Isaiah 63:1-14
“Day of Vengeance and Mercy”
Pastor Jason Van Bemmel

The LORD's Day of Vengeance

¹ Who is this who comes from Edom,
    in crimsoned garments from Bozrah,
he who is splendid in his apparel,
    marching in the greatness of his strength?
“It is I, speaking in righteousness,
    mighty to save.”

² Why is your apparel red,
    and your garments like his who treads in the winepress?

³ “I have trodden the winepress alone,
    and from the peoples no one was with me;
I trod them in my anger
    and trampled them in my wrath;
their lifeblood spattered on my garments,
    and stained all my apparel.
⁴ For the day of vengeance was in my heart,
    and my year of redemption had come.
⁵ I looked, but there was no one to help;
    I was appalled, but there was no one to uphold;
so my own arm brought me salvation,
    and my wrath upheld me.
⁶ I trampled down the peoples in my anger;
    I made them drunk in my wrath,
    and I poured out their lifeblood on the earth.”

The LORD's Mercy Remembered

⁷ I will recount the steadfast love of the LORD,
    the praises of the LORD,
according to all that the LORD has granted us,
    and the great goodness to the house of Israel
that he has granted them according to his compassion,
    according to the abundance of his steadfast love.
⁸ For he said, “Surely they are my people,
    children who will not deal falsely.”
    And he became their Savior.
⁹ In all their affliction he was afflicted,
    and the angel of his presence saved them;
in his love and in his pity he redeemed them;
    he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.

¹⁰ But they rebelled
    and grieved his Holy Spirit;
therefore he turned to be their enemy,
    and himself fought against them.
¹¹ Then he remembered the days of old,
    of Moses and his people.
Where is he who brought them up out of the sea
    with the shepherds of his flock?
Where is he who put in the midst of them
    his Holy Spirit,
¹² who caused his glorious arm
    to go at the right hand of Moses,
who divided the waters before them
    to make for himself an everlasting name,
¹³     who led them through the depths?
Like a horse in the desert,
    they did not stumble.
¹⁴ Like livestock that go down into the valley,
    the Spirit of the LORD gave them rest.
So you led your people,
    to make for yourself a glorious name.

• Isaiah 63:1-14, ESV

Intro: Just give me the good stuff.

We all have a natural desire to want what we find appealing to us and to not want what we find unappealing. You’ve likely never gone to a restaurant and intentionally ordered the meal that was least appealing to you.

Sometimes, though, we can approach God as though He were a menu or a buffet line, and we can be tempted to custom-order what we like about God. There’s a wide spectrum of how we do this. Most of the time, we’re not consciously saying, “I’m going to only pick and choose the parts of God that appeal to me and ignore the rest.” But think of how many hymns and worship songs celebrate the justice and wrath of God. Or think about how uncomfortable some of the imprecatory Psalms make us, those psalms that call on God to strike down the wicked. Or think about what kinds of sermons we prefer to hear – sermons that encourage and uplift us with warm Gospel reminders or with practical help. We tend to like God when He’s forgiving us, loving us, and helping us.

But God is all of His attributes perfectly all the time. You can’t separate God from any of His attributes, and He’s never more one thing or another. He is always who He is, perfectly and unchangeably.

Also, as today’s passage points out, God’s saving of His people by His gracious power and God’s wrath in striking down His enemies in justice are intimately connected. When God delivered His people from bondage in Egypt, He did so by striking down the firstborn in Egypt and by drowning the Egyptian army in the Red Sea. When He delivered the people of Jerusalem in Hezekiah’s day from the oppression of the Assyrians, He did so by striking down 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in a single night. And when Jesus returns to finally and eternally deliver us from all sin, death, and suffering, He will do so by judging Satan and his minions and the nations who are in rebellion against Him.

Those who want the deliverance and rescue of the LORD without His wrath are a bit like a woman who went viral on social media recently because she went into Whole Foods and asked for grass-fed bone-in steak, but vegan. She insisted that it needed to be all three: grass-fed, bone-in, and vegan. And she was indignant when she was told that was impossible.  

Our passage falls into two halves: Verses 1-6 look forward to the coming day of vengeance and salvation when Jesus returns, while verses 7-14 look back at God’s deliverance of His people from bondage in Egypt, despite their sin and rebellion. The value this passage has for us is that is that it equips us in times of stress, anxiety, fear, and distress to look ahead in hope for the LORD’s coming deliverance and also to look back in faithful remembrance to the LORD’s deliverance of His people in the past. These two directions of looking forward and looking back together help us to walk in faith and live in hope.  

