Father Of Your Nation

The father of your nation sinned… - Isaiah 43:27a (NET)

When God tells Israel, through Isaiah, that the father of their nation sinned, He adds that “your spokesmen rebelled against Me” (43:27b), He is expressing to them the reason for His judgment upon them. Who is the father of the nation by ancestry? That would be Jacob, and Isaac before him, going back to Abraham, who was the recipient of a covenant with God and given the promise that he would be made into a great nation. So here, is God saying that Abraham has sinned? Naturally, we can think of Abraham as a sinful man, like any other man, but that is most likely not the referent. Nor should we think of either Isaac or Jacob as the point of reference, though both certainly had their undeniable faults. So who is the father of their nation? Who is the one that sinned? In all probability, based upon God’s dealings with His people that we find throughout the historical books of the Hebrew Scriptures, the father in question, or more correctly, “fathers,” are the kings of Israel and Judah.

Throughout their history, the king stood as the representative for the people. They were the spokesmen for God’s people, in both word and deed. They directed and reflected the national sentiment. Looking through the history of Israel, we find the excellent example of when David ordered that a census that did not include the taking up of an offering for the tabernacle (Exodus 30:12-16). Even though he is at fault, the people suffer a plague until David makes an offering and buys the plot of land on which the Temple will eventually be built (thus effectively making an offering for the tabernacle). Their father sinned, yet the people suffer. When the kingdom is divided into north (Israel) and south (Judah), the fortunes of the people are generally pegged to the righteousness (faithfulness to God and His covenant requirements) or wickedness (unfaithfulness) of the king. Ultimately, the north (Israel) would not have a single king that was said to have done what was right. As a result, they are conquered and dispersed by Assyria in 722 B.C., fewer than three hundred years after King David. By implication, the conquering is as a result of the performance of the king---the father of the nation. The south (Judah), on the other hand, has a few kings that were said to have done what was right in the eyes of the Lord. As a result, though conquering and destruction would eventually come at the hands of the Babylonians, in 586 B.C., they were spared from the Assyrian conquering, having been given a temporary reprieve from judgment. The fate of Judah is sealed by the gross and intolerable idolatry of the king Manasseh, who would reign over Judah for fifty-five years (more than any other king). It was in response to Manasseh’s reign that God makes His irrevocable, though temporarily stayed decree of destruction, saying “I am about to bring disaster on Jerusalem and Judah… I will destroy Jerusalem… I will wipe Jerusalem clean… I will abandon this last remaining tribe among My people and hand them over to their enemies” (2 Kings 21:12b-14a). Again, the conquering was connected to the performance of the father of the nation---the king.

Isaiah is addressing the conquering by Babylon when he reports God saying “So I defiled your holy princes, and handed Jacob over to destruction, and subjected Israel to humiliating abuse” (43:28). To broaden our scope and to bring in the rest of the world, it would not be improper to think of Adam as the father of our nation (spokesman and king). In conjunction with that, we freely admit that he sinned, as he was not faithful to the covenant that God had established with him. Adam was made in God’s image and was given stewardship and rule over the creation, but he rebelled against his Creator. As we consider this and look back to the passage from Isaiah, we begin to see that the defiling of the holy prince, the handing over of Jacob to destruction, and the subjection of Israel to humiliating abuse, goes far beyond the conquering of the nation of Israel, whether by Assyria or Babylon. It goes all the way back to Adam, includes Israel, and points us to Jesus.
Jesus the Messiah, the king of Israel, represented His people. He was their holy prince. He was Jacob. He was Israel, their father and spokesman. As the second Adam, He also stands for all of humanity in the same role, though He was not unfaithful to His covenant charge, and of course, He did not rebel against His calling. Israel had been called out by God to be His covenant people, and to be His instruments to embody His covenant faithfulness in the world, to deal with evil, and to set the world to rights. Just as we are called to share by our Lord to share in the world’s, and in so doing, be salt and a light and a reflection of God’s glory that would draw all men to Him, so was Israel. As Israel, Jesus fulfills that role, doing so by experiencing the defiling, the destruction, and the humiliating abuse of the cross, taking all of death’s power upon Himself, and defeating that power by coming out of the grave, in the God-granted power of the Resurrection. Having fulfilled that role as Israel, Jesus then fulfills it for the wider world---the nations and the creation itself, by taking up the role that had been assigned to Adam, as the father of the nation that is the kingdom of God, to steward God’s good and renewed creation through that kingdom. Jesus carries out this task in union with those that live in a trusting, faithful allegiance to Him as their King. As we lay claim to Jesus and preach the Gospel of the crucified and resurrected Lord of all, we may very well find opportunity to share in defiling, destruction, and humiliating abuse. When this occurs, we shall not despair, but only trust, looking to the words that follow hard on this message from God in Isaiah, in which God tells His people, “Don’t be afraid, my servant Jacob… whom I have chosen!” (44:2b)