remember when Neil Young sang: old enough now to change your name/when so many love you, is it the same?" It reminds me of this passage. Look at Paul Hanson' evocative description of the setting in his Interpretation commentary on Is. 40-66.
I don't know how helpful the division between 2nd and third Isaiah is any longer. I find it more fruitful to look at the dense interplay of images that he then employs throughout and then maybe chart different emphases.
1) I sometimes attend a bible study where one of the leaders repeatedly argues for a "deist" god who doesn't do much with us. The first verse stands against that notion, of a God who will not rest until Israel's light will shine again.
2) With all of the jokes about marriage, it is difficult for us to grasp that for a land to be B eulah, married, as an aspiration. Look at it as the antithesis of the notion of being desolate and forsaken and it being married to the phrase, my delight in in her. Look at the new name for the entire people.
3) If times are not what they are hoped to be, the marriage metaphor becomes even more powerful. some people stress how much work marriage is, but maybe care is the better word.I think one could use this text to speak of early or late marriage. One could also use it as a powerful image to get at the notion of covenant that has become timeworn.
4) Why is the new name issue so important?
5) Are you willing to employ this image in baptism?
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