Isaiah 49:4

Then I said, I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in vain: yet surely my judgment is with the LORD, and my work with my God.

Then I said. "I" - Messiah.

Laboured in vain - comparatively, in the case of the greater number of His own countrymen, and of His own 'relatives.' "He came unto His own, and His own received Him not" (Isaiah 53:1; ; ; ). Only one hundred and twenty disciples met in the upper room after His personal ministry was ended (). Five hundred are mentioned as having at one time seen Him after His resurrection ().

(Yet) surely my judgment (is) with the Lord, and my work with my God - ultimately God will do justice to my cause, and reward (margin for work, cf. ; ) my labours and sufferings. He was never 'discouraged' (; ; ). He calmly, in spite of seeming ill success for the time, left the result with God, confident of final triumph (Isaiah 53:10; ). So the ministers of Christ (1 Corinthians 4:1; ).