\\INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 26\\

This chapter contains a song of praise for the safety and prosperity of
the church, and the destruction of its enemies. The church is
represented as a strong city, whose walls and bulwarks are salvation,
\\#Isa 26:1\\ it is said to have gates which are to be opened to a
righteous nation, \\#Isa 26:2\\ its inhabitants, being such who trust
in the Lord, are promised perfect peace, \\#Isa 26:3\\ hence the saints
are exhorted to trust in him, \\#Isa 26:4\\ then follows an account of
another city, described as lofty, and its inhabitants as dwelling on
high, who are brought down, and trampled on, by the feet of the poor
and needy, \\#Isa 26:5,6\\ when the prophet returns to the righteous,
and asserts their way to be uprightness, because their path is weighed
or levelled by God the most upright, \\#Isa 26:7\\ and in the name of
the church declares that they had waited for the Lord in the way of his
judgments; and that the desire of their souls was to his name, and the
remembrance of it; and that they continued, and would continue, to
desire him, and seek after him, seeing righteousness was to be learned
by his judgments, \\#Isa 26:8,9\\ and though the wicked would not be
brought to repentance and reformation by the goodness of God, nor take
notice of his hand, yet they should see and be ashamed, and destroyed
at last, \\#Isa 26:10,11\\ but notwithstanding these judgments of God
in the earth, the church professes her faith in the Lord, that he would
give her peace and prosperity, from the consideration of what he had
wrought for her, and in her, \\#Isa 26:12\\ and rejects all other lords
but him, \\#Isa 26:13\\ who were dead, and should not live again, but
were visited and destroyed, and their memory made to perish,
\\#Isa 26:14\\ but the righteous nation should be increased, though
they should meet with trouble, which would cause them to go to the
throne of grace, and there pour out their complaints, express their
pain and distresses, and the disappointments they had met with,
\\#Isa 26:15-18\\ to which an answer is returned, promising a glorious
resurrection, \\#Isa 26:19\\ and calling upon the people of God to
retire to their chambers for protection in the mean while, until the
punishment to be inflicted on the inhabitants of the earth for their
sins was over, \\#Isa 26:20,21\\.