God Promises to Restore

International Sunday School Lesson January 8, 2023 Winter Quarter #6

Isaiah 43:1-4 ESV  But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.  (2)  When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.  (3)  For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I give Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in exchange for you.  (4)  Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life.

Isaiah 43:1-4 ESV 

Isaiah 43:10-12 ESV  “You are my witnesses,” declares the LORD, “and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me.  (11)  I, I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior.  (12)  I declared and saved and proclaimed, when there was no strange god among you; and you are my witnesses,” declares the LORD, “and I am God.

Isaiah 43:10-12 ESV 

Notes

Background

• A stern rebuke precedes this section of scripture. Isa_42:18-25.
• The prophet addresses himself to Israel in its present state of blindness and wretchedness. He calls on the exiles to reflect on all that they have suffered at the hand of their God, and to recognize in it the effect of their obduracy and unfaithfulness to their calling, their misuse of religious privileges, and their positive transgressions of the law of Jehovah.

Fear Not — Isaiah 43:1-2 ESV 

• His Workmanship — Ephesians 2:8-10 ESV  For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,  (9)  not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  (10)  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
• Never leave us or forsake us — Hebrews 13:5 ESV  Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
• Fear Incapacitates – 10 spies

Precious in My Eyes — Isaiah 43:3-4 ESV 

• The saved are precious in his sight — 1 Peter 2:9-10 ESV  But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.  (10)  Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
• Special relationship with the Jews — Psalms 135:4 ESV  For the LORD has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel as his own possession.

You are My Witnesses — Isaiah 43:10 ESV 

• Acts 1:8 ESV  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
• God the Creator — John 1:1-3 ESV  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  (2)  He was in the beginning with God.  (3)  All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

I am God — Isaiah 43:11-12 ESV 

• 1 John 4:14-15 ESV  And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.  (15)  Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
• The Shema Prayer — Deuteronomy 6:4 ESV  “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.