Isaiah 7:14 Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.… Isaiah may have meant the Name to speak to him as well as to the nation. He may have desired to bring the message of the Name into his personal and family life. For, after all, a prophet is but a man of like passions with" ourselves, subject to the same infirmities and fluctuations of spirit, "warmed and cooled, by the same winter and summer." There were times, no doubt, when even Isaiah lost faith in his own function, in his own message, when the very man who had assured a sinful nation that God was with them could hardly believe that God was with him or could even cry out, "Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man!" And in such moments as these, when, weary of the world and weary of himself, he lost courage and hope, he may have felt that it would be well for him to have that in his very household which would help to recall the truths he had recognised and taught in hours of clearer insight, help to restore the faith with which he had first sprung up to greet the Divine message. We may believe that there were many darkened hours in his experience, hours of broken faith and defeated hope, when he would fall back on his earlier faith and brighter hopes; when he would call his little son to him, and, as he fondled him, would repeat his name, Immanuel, Immanuel — God-with-us, God-with-us, — and find in that Name a charm potent to restore his waning trust in the gracious presence and gracious will of Jehovah. ("Niger" in Expositor.) Parallel Verses KJV: Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. |
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