Day 221

Isaiah and Paul

Read: Isaiah 50-52

When Paul said, “Who shall bring any charge to God’s elect? It is God who justifies” (Rom. 8:33), he was reflecting the words of Isaiah 50:8-9: “He who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me? . . . Behold, the Lord God helps me; who will declare me guilty?” Both teach the truth that if God accepts us, no one can condemn us.

In Romans 10:15, when Paul was speaking about the necessity of preaching the gospel, he said, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news!” He was quoting Isaiah 52:7 where the prophet is rejoicing in the fact that the good news of their deliverance is being brought to the exiles.

In Isaiah 52:11 the prophet is urging the Jews to take advantage of the offer to return from the exile by saying, “Depart, depart, go out from there; touch no unclean thing” (ESV). Paul uses these words to urge Christians to make a clean break with the practices of the unbelievers around them in 2 Corinthians 6:17.

In Romans 15:21, Paul loosely quotes Isaiah 52:15, which says, “For that which has not been told them they shall see, and that which they have not heard they shall understand” as a reason why he goes to preach the gospel of Christ where it has never been heard before.

One of the reasons Paul is able to quote from Isaiah often is because the Holy Spirit showed Isaiah so much about Christ.

PRAYER
Father, we rejoice that both the inspired prophet Isaiah and the inspired apostle Paul tell us of Jesus Christ your Son, our Savior. In his name. Amen.