Purpose

'God’s Plan to Use His Church to Glorify His Name Among the Nations' is a set of Bible Study Questions on Isaiah 66:18-22. God shows His great power by using a unwilling people to willinging complete His great will, to bring His light to the nations! God’s determination, ability, and plan to glorify His Name among the nations.

1) God’s determination to glorify His Name among the nations (Isaiah 66:18)

“For I know their works and their thoughts; the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and see My glory.”

1. What is it that God says He knows about this people? Can we know those things?

2. Who are they? (Look at prior verses).

3. Were they good or bad things (works and thoughts) that they were doing? (Also see prior verses).

4. Is God happy with His people? What does God say will happen because of their thoughts and works?

5. God’s purpose is to bring His glory around the world. How were the Israelites suppose to be the means God would do this? Did it happen? Why do you think it did or did not?

2) God’s ability to glorify His Name among the nations (Isaiah 66:19)

“And I will set a sign among them and will send survivors from them to the nations: Tarshish, Put, Lud, Meshech, Rosh, Tubal, and Javan, to the distant coastlands that have neither heard My fame nor seen My glory. And they will declare My glory among the nations.

1. What does God say that He will put in their midst? What does that mean? Were else is that used in the Bible? (eg. Isaiah 7)

2. So what does He say that the sign will be?

3. Where are these places? Look at Bible Dictionary, Bible Atlas or look at article. Why doesn’t he refer to the modern names? Name as many of the modern names as possible.

4. What is a survivor? What did they need to survive? (It seems to imply that God will judge Israel but from out of this judged Israel, God will send some people to do His work.)

5. Name twenty distant places from Israel that God’s Name is now glorified. Name five that are still not places God’s glory is being made known.

6. Name at least one major way God has broken down the barriers of a closed country.

3) God’s plan to use His church to glorify His Name among the nations (Isaiah 66:20-22)

20 “Then they shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as a grain offering to the LORD, on horses, in chariots, in litters, on mules, and on camels, to My holy mountain Jerusalem,” says the LORD, “just as the sons of Israel bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the LORD. 21 “I will also take some of them for priests and for Levites,” says the LORD. “For just as the new heavens and the new earth Which I make will endure before Me,” declares the LORD, “So your offspring and your name will endure.”

1. What does verse 20 say that the ‘survivors’ will do? This was written from the perspective of a Jew in Isaiah’s time. What would that mean today?

2. What does the word Gentile mean? (It is used here in verse 20).

3. What are the implications that these people from the nations are called brethren? Who are they brothers to?

4. Read Romans 15: 14-16. Define each of the terms Paul used in light of this Isaiah 66:18-22 text.

   • ‘my brethren’

   • ‘be a minister of Christ Jesus’

   • ‘offering of the Gentiles’

5. From 1 Peter 2:9-10, what do we learn of the responsibility of all the believers in Christ. How does the terminology refer to the terminology here?

6. How are the priests and Levites related to the brethren (of verse 20)?

7. Who are they in the Christian church? See Ephesians 4:11-12.

8. Go through the New Testament and name five Gentile ‘priests and Levites.’ Name five that you know of from your personal experience?

9. If desired, discuss the call into full-time ministry. How are they supported? Compare to the Levites.

Conclusion

The Israelites were stubborn and resistant to spreading God’s truth. How did God deal with them? If God evaluates the church today, is it falling to the same sin as the Jews or is it doing much better?

Think about your own actions and thoughts. Name three things that show that you are active working with God in His mission to declare His glory among the nations.

This concludes this study on the Book of Isaiah.