Justice is far from us, and righteousness does not overtake us; we hope for light, and behold, darkness, and for brightness, but we walk in gloom.Isaiah 59:9 What hope is there for believers who have neglected justice? The answer is God: “Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear” (59:1). But here’s the problem: “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does no...
May 28, 2024•3 min
The LORD saw… that there was no justice.Isaiah 59:15 Isaiah 59 paints an astonishing picture of the world in his day and of our culture today, using three broad brushstrokes. 1. Truth. “Truth has stumbled in the public squares, and uprightness cannot enter. Truth is lacking” (59:14–15). Isn’t that right where we are? Our whole culture has been taken with the idea that truth is just the way you see it; it's what’s true for you. When truth stumbles in the streets, justice falters in the courts. 2....
May 27, 2024•3 min
“Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.”Isaiah 58:8 See what happens when God’s people get a fresh vision for justice: “Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily” (58:8). When? When you “share your bread with the hungry” (58:7). “Then… your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of the LORD shall be you...
May 26, 2024•3 min
“Is such the fast that I choose, a day for a person to humble himself? Is it to bow down his head like a reed, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover hi...
May 25, 2024•3 min
“Declare to my people their transgression, to the house of Jacob their sins.”Isaiah 58:1 God says to Isaiah, “Declare to my people…” (58:1). Notice what God says about His own people and see if you think this describes Christians today. These people were diligent about their personal relationship with God, serious about worship and serious about studying the Bible: “They seek me daily and delight to know my ways” (58:2), and they were serious about prayer and fasting: “They ask of me righteous j...
May 24, 2024•3 min
Do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?Romans 2:4 Repentance begins with a sense of God’s mercy. The natural inclination of your sinful heart will always be to run and hide from God, but when you are persuaded of God’s mercy, you will gather the courage to repent. That’s why faith comes logically and psychologically before repentance. The two are born in the heart together, but repentance flows...
May 23, 2024•3 min
“Because of the iniquity of his unjust gain I was angry, I struck him; I hid my face and was angry, but he went on backsliding in the way of his own heart. I have seen his ways, but I will heal him; I will lead him and restore comfort to him.”Isaiah 57:17–18 How does God make a stubborn heart contrite? The stubborn heart is not changed by judgement; it is changed by mercy. Notice, God is provoked by “the iniquity of… unjust gain.” He is angry. He strikes in punishment. He hides His face. And wha...
May 22, 2024•3 min
“I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes.”Ezekiel 36:26–27 We need to pray for repentance. But you may be asking, “Isn’t repentance something God tells us to do?” In other words: Is repentance something God commands, or is it something He gives? Repentance is a command. God “commands all people everywhere to rep...
May 21, 2024•3 min
You were wearied with the length of your way, but you did not say, “It is hopeless”; you found new life for your strength, and so you were not faint.Isaiah 57:10 Isaiah is describing the stubborn heart. If you are battling an addiction, or you love someone who is, you know exactly what Isaiah is talking about here. You know this is killing you, but you still do it. The sinner gets tired and wearied of his sin but he will not give it up. He finds strength and energy to repeat the same destructive...
May 20, 2024•2 min
“Because of the iniquity of his unjust gain I was angry, I struck him; I hid my face and was angry, but he went on backsliding in the way of his own heart.”Isaiah 57:17 The natural inclination of the human heart is not to come to God, but to hide from Him. That goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden, where you find God coming into the garden to enjoy fellowship with Eve and with Adam. And where are they? Hiding among the trees. Why? Because they are ashamed (Gen. 3:8). We like to think of o...
May 19, 2024•3 min
“I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.”Isaiah 57:15 Look at what God is saying and try to take it in: “I dwell… with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit” (57:15). God dwells with the person who is contrite. Contrite means “penitent,” humbled by our own sins and failures, seeking after God. God says, “When I see a person with a contrite spirit, I will choose him...
May 18, 2024•2 min
“I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit.”Isaiah 57:15 In the year 722 BC, right in the middle of Isaiah’s ministry, the northern kingdom was overrun by the Assyrian army. The people were deported, forcibly relocated to foreign lands, and they would never see Jerusalem again. Then 150 years later, something even worse happened. The Babylonian army marched against the southern kingdom and destroyed the Holy City. The ark of the covenant was lost...
May 17, 2024•3 min
Thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place…”Isaiah 57:15 God is present everywhere-but where can you find Him? One place is in heaven: God says, “I dwell in the high and holy place." If you could ascend to heaven, you would find God there. God’s people in Old Testament times knew another place where they could find God. When they came out of Egypt, He told them to build an ark—a rectangular box housed in a tent, whe...
May 16, 2024•3 min
“Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; hear, that your soul may live… Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.”Isaiah 55:2–3, 7 The people who go out in joy and are led forth in peace (55:12) are those who develop the habit of hearing God’s Word and receiving it with faith and re...
May 15, 2024•3 min
Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price… Seek the LORD while he may be found.”Isaiah 55:1, 6 Seven hundred years after Isaiah, our Lord Jesus took up these words: “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink” (John 7:37). This is something for you to do. How can you cultivate your joy in Jesus? You come to Him. It begins with believing, but it does not end there. Because you believe, y...