1. The Coming Day of Vengeance & Redemption, vv. 1-6

¹ Who is this who comes from Edom,
    in crimsoned garments from Bozrah,
he who is splendid in his apparel,
    marching in the greatness of his strength?
“It is I, speaking in righteousness,
    mighty to save.”

² Why is your apparel red,
    and your garments like his who treads in the winepress?

³ “I have trodden the winepress alone,
    and from the peoples no one was with me;
I trod them in my anger
    and trampled them in my wrath;
their lifeblood spattered on my garments,
    and stained all my apparel.
⁴ For the day of vengeance was in my heart,
    and my year of redemption had come.
⁵ I looked, but there was no one to help;
    I was appalled, but there was no one to uphold;
so my own arm brought me salvation,
    and my wrath upheld me.
⁶ I trampled down the peoples in my anger;
    I made them drunk in my wrath,
    and I poured out their lifeblood on the earth.”

We read earlier in the service from Revelation 19, where we see Jesus coming in judgment in a robe dipped in blood. These six verses are a powerful portrait of the LORD Jesus coming in wrath and salvation, to execute vengeance and to redeem His people. During His earthly ministry, Jesus taught that the end of the age would bring the great harvest, and that the people of God would be gathered safely together, while the enemies of God would be punished.

We read a vision of this day at the end of Revelation 14:

¹⁴ Then I looked, and behold, a white cloud, and seated on the cloud one like a son of man, with a golden crown on his head, and a sharp sickle in his hand. ¹⁵ And another angel came out of the temple, calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, “Put in your sickle, and reap, for the hour to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe.” ¹⁶ So he who sat on the cloud swung his sickle across the earth, and the earth was reaped.

¹⁷ Then another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. ¹⁸ And another angel came out from the altar, the angel who has authority over the fire, and he called with a loud voice to the one who had the sharp sickle, “Put in your sickle and gather the clusters from the vine of the earth, for its grapes are ripe.” ¹⁹ So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. ²⁰ And the winepress was trodden outside the city, and blood flowed from the winepress, as high as a horse's bridle, for 1,600 stadia. [about 200 miles]

– Revelation 14:14-20, ESV

Many of us are very uncomfortable with this kind of imagery, in part because just about all of us know people close to us, people we love, who are on a path that would make them subject to God’s wrath as His enemies. I think the knowledge of that should cause of to pray more fervently for their salvation.

But our hearts are also longing for this day. We ache for true justice in a world of evil. When we see and hear about atrocities being done in the world or in our country – horrific crimes, cruelty, unjust suffering – we long for it to end and for justice to be done.  

In Isaiah 63, the vision of Christ has Him coming from Edom and its capital, Bozrah. In the Bible, Edom represents the persistent, nagging, antagonistic enemies of God’s people. We’re all painfully familiar with our enemies – the world and its addiction to selfishness, rebellion, constant distraction, and temptation; our flesh with its nagging selfishness and destructive desires; Satan and his minions who mock God and sow seeds of doubt and despair in our hearts and minds.

For God to finally and eternally deliver us from the evil that plagues us and to bring us into the glory of His eternal kingdom, He must execute vengeance on all who are in rebellion against Him.

But the coming day is also a day of great mercy, great salvation and redemption. Because the One who comes to judge and execute vengeance is also the One who speaks in righteousness and is mighty to save. When He comes again, His robe will be stained with the blood of His enemies, but when He came the first time, His garments were stained deeply with His own blood before they were stripped off of Him and He bore the wrath of God we deserve for our sin.

Those of us who trust in Him and who have found salvation in Him will see very clearly on that day what He has saved us from. We will see what we deserve and what He took on Himself instead. And those who want to escape the wrath of that coming day need only hide themselves in Jesus now, run to Him for salvation today, and find mercy for our sins and grace for our needs flowing from His nail-scarred hands.  

1. The LORD’s Mercy & His People’s Rebellion, vv. 7-10

While God is all of His attributes all of the time, and all of His attributes are holy and  perfect, the Bible does tell us the heart of God. Jesus said of Himself that He is gentle and lowly in heart, welcoming all who come to Him. God tells us in Lamentations that He does not afflict from the heart the children of men. God also tells us He takes no delight in the death of the wicked, but it pleased God to send His Son to be crushed for our iniquities and save us. John 3:17 says, “For God did not send His Son to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”

The heart of God can be seen in the heart of our passage today, in verse 7:

⁷ I will recount the steadfast love of the LORD,
    the praises of the LORD,
according to all that the LORD has granted us,
    and the great goodness to the house of Israel
that he has granted them according to his compassion,
    according to the abundance of his steadfast love.
⁸ For he said, “Surely they are my people,
    children who will not deal falsely.”
    And he became their Savior.
⁹ In all their affliction he was afflicted,
    and the angel of his presence saved them;
in his love and in his pity he redeemed them;
    he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.

