The children of your bereavement will yet say in your ears: ‘The place is too narrow for me; make room for me to dwell in.’
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
The children which thou shalt have, after thou hast lost the other,.... Which "other lost" are not the Jews, the broken branches, rejected and cut off for unbelief; and the "children after" them not the Gentiles converted, which took their place; but "the other" are such who have been destroyed by the Heathen persecutions, and especially by the antichristian cruelties; and the "children after", the...
children . . . after . . . other--rather, "the children of thy widowhood," that is, the children of whom thou hast been bereft during their dispersion in other lands (see on Isa 47:8) [MAURER]. again--rather, "yet." give place--rather, "stand close to me," namely, in order that we may be the more able to dwell in in the narrow place [HORSLEY].