September Reading from The Message
What are you waiting for in life? A promotion? A new house? Maybe it’s for physical healing or the restoration of a relationship? We’re always waiting for something, and we get impatient as we anxiously await the next best thing. In Isaiah 64, we see that although we find ourselves waiting in this life, we can be confident that God will deliver what we need. In fact, what He brings will be better than what we could ever hope for.
Oh, that you would rip open the heavens and descend,
make the mountains shudder at your presence—
As when a forest catches fire,
as when fire makes a pot to boil—
To shock your enemies into facing you,
make the nations shake in their boots!
You did terrible things we never expected,
descended and made the mountains shudder at your presence.
Since before time began
no one has ever imagined,
No ear heard, no eye seen, a God like you
who works for those who wait for him.
You meet those who happily do what is right,
who keep a good memory of the way you work.
But how angry you’ve been with us!
We’ve sinned and kept at it so long!
Is there any hope for us? Can we be saved?
We’re all sin-infected, sin-contaminated.
Our best efforts are grease-stained rags.
We dry up like autumn leaves—
sin-dried, we’re blown off by the wind.
No one prays to you
or makes the effort to reach out to you
Because you’ve turned away from us,
left us to stew in our sins.
Still, God, you are our Father.
We’re the clay and you’re our potter:
All of us are what you made us.
Don’t be too angry with us, O God.
Don’t keep a permanent account of wrongdoing.
Keep in mind, please, we are your people—all of us.
Your holy cities are all ghost towns:
Zion’s a ghost town,
Jerusalem’s a field of weeds.
Our holy and beautiful Temple,
which our ancestors filled with your praises,
Was burned down by fire,
all our lovely parks and gardens in ruins.
In the face of all this,
are you going to sit there unmoved, God?
Aren’t you going to say something?
Haven’t you made us miserable long enough?
Scripture Insight
A Waiting of Anticipation
Isaiah was as much concerned with the way in which God comes to us as he was about the fact that he comes. The genius of Christian preaching isn’t in proving that God exists but that he acts. Christian discourse isn’t an analysis of God but an adventure with him.
The story of Israel’s faith is that God came to the people in their need; he arranged their salvation and led them into his love. It wasn’t what they had asked for; it was better than they had asked for. It has always been thus, said Isaiah:
Since before time began
no one has ever imagined,
No ear heard, no eye seen, a God like you
who works for those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4)
If we have faith in God’s willingness to act on our behalf, it’s possible to wait for him to act. And the waiting isn’t a waiting of anxiety but a waiting of anticipation. It’s based on the certainty that God is coming.
All Israel’s waiting, and all of our waiting, was fulfilled in the coming of Jesus.
God comes. He comes certainly, but not in ways we can prescribe or predict.
40 Days to Deeper Intimacy with Jesus
Using the text of The Message Bible, Praying the Parables of Jesus is a Bible study that provides holistic, multisensory prompts that encourage readers to not only hear and respond to the Word but also to live into it. This beautiful resource guides you through Jesus’ parables with the practices of Lectio Divina and of Visio Divina. With original art and insight, this devotional immerses you in the contemporary and the ancient.