How can we know that the great day of final salvation is coming?  How can we trust that God will keep His promises? Verse 7 has Isaiah calling to mind the steadfast love of the LORD and His goodness and compassion to His people, and verse 8 specifically refers to the Exodus deliverance.

As we look forward in hope to the great coming Day of the LORD, we can be assured that He will keep this final promise by looking back in gratitude on all the promises He has already kept and all the times He has delivered and provided for His people.

When God saw His people in bondage in Egypt, He had deep compassion on them. He became their Savior. He entered into their affliction. I love that first line of verse 9: “In all heir affliction he was afflicted.” This is an expression of how the Lord identified with and empathized with His people. Some people lately have been speaking out against empathy, calling it dangerous and even a sin. That is one of the most shockingly unbiblical positions I could ever imagine any Christian pastor taking.    

Verse 7 tells us that God granted great goodness to His people according to His compassion – compassion here is a word that refers to the bowels and the womb, and it refers to a deep pity, compassion, and mercy. It’s a powerfully emotional word. Then, verse 9 tells us that He was afflicted in all their affliction.

This lines up with what Jesus said to Paul when He stopped him on the Road to Damascus, “Why are you persecuting Me?” Jesus takes the persecution of His people as persecution of Himself. Hebrews explains that Jesus become human to enter into our suffering and to understand our weakness and to become a merciful and faithful high priest, who identifies with us in our affliction, our weakness, our bondage.

Without empathy, we don’t have a Savior or salvation. And we are called to empathy ourselves as Christians – to bear one another’s burdens, to rejoice with those who rejoice and to weep with those who weep. If some modern people have weaponized empathy and used it to challenge moral truth, that’s their problem. People have also weaponized love in the same exact way, but we don’t need to proclaim that Christians need to be careful not to love too much or that love might be sinful.

By looking back at the Exodus, the people of God in Isaiah’s day were reminded of the LORD’s compassion for them and of His power to save them from their enemies. They needed that perspective with the Assyrians oppressing them and the Babylonian captivity coming in the future. We face enemies and distress and oppression ourselves, and we need to know that the LORD is mighty to save, that He speaks righteousness, and that He keeps His promises. We have something far more powerful than the Exodus to look back on, since we live on this side of the cross. If God did not spare His own Son but freely gave Him up for us all, how will He not – along with Him – graciously give us all good things? (Romans 8:32)

And yet, God’s people who were brought out in the Exodus rebelled against God.

¹⁰ But they rebelled
    and grieved his Holy Spirit;
therefore he turned to be their enemy,
    and himself fought against them.

And even though we’ve been delivered even more powerfully through the cross, we see the same tendency to rebel in our hearts. And so, we need the LORD to not only be our Savior but also to be the One who leads us and provides for us.

• The LORD Who Leads and Provides, vv. 11-14

¹¹ Then he remembered the days of old,
    of Moses and his people.
Where is he who brought them up out of the sea
    with the shepherds of his flock?
Where is he who put in the midst of them
    his Holy Spirit,
¹² who caused his glorious arm
    to go at the right hand of Moses,
who divided the waters before them
    to make for himself an everlasting name,
¹³     who led them through the depths?
Like a horse in the desert,
    they did not stumble.
¹⁴ Like livestock that go down into the valley,
    the Spirit of the LORD gave them rest.
So you led your people,
    to make for yourself a glorious name.

God led His people through the desert wilderness, providing for their needs, to bring them into the Promised Land for the glory of His name. In the same way, He is leading us by His Holy Spirit through the wilderness of this world, meeting our needs day-by-day, until we are home and settled in the eternal Promised Land for the glory of His name.

But as we journey though this world following our Savior-Shepherd, we need to love Him, trust Him, and follow Him – and not a figment of our imagination.

Conclusion – Loving God - Justice & Love: Wrath & Deliverance

Loving God means loving all of His attributes, to rejoice in His justice as well as in His love, to look forward to His wrath against His enemies just as we look forward to His deliverance of us from our bondage. We look back in gratitude on what He has done to deliver us from our enemies, when mercy and wrath met at the cross. We look forward in hope to the Day of the LORD, when love and justice will again meet in our final deliverance and the final punishment of God’s enemies. And we look up in faith for the daily leading and providing we need to press on in faith to the glory of God!