Isaiah 63:18-19

18, 19. The people of thy holiness People adhering to principles of the divine holiness, is an expression stronger than the phrase, thy holy people, and is to be preferred. God’s interposition in their behalf is pleaded for in the preceding, and continued in this verse, on the ground that, as the covenant people with God, they held peaceable possession of the land of promise but a little while, because their sins had made him to become their enemy; but now that they return in penitence, they plead for spiritual and eternal possession on the ground of such having been the intent of the covenant on God’s part. Besides, the original and literal promised possession is now trodden down by foes, and this gives reason for his people’s stronger and more persistent pleading. Besides, still further, say they, We are thine. Thy foes are not thy people. They will not have thee as their ruler. We are of old. We belong to the line who always held sacred thy spiritual covenant. Yet “but a little while” have we held spiritual possession.