Isaiah 63:10

THIS is a terrible case. When God is turned to be a man's enemy and fights against him, he is in a desperate plight. With other enemies we may contend with some hope of success, but not with the Omnipotent. The enmity of others is an affliction, but the enmity of God is destruction. If He turns to be our enemy, then everything is turned against us. The stars in their courses fight against us and the stones in the fields are in league for our stumbling. "If God is for us, who can be against us?" But if God is against us, who can be for us? The words read like a funeral knell—"He was turned to be their enemy, and He fought against them." This shows us that God is not indifferent to sin. Men may try to persuade themselves that God does not care—that it is nothing to Him how men act—whether they break or keep His Laws. Men plead that He is "kind to the unthankful and to the evil," and the same event happens to all, both to the righteous and to the wicked. And so, indeed, it seems for the present. Our shortsightedness may even assure us that the ungodly prosper and have the best of it—but this is only our blindness. God hates sin now and always! He would not be God if He did not. God is stirred with righteous indignation against every kind of evil—it moves His Spirit to anger. Some believe in an impassive God, but certainly the God of the Bible is never so described. He is represented in Holy Scripture after the manner of men, but how else could He be represented to men? If He were represented after the manner of God, you and I could understand nothing at all of the description—but as He is represented to us in Scripture—the Lord notes sin, feels sin, grows angry with sin, is provoked and His Holy Spirit is vexed by the rebellion of men.

THIS is a terrible case. When God is turned to be a man's enemy and fights against him, he is in a desperate plight. With other enemies we may contend with some hope of success, but not with the Omnipotent. The enmity of others is an affliction, but the enmity of God is destruction. If He turns to be our enemy, then everything is turned against us. The stars in their courses fight against us and the stones in the fields are in league for our stumbling. "If God is for us, who can be against us?"

But they rebelled - Against God. This charge is often made against the Jews; and indeed their history is little more than a record of a series of rebellions against God. And vexed - Or rather ‘grieved.’ The Hebrew word עצב ‛âtsab, in Piel, means to pain, to afflict, to grieve. This is the idea here. Their conduct was such as was suited to produce the deepest pain - for there is nothing which we more deeply feel than the ingratitude of those who have been benefited by us. Our translators have supposed that the word conveyed the idea of provoking to wrath by their conduct (thus the Septuagint renders it παρώξυναν τὸ πνεύμα, κ.τ.λ. parōxunan to pneuma, etc.; but the more appropriate sense is, that their conduct was such as to produce pain or grief. Compare Eph 4:30: ‘Grieve not (μὴ λυπεῖτε mē lupeite) the Holy Spirit.’ Psa 78:40; Psa 95:10. Heb 3:10-17. His Holy Spirit - The Chaldee renders this, ‘But they were unwilling to obey, and they irritated (provoked, blasphemed רגז râgaz) against the words of the prophets.’ But the reference seems rather to be to the Spirit of God that renewed, comforted, enlightened, and sanctified them. Grotius, Rosenmuller, and Gesenius, suppose that this means God himself - a Spirit of holiness. But, with the revelation of the New Testament before us, we cannot well doubt that the real reference here is to the third person of the Trinity - the renewer and sanctifier of the people of God. It may be admitted, perhaps, that the ancient Hebrews would refer this to God himself, and that their views of the offices of the different persons in the divine nature were not very clearly marked, or very distinct. […]