‏ Isaiah 52:3

3. As you became your foes' servants, without their paying any price for you (Jr 15:13), so they shall release you without demanding any price or reward (Is 45:13), (where Cyrus is represented as doing so: a type of their final restoration gratuitously in like manner). So the spiritual Israel, "sold under sin," gratuitously (Ro 7:14), shall be redeemed also gratuitously (Is 55:1).

‏ Isaiah 61:1

CHAPTER 61

Is 61:1-11. Messiah's Offices: Restoration of Israel.

Messiah announces His twofold commission to bring gospel mercy at His first coming, and judgments on unbelievers and comfort to Zion at His second coming (Is 61:1-9); the language can be applied to Isaiah, comforting by his prophecies the exiles in Babylon, only in a subordinate sense.

1. is upon me; because ... hath anointed me--quoted by Jesus as His credentials in preaching (Lu 4:18-21). The Spirit is upon Me in preaching, because Jehovah hath anointed Me from the womb (Lu 1:35), and at baptism, with the Spirit "without measure," and permanently "abiding" on Me (Is 11:2; Joh 1:32; 3:34; Psa 45:7; with which compare 1Ki 1:39, 40; 19:16; Ex 29:7). "Anointed" as Messiah, Prophet, Priest, and King.

good tidings--as the word "gospel" means.

the meek--rather, "the poor," as Lu 4:18 has it; that is, those afflicted with calamity, poor in circumstances and in spirit (Mt 11:5).

proclaim liberty--(Joh 8:31-36). Language drawn from the deliverance of the Babylonian captives, to describe the deliverance from sin and death (He 2:15); also from the "liberty proclaimed" to all bond-servants in the year of jubilee (Is 61:2; Le 25:10; Jr 34:8, 9).

opening of the prison--The Hebrew rather is, "the most complete opening," namely, of the eyes to them that are bound, that is, deliverance from prison, for captives are as it were blind in the darkness of prison (Is 14:17; 35:5; 42:7) [Ewald]. So Lu 4:18 and the Septuagint interpret it; Lu 4:18, under inspiration, adds to this, for the fuller explanation of the single clause in the Hebrew, "to set at liberty them that are bruised"; thus expressing the double "opening" implied; namely, that of the eyes (Joh 9:39), and that of the prison (Ro 6:18; 7:24, 25; He 2:15). His miracles were acted parables.

‏ Zechariah 9:11

11. As for thee also--that is, the daughter of Zion," or "Jerusalem" (Zec 9:9): the theocracy. The "thee also," in contradistinction to Messiah spoken of in Zec 9:10, implies that besides cutting off the battle-bow and extending Messiah's "dominion to the ends of the earth," God would also deliver for her her exiled people from their foreign captivity.

by the blood of thy covenant--that is, according to the covenant vouchsafed to thee on Sinai, and ratified by the blood of sacrifices (Ex 24:8; He 9:18-20).

pit wherein ... no water--Dungeons were often pits without water, miry at the bottom, such as Jeremiah sank in when confined (Ge 37:24; Jr 38:6). An image of the misery of the Jewish exiles in Egypt, Greece, &c., under the successors of Alexander, especially under Antiochus Epiphanes, who robbed and profaned the temple, slew thousands, and enslaved more. God delivered them by the Maccabees. A type of the future deliverance from their last great persecutor hereafter (Is 51:14; 60:1).

‏ Romans 3:24

24. justified freely--without anything done on our part to deserve.

by his grace--His free love.

through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus--a most important clause; teaching us that though justification is quite gratuitous, it is not a mere fiat of the divine will, but based on a "Redemption," that is, "the payment of a Ransom," in Christ's death. That this is the sense of the word "redemption," when applied to Christ's death, will appear clear to any impartial student of the passages where it occurs.