Isaiah 48:9-11

For My name’s sake will I defer Mine anger

God’s anger deferred

“For My name’s sake I draw out My wrath.

” Jehovah lengthens out His wrath, i.e delays its outbreak, thus shows Himself long-suffering; He checks, restrains, damps it for the good of Israel, that He may not by unchaining His wrath utterly destroy it; and that for the sake of His name, His praise, which demands the carrying out of the plan of salvation, which is the purpose of Israel’s existence. (F. Delitzch, D. D.)

Mercy’s master motive

I shall take the text to illustrate--

I. THE CONVERSION OF THE SINNER.

1. In him there is no argument for mercy, no plea for grace.

2. God Himself finds the reason for His mercy. He finds it in Himself. The Lord is a patient God, and determines to make His patience glorious. God also would illustrate His sovereign and abundant mercy towards sinners. God can display His power.

3. But it may be that a soul is saying, “Well, I can see that God can thus find a motive for mercy in Himself, when there is none in the sinner, but why is it that the Lord is chastening me as He is?” Possibly you are sickly in body, have been brought low in estate, and are grievously depressed in mind. God now, in our text, goes on to explain His dealings with you, that you may not have one hard thought of Him. It is true He has been smiting you, but it has been with a purpose and in measure. “I have refined thee, but not with silver.” God has not brought upon you the severest troubles.

4. Notice the next thing: the Lord declares that the time of trial is the chosen season for revealing His love to you. “I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction.” It often happens that the time in which God reveals His choice and manifests His electing love to a soul is when that soul is almost consumed with trouble.

5. But note, before I leave the sinner’s case, that lest the soul should forget it, the Lord repeats again the point He began with, and unveils the motives of His grace once more. What is the eleventh verse but the echo of the ninth? If a soul should perish while trusting in the blood of Christ, the glory of God would go over to Satan It would be proved that Satan had overcome the truthfulness of God, or the power of God, or the mercy of God.

II. THE RECLAIMING OF THE BACKSLIDER. God was speaking to His own people Israel in these remarkable words. I see more reason for punishing you, for you have made a profession and belied it (Isaiah 48:1). God having declared the reason of His love to the backslider goes on to tell him, that the present sufferings which he is now enduring as the result of his backslidings should be mitigated. “I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have put thee into the fire, but I have not blown the heat to such an extreme degree that thy sin should be melted from thee: that would be a greater heat than any soul could bear. I have refined thee, that was needful, but not as silver; that would have been destructive to thee.” Thou sayest, “All Thy waves and billows have gone over me.” Not so; you know not what all God s waves and billows might be, for there is a depth infinitely lower than any you have ever seen. Then comes His next word: “I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction”; that is, as if He said, “I will renew My election of you.” It was never revoked, but now it shall be more manifestly declared. God has looked at you in prosperity and He has seen you treacherously forgetting Him. Now, however, your affairs are at a low ebb and you begin again to pray. Hear this for your comfort--when repentance defiles the face before men it beautifies it before God. (C. H.Spurgeon.)