When Yahweh chastens, Israel is helpless. She can only seek the Lord, whisper a desperate prayer, lot her doors and hide in her room (Isaiah 26:16, 20-21). She writhes like a pregnant woman, but instead of bearing a child she gives birth only to wind (Heb. ruach ; 26:18). Nothing that Israel can produce will help. She is completely in Yahweh’s hands, at His mercy.
And in particular, Israel confesses “we could not accomplish deliverance in the earth.” Israel writhes like a woman in labor, but cannot give birth to salvation, yeshua (v. 18). So long as Israel is left to herself, there will be no Jesus. Isaiah 26:16-18 is a prooftext, and justification, for the virgin birth.
And not only that, but the resurrection, because Isaiah goes on to say that the Lord’s dead, His corpses, will rise from to shout for joy. The earth is no more able to give birth to the dead than Israel can give birth to Jesus. If the dead are going to rise, if they are going to be born again from the dust, it will have to be by Yahweh’s power.
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