May 14, 2024•3 min
“Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat!”Isaiah 55:1 The ones who find joy in God are the people who have discovered a deep thirst in their own souls: “Come, everyone who thirsts” (55:1), and those who feel that they are bankrupt: “Come… he who has no money” (55:1). They realise they don’t have what it takes to get what they need. You can’t ask God to restore your soul until you know that your soul needs restoring. That’s why the barren woman, ...
May 13, 2024•3 min
"O afflicted one, storm-tossed and not comforted, behold, I will set your stones in antimony, and lay your foundations with sapphires. I will make your pinnacles of agate, your gates of carbuncles, and all your wall of precious stones.”Isaiah 54:11–12 The ruined city is being rebuilt, not with brick and mortar, but with sapphires and precious stones. John takes up this theme of the city built with precious stones in Revelation 21—making it clear that Isaiah is talking about the New Jerusalem, th...
May 12, 2024•3 min
“You shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.”Isaiah 55:12 You might expect that the barren woman, the deserted wife and the people who live in the ruined city are the unhappiest people in the world. But Isaiah sees joy in these unlikely places. The barren woman is singing! The abandoned wife knows that she is loved. The ruined city is rebuilt, not with brick and mo...
May 11, 2024•3 min
“For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed,” says the Lord.Isaiah 54:10 Isaiah 54 paints three scenes of sorrow in verses 1, 6, and 11. The choice of these scenes is significant because our natural inclination is to seek happiness in three places: children, marriage and money. 1. The barren woman: “Sing, O barren one, who did not bear; break forth into singing and cry aloud!” (Isa. 54:1). ...
May 10, 2024•3 min
Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame.Hebrews 12:2 The desire for joy is universal. One thing that unites us all is that we want to be happy. The famous mathematician and physicist Blaise Pascal said, “All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in bo...
May 09, 2024•3 min
“I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life.”Genesis 45:4-5 If you look at the story of Joseph through the frame of unbelief, it is a catalogue of disasters: 1. He was born into a dysfunctional family, where his brothers beat him up and sold him into human trafficking. 2.His sexual integrity caused him to lose his job and spend years in prison, after his boss’s wi...
May 08, 2024•3 min
They still did not believe in him, so that the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: “Lord, who has believed what he heard from us, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”John 12:37-38 When a picture is put in a new frame, that same picture can look entirely different. Before it was placed in the new frame, you barely noticed it hanging on the wall, but now it draws your eye and becomes a very attractive feature. Many people view their lives in the old frame called un...
May 07, 2024•3 min
Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.Psalm 42:5-6 The psalmist models for us what it looks like to address our own souls. Notice, he does not simply listen to his own feelings and thoughts, he speaks to himself. He asks himself questions, and he encourages himself with reasons to hope in God. Every day, you have to reset your soul to embrace, believe, live on and rejoice in all that Jesus Christ...
May 06, 2024•3 min
Who has believed what he has heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?Isaiah 53:1 Who believes the gospel message? That is Isaiah’s question: “Who has believed what he has heard from us?” He’s asking God’s people, those who are known by God’s name. Then he asks a second question: “To whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?” Who gets it? Who gets the life- changing power of what God has done in Jesus Christ? You may say, “I do. We do. It’s in our statement of faith. We...
May 05, 2024•2 min
Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied.Isaiah 53:11 You are an eternal being. And if you have faith in Jesus Christ, the suffering you know in this world is the only suffering you will ever know in your entire life. Think about your eternity. What part is 10, 20, or 30 years in the light of eternity? Isaiah is telling us that what Jesus did on the cross, He did freely and gladly; counting the joy of your redemption greater than the pain of His suffering. The risen Lord alre...
May 04, 2024•3 min
But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healedIsaiah 53:5 What kind of heaven would it be if there were no cancer, but there was still human trafficking? What kind of hope would it be to have no death, but still to have sexual abuse? What joy would there be in a heaven that was divided by race? In order to free the world from human trafficking, sexual abuse, and racism, you have ...
May 03, 2024•2 min
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul.Psalm 23:1-3 How does God restore your soul? By leading you to Jesus Christ. This is what He was doing through the ministry of Isaiah 700 years before the birth of Jesus, and this is what He wants to do in your life today. Isaiah 53 is one of the clearest statements in the Bible of what Jesus has accomplished for His people. Here is the first thing Jesus has don...
May 02, 2024•2 min
“This people draw near with their mouth and honour me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me.”Isaiah 29:13 The London underground system is a marvellous way of getting around the city. However, some of the station platforms are on a curve, which means that there is a gap between the edge of the platform and the side of the train. If you are in one of these stations, there is a looped recording that plays every time the train comes in: “Mind the gap. Mind the gap.” You can even get L...
May 01, 2024•3 min
You are not your own. for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.1 corinthians 6:19-20 Knowing that you will one day be raised and given a resurrection body, how should you live in your present body? Recognise that you are wholly owned by Jesus Christ. Christ has the right to determine where you live and what you do. He bought you with His own blood, and over every area of your life Jesus Christ says, “Mine.” You are not your own. Your life is His to spend, and the great calli...
Apr 30, 2024•3 min
The resurrection body will be imperishable and glorious. How else will it be different from our present bodies? Your body will be powerful: “It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power” (1 Cor. 15:43). Donald Macleod says that the resurrection body is going to have more energy, more stamina, more athleticism, more speed, more coordination, and more durability than it ever had—because we’re not going to need the body less, we’re going to need it and use it more. Think about what this will mean ...
Apr 29, 2024•3 min
