Isaiah 59 Cannot Take a Futurist Interpretation

In a recent Bible study on Isaiah chapter 59, someone suggested a futurist interpretation should guide our understanding of 59:20,21. This passage reads:

20“The Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,” says the Lord. 21“As for Me,” says the Lord, “this is My covenant with them: My Spirit who is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants’ descendants,” says the Lord, “from this time and forevermore.”

But I wish to demonstrate that this passage cannot possibly be interpreted as futurists suggest, i.e. as unfulfilled. Nor should we await a yet future fulfillment of this. In fact, I am appalled that such an interpretation is so widespread! For at least five reasons this passage is fulfilled, in the bride and church of Jesus our Lord---and wonderfully so!

First, The argument was made that in the entire Old Testament as well as in this passage, "Zion" and "Jacob" are terms that can ONLY refer to ethnic Israel, and can NEVER refer to the church or to Gentile believers. But such a presupposition does not have good grounds in the light of the New Testament, since the New Testament writers often use terms like Zion and Israel as types (prophetic symbols) of a greater spiritual reality.  

For example, in St. Paul's hermeneutic, Israel, then Isaac, then Jacob are interpreted as types of those who are the elect in Romans 9 (as well as in Galatians 4). In Romans 9:6ff we read,

6For they are not all Israel who are of Israel, 7nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham; but, “In Isaac your seed shall be called.” 8That is, those who are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted as the seed. ... 11That the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls. 

Paul is not arguing that Isaac and Jacob, but not Ishmael and Esau, were the heirs. This requires no argument and wouldn't be germane to his line of reasoning.  His point is that all were actual sons, but only Isaac and Jacob were accepted. The analogy is used to argue his doctrine of election.  He even explicitly rejects the notion that ALL ethnic Jews are God's children. Whoever God elects is true son, True Israel;  those He hardens [9:18] are not Israel even if they are of Israel.

Other examples of a non-literal hermeneutic abound in the NT: the Temple [John 2:19], the Holy Place and the curtain of the temple [Heb 10:19], Mount Zion and Jerusalem and "congregation of the firstborn" [Heb 12:22f], and "unshakable kingdom" [Heb 12:28], the priesthood [1Pe 2:5]; all are used of spiritual realities, of which the material Old Testament versions are but copies (or antitypes in the Greek). [Heb 9:24].

Second, Jesus DID come TO Zion and DID offer the kingdom, and thus the New Covenant and the Holy Spirit, to ethnic Israel. He took pains to make sure the disciples would "not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans" [Matt 10:5] until he later commanded them to do so. Peter also held out the promises first to the Jews saying [Acts 2:39]: "Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”

Third, the promised covenant in Isaiah 59 is completely in concord with the New Covenant spoken of by Jeremiah 31:31ff and fulfilled in Jesus according to Hebrews 8:8ff. The Lord Jesus said, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you." [Lk 22:20, 1Cor 11:25] I ask, then, why is the New Covenant of Jeremiah 31---which Jesus proclaimed and Hebrews 8 claims is fulfilled---not the same covenant promised in Isaiah 59:21?  The knowledge of God HAS been given to us, as Jesus attests in John 17:6f:

6“I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. 7Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You.”

It makes no sense to hold that Isaiah 59 is not fulfilled and at the same time agree that Jesus did establish the New Covenant per Jeremiah 31, especially since 

Fourth, Isaiah's prophecy includes the giving of the Holy Spirit, Who was assuredly given by Jesus to both Jews and Gentiles. According to Jesus' words in John 16 and 17, it is the Spirit Who brings repentance, gives to all---that is, to all those who turn from transgression---knowledge of God and reminds us of the words of Jesus. [John 14:26, 16:8--13, &c] Perhaps many Christians have not experienced this revelation of truth that the Spirit gives as we go in His power, and so are convinced that such knowledge of God as Isaiah and Jeremiah foretold has not been given. But praise God, it IS given, and I have experienced it again and again when I had no idea what to teach or preach or witness.

Fifth, even if Jeremiah 31 is fulfilled and Isaiah 59 is not, for the sake of argument, nowhere in the NT is an additional new covenant ever promised to ethnic-national Israel, as the futurists argue. If some new outpouring of the Spirit or additional covenant is in store during a distant age, the NT authors never mention it. (The potential exception is discussed in the next paragraph.) 

Sixth, now the futurist will say, "But, no! Paul applies this passage (Isaiah 59:21) in Romans 11 to the future awakening of ethnic Israel, not as being already fulfilled by Christ in the church." Let us look at Romans 11:

25For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. 26And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:

“The Deliverer will come out of Zion,
And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob;
27For this is My covenant with them,
When I take away their sins.”

Paul here is, in fact, applying Isaiah's promise to Jesus, the Deliverer out of Zion, who DID take away their sins, "first for the Jew, then for the Gentile". His point here is that God has worked among the Gentiles as a strategy to "provoke Israel to jealousy" [11:11]. When the fulness of the Gentiles have believed and been grafted into the olive tree, ethic Jewish believers will also be grafted back in, but only by believing in Jesus, the Deliverer from Zion. He is already turning ungodliness away from Jacob, that is, the remnant, and from those who are "of the faith of Abraham" ("who is the father of us all") and are thus counted as true sons. [Rom 4:16,17]  

Obviously I take the olive tree in Romans 11 to represent the true, spiritual Israel, which is just to say, the people of God, the holy nation, the assembly, the ekklesia, and what Jesus called "My church" and "the kingdom of heaven" in Matthew 16:18.  

It is interesting that Paul doesn't quote Isaiah fully, but summarizes his promise of the Holy Spirit and the indwelling knowledge of God with "When I take away their sins". It is, of course, God's Word and Spirit which sanctifies us [John 17:17], and Jesus' blood which takes away our sin [1Jn 1:7]. Some have even suggested that the ending of Rom 11:27 is juxtaposed by Paul directly from Jeremiah's version of the New Covenant, viz. [Jer 31:34]:

No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”

If St. Paul conflates the two prophecies, as it appears he does, it is not without good reason, and certainly not without inspiration. He must have seen that to Know the Lord, and to be enlightened by the Holy Spirit, is to be freed from sin, made holy, and filled with the fullness of God!  I believe this is why Paul elsewhere exclaims, "But we have the mind of Christ!" [1Cor 2:16] 

Praise be to the Lord Jesus, our glorious Deliverer, Who has not only given us His precious blood to take away our sin, and the knowledge of God which IS eternal life [Jn 17:3], and His own power and Spirit to be in us forever, but His very mind!  We need not pine for a future kingdom which may come soon or not, as the Jews.  We have the New Covenant now!  To assume it is a future promise is, it seems, to make the same mistake as the Jews who rejected Christ, since He did not give (nor promise) them the carnal throne and political-military kingdom they craved.  But what He gave was a far greater, far more real, far better covenant [Heb 8:6] and a far better, spiritual, eternal and universal kingdom.

Hallelujah to the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Ghost, forever and ever.  Amen and amen!