Isaiah 12:4

Chapter 12 closes the part of Isaiah that runs from chapter 7 through chapter 12, often called the Book of Immanuel. It opens in a crisis of the 8th century BC. Aram and Israel had joined forces against Judah, and King Ahaz looked to the Assyrian empire for help when he should have trusted the LORD, a choice that later brought Judah under Assyria’s weight. Through these chapters Isaiah warns Judah and the nations around it of God’s judgment, and he weaves the great promises into those warnings: the virgin’s son called Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14), the child born to us and his reign (Isaiah 9:6–7), a remnant that returns to God (Isaiah 10:20–23), and the Branch from Jesse who rules in righteousness and peace (Isaiah 11:1–10).

Chapter 12 answers all of this with a hymn of thanksgiving. Its first verses thank God that his anger is turned away and confess him as strength, song and salvation (Isaiah 12:2), and they promise that his people will draw water with joy out of the wells of salvation (Isaiah 12:3). Verses 4 to 6 carry that joy out to the peoples and the whole earth, and then bring it home to Zion. The words are inspired by God’s Spirit and given to his people before the day arrives. Singing was how Israel celebrated God’s great deliverances, and this song echoes the one Moses and Miriam sang after the crossing of the Red Sea (Exodus 15:1–21).

Verse 4 gives four commands in a row: praise, call, declare and make mention. The first two turn toward God, and the last two turn toward the world.

“Praise the LORD” uses yâdâh, which in this form means to praise, to give thanks or to confess. Its root is tied to holding out the hand, and the praise it describes is open and spoken, a thankful acknowledgment of who God is and what he has done. The one praised is the LORD, Yᵉhôvâh, the covenant name of the self-existent God who keeps his promises.

“Call upon his name” joins the verb qârâʼ, to call, with shêm, name. In Scripture a name stands for the person who bears it: his character, his authority and his reputation. To call on God’s name is to pray to him and appeal to him as the God he has shown himself to be, trusting him and owning him openly as ours. The New Testament ties this calling to salvation itself: “whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13).

“Declare his doings among the people” uses yâdaʻ, to know, here in the sense of making something known. God’s doings are his acts of salvation, judgment and providence. The word for people, ʻam, means a people, a community joined together, and in this verse the audience reaches past Israel to the peoples of the world. Psalm 105 opens with the same calls to give thanks, to call on his name and to make his deeds known (Psalm 105:1).

“Make mention that his name is exalted” uses zâkar, to remember, which in this form means to mention or to bring to remembrance. God’s people speak of his name so that others remember it too. The word for exalted, sâgab, means set on high, lofty and out of reach, and so safe and strong. The words “his name” come twice in this verse, first as the name his people call on and then as the name they proclaim above every other.

Verse 5 calls for song. The verb zâmar means to sing praise or make music in praise of God, whether with instruments and dancing or with the voice alone, to a set tune or one made up in the moment. The command comes with its reason attached: “for he hath done excellent things”. Praise in Scripture answers what God has done.

The word behind “excellent things”, gêʼûwth, comes from a root meaning to be high. Used of people it can mean pride, and used of God it means majesty. These are majestic deeds, works of a greatness that belongs to God alone. The sâgab of verse 4 and the gêʼûwth of this verse both carry the thought of height: God’s name is set on high, and his deeds are lofty.

“This is known in all the earth” uses yâdaʻ again, the same verb that stands behind “declare” in verse 4. What God’s people make known among the peoples becomes known in all the earth. Habakkuk looks to the same end, when the earth shall be “filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea” (Habakkuk 2:14). A psalm says that all the earth will worship God and sing to him (Psalm 66:4), another calls for a new song to the LORD and for his glory to be declared among the nations (Psalm 96:1–3), and Zechariah sees the LORD as king over all the earth (Zechariah 14:9).

The song ends with two verbs of loud joy. “Cry out” is tsâhal, a loud, clear cry, a word used even of horses neighing, and here of people lifting their voices in triumph. “Shout” is rânan, a ringing cry or shout, usually for joy, and in Scripture it is often commanded or resolved, as in “let us sing”. Joined together they call for full-voiced, public celebration.

Those addressed are the “inhabitant of Zion”. Zion is Jerusalem, the city where God’s temple stood, and it also stands for God’s people, the whole community of faith. A people who had lived through oppression, fear and the threat of Assyria are told to shout, and the reason given is God himself: “for great is the Holy One of Israel in the midst of thee”. His greatness is his power, his majesty and his rule, all of them beyond compare, and their joy rests on who he is.

This song is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. The day it looks for began at his first coming and will be complete at his return. The child born of a virgin is Emmanuel, “God with us” (Matthew 1:23), and the Holy One in the midst of his people came in the flesh, for “the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). He is the Branch from Jesse (Isaiah 11:1) and the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29). His life, his atoning death and his resurrection are the greatest of God’s excellent things, and through him the water of the wells of salvation is given to all who believe.

His is the name exalted above every other, for God has highly exalted him so that every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Philippians 2:9–11). The church makes his doings known among the nations as he commanded, and the new song of the redeemed is sung to the Lamb by people of every nation, tribe, people and language (Revelation 5:9–10). Through the Spirit, God now lives among his people in the church, the new Zion, built together into his dwelling place (Ephesians 2:22), and Christ has promised to be with them always (Matthew 28:20). So the shout of Zion belongs to us as well, raised over a salvation already won and a Lord who reigns and will return.

God gave his people the words of their praise before he gave the salvation it celebrates. These verses show that the end of his saving work is a people who give thanks to him, call on him, tell others what he has done and lift his name above every other. They show a God whose deeds are majestic and meant to be known in all the earth, and who is pleased to live in the midst of the people he has saved. Whoever has called on the name of the Lord has been given this song, and has every reason to sing it aloud, because the Holy One is great and he is near.