It is the iwactical use of this subject that renders it so interesting to the Church of God : and it is in that view only that we wish to impress it on our minds. It is introduced by the prophet in reference to two points :
1. The deliverance of God's people —
[The state of the Jews in Babylon was as hopeless as could well be conceived : but God foretold their deliverance from it, and their restoration to their own land ; and that, though cap- tives, and grievously oppressed, " they should take them captives whose captives they were, and should rule over their oppressors"." This God declared to be irreversibly decreed.
Now the same is true respecting the deliverance and sal- vation of all the Lord's people, in every age and quarter of the world. As the Jews were his elect, so is there now " a remnant according to the election of grace P;" a people whom he has given to his Son ^, and to whom, as viewed in him, he gave a " promise of eternal life, before the world began ^" Now these he will search out, wherever they are, even amongst the remotest Gentiles **: and in due time he will call them by
f Mai. iii. 6. s Jam. i. 17. ^ Prov. xxi. 30.
i Dan. iv. 35. i^ Numb, xxiii. 19. * Isai, xlvi. 10.
n' Job xxiii. 13. " Ps. xxxiii. 11. ° ver, 1, 2.
P Rom. xi. G. q John xvii. 6, 9. r Tit. i. 2. ^ John X. 10.