Kings will be your foster fathers, and their queens your nursing mothers. They will bow to you facedown and lick the dust at your feet. Then you will know that I am the LORD; those who hope in Me will never be put to shame.”
Two things are here promised, which were to be in part accomplished in the reviving of the Jewish church after its return out of captivity, but more fully in the planting of the Christian church by the preaching of the gospel of Christ; and we may take the comfort of these promises. I. That the church shall be replenished with great numbers added to it.
Commenting on Isaiah 49:18-23
And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers,.... Who shall show favour and respect to the church and people of God, grant them liberty, and protect and defend them in their religious privileges: for this is to be understood not figuratively of apostles and apostolical men, as Jerom, who are kings and priests unto God, and who feed the church...
lick . . . dust--that is, kiss thy feet in token of humble submission. for they . . . not . . . ashamed . . . wait for me--The restoration of Israel shall be in answer to their prayerful waiting on the Lord (Isa 30:18-19; Psa 102:16-17; Zac 12:10; Zac 14:3).