Verse 12. - Let them give glory unto the Lord... in the islands; i.e. "let those who are in the islands," or the maritime tracts, "give glory to God" - a repetition of the last clause of ver. 10. The persistency with which the islands, or the maritime tracts of the west, are mentioned (Isaiah 41:1, 5; Isaiah 42:10, 12; Isaiah 49:1, etc.) may perhaps be accounted for by the fact that Christianity was to obtain its earliest and its most enduring triumphs in these regions.

42:5-12 The work of redemption brings back man to the obedience he owes to God as his Maker. Christ is the light of the world. And by his grace he opens the understandings Satan has blinded, and sets at liberty from the bondage of sin. The Lord has supported his church. And now he makes new promises, which shall as certainly be fulfilled as the old ones were. When the Gentiles are brought into the church, he is glorified in them and by them. Let us give to God those things which are his, taking heed that we do not serve the creature more than the Creator.Let them give glory unto the Lord,.... For all the great and good things he has done for them, in sending his Gospel to them, calling them by his grace, enlightening their minds, and revealing his Son in them, and making them partakers of the blessings of his grace, and entitling them to eternal glory and happiness:

and declare his praise in the islands; as on the western continent, and the isles of it; so on the eastern continent, and the islands of it, the islands of Greece, the islands in the Aegean sea.