Isaiah 45:11

Thus saith the Lord. .. Ask Me

Prayer and criticism

“Ask Me, but do not criticise Me.

” “Command Me” must mean “leave to My care.” (Prof. J. Skinner, D. D.)

Encouragement to pray from the names of God

“The Lord”--that is, God in His everlasting redemptive purpose; “the Holy One of Israel”--that is, the moral perfections of Israel’s God, as contrasted with the abominations perpetrated under the sanction of heathen religions; “his Maker”--suggesting the purpose which from the clay gathered in Abraham’s time from the highlands of Mesopotamia, was fashioning a fair vessel meet for His use. This threefold description of God introduces the august command which bade the people seek by prayer the fulfilment of the purpose on which the Divine heart was set. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)

Putting forth of` God’s power dependent on prayer

In launching an ironclad, the pressure of a baby’s finger is not infrequently required to put in operation the ponderous machinery by which the iron leviathan glides evenly and majestically on to the ocean wave. So, if we may dare to say it, all the purposes of God, and the providential machinery by which they were to be executed, stood in suspense until the chosen people had asked for the things which He had promised, and had even commanded Him concerning the work on which His heart was set. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)

Asking and commanding

I. PRAYER IS A NECESSARY LINK IN THE PERFORMANCE OF THE DIVINE PROMISES. “Ask Me of things to come.” Even to the Son, Jehovah says,” “Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the heathen,” &c. And to the chosen people, at the end of a paragraph beginning with “I will,” and unfolding the work which He is prepared to do, not for their sakes, but for His own--He says, “For this, moreover, will I be inquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them.” Our Lord is unremitting in the stress He lays on prayer, and pledges Himself to do only whatsoever is asked in His name.

1. Prayer is part of the system of co-operation between God and man which pervades nature and life.

2. Prayer, when genuine, indicates the presence of a disposition to which God can entrust His best gifts without injury to the recipient. To bless some men, apart from humility and submission, and weanedness of soul from creature aid, would only injure. And so, in His dear love, God withholds His choicest gifts until the heart is sore broken, and cries to Him. That cry is the blessed symptom of soul-health.

3. Prayer is also in its essence, when inspired by faith, an openness towards God, a receptiveness, a faculty of apprehending with open hand what He would impart. Let us pray--

(1) Unitedly. God would be inquired of by the “house” of Israel.

(2) Sympathetically. A prayer offered in the presence of others should receive their endorsement.

(3) Earnestly. The Divine gauge of the worth of prayer is its pressure on the heart of God.

(4) In the name of Jesus.

II. THE IMPERATIVE ACCENT IN FAITH. “Concerning My sons, and concerning the work of My hands, command ye Me.” Our Lord spoke in this tone when He said, “Father, I will.” Joshua used it when in the supreme moment of triumph he lifted up his spear towards the setting sun, and cried, “Sun, stand thou still!” Elijah used it when he shut the heavens for three years and six months, and again opened them. Luther used it when, kneeling by the dying Melanchthon, he forbade death to take his prey. It is a marvellous relationship into which God bids us enter. We are accustomed to obey Him. But with the single limitation that our biddings must concern His sons, and the work of His hands, and must be included in His word of promise, Jehovah says to us, His redeemed children in Jesus Christ, “Command ye Me!” The world is full of mighty forces which are labouring for our weal. How is it that these great natural forces--which are manifestations of the power of God--so absolutely obey man? Is it not because, since the days of Bacon, man has so diligently studied, and so absolutely obeyed, the conditions under which they work? “Obey the law of a force, and the force will obey you,” is almost an axiom in physics. So God gives the Holy Spirit to them that obey Him. All the resources of God dwell bodily in the risen and glorified Lord. Obey Him, and He pours such mighty energy into and through the spirit that men are amazed at the prodigality of its supply; resist or thwart Him, and He retires from the spirit, leaving it to struggle as best it may with its difficulties and trials. But after our greatest deeds of prayer and faith we shall ever lie low before God; as Elijah did, who, after calling fire from heaven, prostrated himself on the ground, with his face between his knees. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)

Counsel for God’s people in trouble

(Isaiah 45:11):--

I. THE PEOPLE OF GOD IN CAPTIVITY ARE INVITED TO INQUIRE CONCERNING THE ISSUE OF THEIR TROUBLES (Isaiah 45:11). The Holy One of Israel, though He doth not allow them to strive with Him, yet encourageth them--

1. To consult His Word. “Ask Me of things to come.”

2. To seek unto Him by prayer. “Command ye Me.”

II. THEY ARE ENCOURAGED TO DEPEND ON THE POWER OF GOD WHEN THEY WERE BROUGHT VERY LOW, AND WERE UTTERLY INCAPABLE OF HELPING THEMSELVES (Isaiah 45:12).

III. THEY ARE PARTICULARLY TOLD WHAT GOD WOULD DO FOR THEM, THAT THEY MIGHT KNOW WHAT TO DEPEND UPON (Isaiah 45:13).

IV. THEY ARE TAUGHT TO TRUST GOD FURTHER THAN THEY CAN SEE HIM (Isaiah 45:15). (M. Henry.)

God’s abounding liberality

I am told that, in the olden times, on Christmas Day, it was the custom in country villages for the squire always to fill with good things whatever vessels the poor people brought up to the hall, that they might have a Christmas dinner. It was strange how big the basins grew year after year. Whenever the man came round with the crockery cart, every good housewife would look all over his stock to see if there was not a still larger basin. It was a rule that the squire’s servants should always fill the bowl, whatever size it was, and thus the bowls grew bigger and bigger. God will fill your bowl, however large it is! Get as big a bowl as you can; and when you bring it, if ever there comes a whisper in your ear, “Now you have presumed upon God’s benevolence, you have brought too big a bowl,” smile at yourself, and say, “This is as nothing to His overflowing fulness.” If I said, “O poor sea, poor sea, now thou wilt be drained dry, for they bring such big bowls to be filled with thy waters”; the sea, tossing its mighty billows far and wide, would laugh at my folly. Come, then, and bring your largest conceptions of God, and multiply them ten thousandfold, and believe in Him as this Book would make you believe in Him. Open thy mouth wide, and He will fill it. He bids you even to command Him. He says, “Ask Me of things to come concerning My sons, and concerning the work of My hands command ye Me.” That is a wonderful expression; rise to the sublimity of faith, and be daring with your God. (C. H. Spurgeon.)