God is in control of history. Prophecy proves it. There is an arresting passage in the book of Isaiah that reveals the interplay between human history and biblical prophecy. It describes in some detail how Israel’s God would prompt the king of the mighty Persian empire to release the Jews from their exile in Babylon and permit them to return to Jerusalem.
These events are described after the fact in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. God moved the heart of the Persian emperor in 536 B.C. to provide money for their expenses, protection for their journey and permission for the Jews to rebuild the temple of the Lord in the Holy City.
In the British Museum, I have seen the famous Cyrus Cylinder which tells the story from the standpoint of this pagan king. He adopted a policy of religious tolerance toward the conquered peoples in his empire. He authorized the rebuilding of many of their sacred sites. He dedicated this project to the gods of Babylon, Marduk, Bel, and Nebo. He asked his subjects to pray to their various gods for the success of his reign.
The prophets of Israel saw in these events the sovereign influence of the Living God of Israel who said of the Persian king: “He is my shepherd and will accomplish all that I please; he will say of Jerusalem, ‘Let it be rebuilt,’ and of the temple, ‘let its foundations be laid'” (Isaiah 44:28).
There are those who say Isaiah could not have written this. They claim a pseudo-Isaiah or an anonymous “second Isaiah” wrote about Cyrus contemporaneously as if it were a prophecy. After all, Isaiah lived 150 years before these events took place. How could he have known the name of Cyrus and the sequence of events that would transpire long in the future?
There is plenty of evidence for the unity of Isaiah as one book, not a patchwork of descriptions posing as prophecies. It is an integrated whole, “The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz saw…” (Isaiah 1:1). A few points of evidence testify to the unity of the book.
The Jews accepted Isaiah’s authorship of the last part of the book, well before the time of Christ. The monumental Isaiah scroll, discovered with the Dead Sea Scrolls, has the complete text. It has been dated about 125 B.C. The New Testament quotes from the different parts of Isaiah, assuming it is all the inspired Word of the Lord.
The expression “the Holy One of Israel” is used of God in all parts of the book. Scholars tell us there are many other verbal parallels tying the two halves of the book together. According to the NIV Study Bible, there are at least 25 Hebrew words found in both halves of Isaiah that are found in no other prophetic writing. This is evidence that Isaiah wrote both parts of the book, including the remarkable Cyrus prophecies in chapters 41, 44, and 45.
So let’s assume that Isaiah wrote about King Cyrus of Persia long before he emerged on the stage of history. What does this mean? It means that God’s Word has been fulfilled literally. It means that God is in control of history. He calls Cyrus his anointed one (Isaiah 45:1) and his shepherd (48:28). God says it is he who opens doors for Cyrus to subdue nations (45:1) for the sake of his people Israel (45:4).
God will use Cyrus even though he does not acknowledge Yahweh as the true sovereign God (45:4). G.W. Grogan wrote, “We cannot accuse God of using inappropriate means to achieve his ends.” These historical developments will be the by-products of Cyrus’s policy toward all the nations under his reign. But Isaiah knows that this is all under God’s control who will use Cyrus for the benefit of Israel.
Isaiah wrote this as a prophecy of future events. It is not a recitation of current events or recent history. “I will raise up Cyrus (‘him’ in Hebrew) in my righteousness: … He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free” (45:13).
Therefore, if prophecies of Israel’s preservation have been fulfilled literally in the past, we may safely assume that the prophecies about Israel’s future restoration will also be fulfilled (Romans 11:25-27). Isaiah is full of such prophecies. He who kept his promises in the past will keep his promises in the future.
In the same way, the Isaiah who foresaw the coming of Messiah as the “Suffering Servant of the Lord” (Isaiah 52–53) also foretold the second coming of Messiah as Universal King (9:6-7; 32:1; 33:20-22). He will bring justice to the nations of the world (42:1; 60:3). At his first coming, he died to bear the sins of his people. At his second coming, he will diffuse the glory of God throughout the earth and reign as King of kings.
When we are troubled by the world situation in our own time, we may be encouraged to know that the sovereign God holds history in his mighty hand. No potentate or politician can successfully thwart the operation of his divine purpose. His kingdom will come, as promised.
