◄ Isaiah 39:5 ►














Pulpit Commentary Homiletics
The Home, Seen Though Not Shown
Isaiah 39:4
W. Clarkson
No doubt the ambassadors of the King of Babylon saw many things in the palace of Hezekiah which he did not exhibit to them; more things are seen than those which are displayed. It is so in every house; and it may be that the visitor goes away more impressed with some things which no one pointed out to him than with anything to which his attention was called. If any one were to ask him what he has seen in the house, he would mention that which its master had not thought to show him. What would any visitor to our house see, though we did not show it to him?

I. ORDER OR DISORDER? The manifest presence of a strong hand keeping every one in order and everything in its place; or the painful absence of it?

II. OBEDIENCE OR DISOBEDIENCE? Filial readiness and even eagerness to comply at once with the parents' wish; or the lingering step or even the entire disregard of that desire?

III. COURTESY OR DISCOURTESY? Habitually becoming behaviour at the table and the hearth; or the unwise neglect of those smaller observances which minister to the beauty and the sweetness of daily life?

IV. LOVE OR INDIFFERENCE, OR POSITIVE DISLIKE? The presence of that warm affection which should bind husband and wife, parent and child, brother and sister, in the bonds of happy and enduring fellowship; or a cold and sad indifference to one another's well-being; or a still sadder animosity and persecution?

V. SELFISHNESS OR SYMPATHY? The confinement of thought and care to the four walls of the home establishment; or a considerate and generous regard for the wants and wishes of neighbours and fellow-citizens?

VI. PIETY OR WORLDLINESS? Family worship, and - what is better still - a prevailing religious tone, as if parents and children all felt that temporal success was a very small thing in comparison with spiritual worth; or the language and habits of an ignoble and degrading worldliness? - C.

Biblical Illustrator
Hear the word of the Lord of hosts.
Isaiah 39:5-7
Isaiah's prophecy of the Babylonian captivity
J. A. Alexander.
directs attention to the exact correspondence of the punishment with the offence. As the Babylonians had seen all, they should one day take all; as nothing had been withheld from them now, so nothing should be withheld from them hereafter.

(J. A. Alexander.)

A costly gratification
W. C. Bonnet.
Benjamin Franklin, when a lad, was greatly enamoured of a whistle he saw for sale. Swept away by the desire to possess the toy, he gathered all his money and offered it to the vendor, who at once took it and handed over the whistle to the eager boy. For a time the sense of a craving gratified shut out all other consideration. Then, gradually, the lad realised how he had been fooled; and in after-days the wise man, as he observed men and their foolish ways, would remember his own early experience, and say of this man and of that, "He has paid too dear for his whistle."

(W. C. Bonnet.)

People
Baladan, Hezekiah, Isaiah, Merodachbaladan
Places
Babylon
Topics
Almighty, Armies, Ear, Hezekiah, Hezeki'ah, Hosts, Isaiah
Outline
1. Merodach-baladan, sending to visit Hezekiah, has notice of his treasures.
3. Isaiah, understanding thereof, foretells the Babylonian captivity.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Isaiah 39:5

     1690   word of God

Isaiah 39:1-7

     5305   empires

Isaiah 39:1-8

     4215   Babylon

Isaiah 39:5-7

     5309   eunuchs
     7217   exile, in Babylon

Library
Sennacherib (705-681 B. C. )
The struggle of Sennacherib with Judaea and Egypt--Destruction of Babylon. Sennacherib either failed to inherit his father's good fortune, or lacked his ability.* He was not deficient in military genius, nor in the energy necessary to withstand the various enemies who rose against him at widely removed points of his frontier, but he had neither the adaptability of character nor the delicate tact required to manage successfully the heterogeneous elements combined under his sway. * The two principal …
G. Maspero—History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, V 8

That for the Most Part the Occupation of Government Dissipates the Solidity of the Mind.
Often the care of government, when undertaken, distracts the heart in divers directions; and one is found unequal to dealing with particular things, while with confused mind divided among many. Whence a certain wise man providently dissuades, saying, My son, meddle not with many matters (Ecclus. xi. 10); because, that is, the mind is by no means collected on the plan of any single work while parted among divers. And, when it is drawn abroad by unwonted care, it is emptied of the solidity of inward …
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great

The Prophet Micah.
PRELIMINARY REMARKS. Micah signifies: "Who is like Jehovah;" and by this name, the prophet is consecrated to the incomparable God, just as Hosea was to the helping God, and Nahum to the comforting God. He prophesied, according to the inscription, under Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. We are not, however, entitled, on this account, to dissever his prophecies, and to assign particular discourses to the reign of each of these kings. On the contrary, the entire collection forms only one whole. At …
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

Isaiah
CHAPTERS I-XXXIX Isaiah is the most regal of the prophets. His words and thoughts are those of a man whose eyes had seen the King, vi. 5. The times in which he lived were big with political problems, which he met as a statesman who saw the large meaning of events, and as a prophet who read a divine purpose in history. Unlike his younger contemporary Micah, he was, in all probability, an aristocrat; and during his long ministry (740-701 B.C., possibly, but not probably later) he bore testimony, as …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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