“‘Comfort, comfort my people,’ says your God. ‘Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and announce to her that her time of hard service is over, her iniquity has been pardoned, and she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins’” (Isaiah 40.1-2).

G. Campbell Morgan arranged the second half of Isaiah around the Triunity of God:

1. The Father: The Purpose of Peace (40-48)

2. The Son: The Prince of Peace (49-57)

3. The Spirit The Program of Peace (58-66)

These chapters were written when Judah was not yet in captivity. Isaiah was prophesying about the people who would be carried away into captivity by Babylon. Is God able to deliver Israel? Will He do so? The answer comes right away in these verses. God commands His prophets to keep on speaking words of comfort to His people. 

Isaiah and other prophets are to keep on speaking tenderly to the people of God. God hasn’t given up on them. How is it that her iniquity was pardoned? How is it that she had received double for all her sins? We don’t find the answer to this until we get to Isaiah 53.6: “We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the LORD has punished him [Jesus, the Servant of YHWH] for the iniquity of us all.” 

These are universal words of comfort expressed by a triune God. The Father’s love is expressed in the Son’s redemption infused with the Spirit’s power. God gave us His Son. “[The Father] made the one who did not know sin [namely, the Son] to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5.21). What glorious words of comfort! The Holy Spirit testifies of the Son. We are God’s children, sealed until the day of redemption. We are continually reminded of the comfort we have by the Holy Spirit. He is our Comforter. 

God continually speaks words of comfort. He is the God of all comfort who comforts the downcast. He is a Father who pities his erring children or a mother who comforts a sick baby. God continually speaks words of comfort to us in the Scriptures. The only question which remains is, “Who will listen?” God can and will comfort you. Will you receive this comfort?