsake them. (1 Chronicles 28:20), and many other places in Scripture says God is with us and He will not forsake us both His people Isreal and Gentiles.

Isaiah 49:6 6he says: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

The Father encourages His Son, His servant, for the task set before Him.  This is but a small task and yet a great task as it not only reaches the people Isreal but all who believe, Jew and Gentile.  The actions of Jesus will spread salvation to all the nations and to the ends of the earth.  This is the Father saying as we heard Him say, this is my Son of whom I approve.  We see this at the baptism of Jesus and also at the transfiguration.

Isaiah 49:7 7Thus says the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel and his Holy One, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nation, the servant of rulers: “Kings shall see and arise; princes, and they shall prostrate themselves; because of the Lord, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you.”

And now we come to the beginning of salvation as Jesus is crucified.  Jesus was made to suffer by the sins of mankind and even by His chosen people Isreal.  Not only did Jesus suffered pain at bidding of those who should have loved Him, but He suffered humility as well.  Jesus was made to look less than a God or even a son of a God. 

But though they killed the flesh as flesh brings sin they did not kill the savior whose spirit comes from the Father.  And the Father did compensate the Son in that He was resurrected from the dead for our sake as well as the Father’s sake.  This resurrection is the foreknowledge of our resurrection into an eternal life with our Lord, our savior, our Jesus Christ. 

Amen.