Tag: prophet isaiah

Isaiah 6:1-5

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year CLeave a comment
            Isaiah saw a vision of God in his throne room.  It was a grand, majestic, and transcendent vision of a God who dominates the entire setting.  The train of God’s robe filled the temple.  This is Isaiah’s way of saying that the vision he saw was a really big one.  God is immense and huge.  It is vital that we see the bigness of our God.  Gaining a vision of the hugeness of God is what causes our human problems to be seen as small.
 
            We are to take our cues from the seraphs that were worshiping God.  They were in the presence of God’s immensity and the seraphs gave unceasing praise.  A seraph is an angel with the job description to glorify God with continual adoration.  The seraphs physical description symbolizes their function:  covering their face symbolizes humility in God’s presence; covering their feet identifies that they are on holy ground; and, flying symbolizes their work to do God’s bidding. 
 
            So, then, the seraphs have two-thirds wing power for worship, and one-third wing power for work.  If this is any kind of indication how God’s creatures are to conduct their lives, we as humans have a great deal of life-adjustment to make in order to accommodate the worship of God into our lives. 
 
            Perhaps we see our problems as so large because we have a small view of God.  This must be inverted so that we see a big God who can take care of our puny situations.  The only way this is going to happen is if we have a vision of God, and the only way having a vision of God is going to occur is if we put ourselves in a position to see God. 
 

 

            Holy God, you are very large and very in charge over all your creation.  When I contemplate your bigness, I realize how small I am and how much I really need you.  My life is yours.  Here I am.  I belong to you. Amen.

Isaiah 11:1-9

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year CLeave a comment
            No more appropriate Scripture could be highlighted during the season of Advent:  “And the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD.”  As Christians, we believe this is a prophecy of Jesus in whom all of these virtues exist in wonderful perfection and practice.
 
            Jesus has so clearly identified with us that we are in a vital union with him.  He still exists here on earth in the person of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus was sent by the Father.  With the Father and the Son, the Spirit was sent to press the redemptive events of Jesus into the believer’s heart.  This is basic robust Trinitarian theology.  But these are not abstract ideas.  Prayer, discernment, and listening are the pathways forward to discovering the wisdom, counsel, and knowledge we need in order to live and serve well as Christians.
 
            In many quarters of Christianity the church exists as a mere stump of its former existence.  In many Christians’ daily experience the Spirit has been supplanted by individual ingenuity, hard work, and getting ahead through accumulation of more and more.  Basic Christian spirituality is a mere shadow of its former influence.  If we again desire the Spirit of the Lord to rest upon us, we will seek Christ as of foremost importance.  Let this Advent season be a time of renewal as we take the prophecy of Isaiah to heart.
 

 

            Righteous God, you have not forgotten your people.  Thank you for fulfilling all your good promises to us in Christ.  I seek you for everything so that I might do your work and implement your will instead of trusting in my own abilities.  May Jesus be glorified and praised through the work of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Isaiah 26:1-15

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
            Today demonstrates and illustrates why I often make a big deal about following a more liturgical way of life through observing the Church Calendar or Christian Year.  How we live our lives through the time we have been given is not a neutral thing; it matters to God.  In my typical procrastinating manner, I just finished writing checks to the U.S. Treasury and the State of Wisconsin on this secular anti-holiday we have dubbed “Tax Day.”
 
            The Old Testament lectionary reading for today reminds me who is in charge, who I can really trust, and who is my true source of peace.  “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.  Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock.”  Keeping secular time usually stresses me out.  But remembering God by journeying with the life and work of Jesus through the Christian Year does not apply pressure to me; it unburdens me by re-orienting my sense of time, commitment, and responsibility back to where it ought to be: in Christ.
 
            I may not be rich.  Uncle Sam might squeeze more out of me than I like.  But I believe I am wealthy in a right, good, and important way.  I’ve been ordained to know and experience peace solely because of God’s love in Christ.  Tonight my head will rest with peace on my pillow, not because of a full bank account, but because I am united with Jesus in his death and resurrection.
            God of peace, you make level the path of your righteous people.  No matter what the circumstances might be, manifest your presence in me to such a degree that I will walk with Jesus with freedom and enjoyment through the enablement of your Spirit.  Amen.

Isaiah 49:5-15

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
            Restoration is a major theme in the prophetic books of the Old Testament.  In this passage of Isaiah, God speaks of bringing Israel back to her original calling and purpose.  This would be accomplished through not just one nation but in the Messiah.  The scope and vision of what the Savior would do is enunciated by God:  “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”
 
            In other words, Messiah is not just for Israel – Christ is given to reach the entire planet.  Jesus did not come to earth only to gather the Jewish nation back together like some sort of Bill Gaither Homecoming tour.  Instead, Messiah’s place and power is so significant that it is to be shared with everyone in the world.  Although Israel was to be a holy entity and separate from the surrounding culture, they were always to be a light to the nations.
 
            This has great import for the church and every individual believer in Jesus.  The church is not just to be like a country club that caters to club functions and members.  Instead, a missional understanding of church is to be at the forefront of Christian theology and practice because it has always been God’s vision to reach the nations.  The Lord is not satisfied with only catering to a specific people; God wants everyone.  And until believers grasp this heart of God for all persons the church will not be what it is designed to be:  a missionary enterprise that is to put all its resources into shining the light of Christ to every nook and cranny of creation.
 
            It behooves each of us, then, to be taught, trained, and led into God’s missionary heart for all.  Let us build caring relationships and extend loving actions not just to those within the church but toward those outside our fellowship so that God’s intentions are carried out and his prophecy fulfilled in Jesus’ name.
            Restoring God, you bring us back to close relation and fellowship so that we might extend your gracious purposes throughout the world.  Revive us again, God, so that we can hear your call to the nations through our Savior, Jesus Christ.  Amen.