Charles Spurgeon Commentary Isaiah 35

The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them;

They shall be so glad that they shall inspire gladness where all was desolation, and brooding, melancholy batswing, and dragon's howl. The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them.

And the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.

God's people are a happy-making people. They are a blessing in themselves, and they will be a blessing to others, until all say, These are the seed that the Lord hath blessed. The desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose.

It is a wonderful sight to see, for one of the most lovely sights in the world is when the glory and excellence of God are seen in the works of his grace in his own people. It is such a sight that it makes people first rejoice in their hearts, and then rejoice with their tongues. They shall rejoice with joy and singing, which is the double rejoicing of the heart and of the lip. Indeed, these must be favored people who, wherever they go, can make others glad in this way. Brothers and sisters, they must be full or they could not overflow!

They must themselves be alive, or else they could not revive the desert places. They must themselves be in flower, blooming like the rose, or they could not make the wilderness so full of greenery. May the Lord grant that we may be in such a state that we are able to go into the wilderness. There are some of God’s people who cannot trust themselves to go where they are needed, because they do not have enough grace. They are so weak that they are like a weak person standing on the riverbank, who cannot leap in to pull out a drowning person for fear they should be pulled in themselves. But, oh!

They are blessed indeed who dare to go into wildernesses and into solitary places, and carry the transforming blessing of heaven with them until the wilderness changes its attire, and the brown of the sand yields to the redness of the rose, because God has come there with his people.

Are there such here tonight? No doubt there are – weak at work, and weak at praying. The two things go together – weak hands and feeble knees. May they both be strengthened.

It is very singular how salvation and vengeance are so often associated together in Scripture. It is the day of salvation, and the day of vengeance of our God to comfort all that mourn. Vengeance upon the false is the best consolation to the true. When God smites the sham, even to the heart, then does he bless that in which the truth is found. He will come and save you.

See what the presence of Christ does. See what the presence of Christ's people will do when he comes in them and with them. They make the wilderness rejoice. But, besides that, the dwellers who are found in the wilderness—these lame and deaf people—get the blessing. Oh! May God make us be a desert to others of this sort.