Isaiah 55:1-13.  This is the end of the last mini message.  This message has been about our future.  What it will be and how we can get there.  The future will be awesome but only if we have allowed God’s Servant, Jesus, to take us there.  We cannot make our relationship right with God on our own so Jesus took our punishment.  His death  in our place made us acceptable to God and an acceptable place for the Spirit of God to live, and to coach or influence.  Eventually there is a permanent place for us in god’s presence, again only if we have put our complete trust in Jesus to get us there.  Remember that the two main ideas of the book of Isaiah have been that God will deal with pride and that he alone deserves to be honored and worshipped.  He will deal with pride because as long as we try to reach him on our won, as long as we insist on trying to fix our broken relationship with him thorough our own actions, we will continue to be separated from him, spiritually dead.

In today’s reading we see just how much we mean to God.  God is still talking here and it’s very personal.  He shouts out to get our attention and then calls to us to satisfy our deep desire.  The book of Ecclesiastes tells us that we all have “eternity in our hearts” (Ecclesiastes 3:11).  One pastor put it this way, “We have a God shaped hole in our hearts”.  He compares our longing to have that hole filled with being thirsty and hungry.  But what we are thirsty and hungry for is a friendship with God.  That is why most people in the world are religious or look for meaning for their lives.  We know we have been made for something for someone, and we search for answers.  And the greatest part of  the real answer is that what we want is free.  God has paid the price, the Servant has paid the price.  According to verse 2 we need to stop trying to fill our selves up and let God provide for us.  But I suppose that might hurt our pride.

Verse 3 makes it clear that these verses are not about food and drink but about our relationship with God.  The idea of living is the idea of being together.  Just like our bodies are alive when our soul or spirit is in them and dead when our spirit or soul leaves them.  We live spiritually when we have a relationship with God and are spiritually dead when our friendship is broken.

Also in verse 3 we see that God is making a promise, covenant, a contract, and it is an everlasting one.  The first contract (at least with the Israelites) was the Law of Moses.  Paul tells us in Romans 3:19-21; 8:3 that that old contract, the law was weak because we are weak and could only point out that we fail in our relationship with God.  Hebrews 8:6-13 tells us that Jesus set up this new contract of covenant between us and God.  This fits in with the description of him as the Servant of God in Isaiah 53 and how he took care of the price of our broken relationship.  So now there is a permanent path back to God, Jesus is that way (see John 14:6).  The end of verse 3 is really talking about the Servant when it mentions David since David is the ancestor of the Servant that the promise of a forever kingdom was made to.  Verses 4-5 are talking about how God is going to have Jesus be a witness to the world and how the world will come to him and he will be a leader.  A real contrast to the picture of the Servant in Isaiah 53.  Jesus is both the suffering servant and the reigning king.

Verses 6-7 tell us to look for God now.  There is a time when he will no longer be available.  We also need to change.  We need to stop living our prideful lives our way and start doing thing that make God happy.  God is very forgiving and if we turn to him he will accept us.  But it has to be according to “his way”.  We need to allow the servant to take care of our sin problem.  We need to accept the free gift, the one with no cost to us.  We need to listen to the words God has used to tell us all of this, only they have the power to change where we will spend eternity.

Verses 12-13 are poetical in Hebrew and that indicates to us that they are the song that ends this last mini message.  And what is the message of this song?  In Genesis 3:17 when the first man, Adam, disobeyed God (that was the first ever sin) one of the main consequences was that the earth would grow lots of weeds.  It would be hard for Adam and the rest of mankind to grow their crops.  Weeds are a constant reminder to us that we screwed up.  Here in the end of Isaiah 55 we see the weeds being taken away.  And that sign will be a forever reminder that God has made things right between us.

God thank you for taking care of that God shaped hole in my life.  Thank yo for putting it there in the first place.  I mean I know that my actions are what has kept us apart but you could have made it so I (we) was numb to our broken relationship.  But instead you placed a desire deep inside so I wuld look for you.  Thank you for doing that.  Thank you for making eternity with you available.  I know that now my life is supposed to draw people to you.  Help me live that kind of life.  And help people see the reality of how bad eternity will be on the outside.  Someone once said that if you are a believer in Jesus this life is as close as you will get to Hell but that if you have rejected Jesus that this life is as close as you will ever get to Heaven.  Lord help people realize that and turn back to you.

Isaiah 54:1-17.  If you have read “The Old Testament Connection” you know that the Old Testament contains God’s history about salvation.  Mankind’s relationship with God is in a mess, which we have made.  But God has a plan to fix the mess.  That’s what we mean by salvation, God has a plan to save us from the consequences of our rebellion and disobedience (sin).  Part of that plan was helping mankind see the problem and that involved the family of a guy named Abraham, not his whole family but those people descended form his grandson Jacob (or Israel, see “What in a Name”).  Those people are known as Israelites or sometimes Jews.  The Jewish people were given the chance of helping see the one true God, Yahweh, for who he is a holy, just, powerful, loving , and forgiving God.  Part of their job was to live by a certain set of rules that he gave to them.  Unfortunately they did not do a very good job (which was actually the point) and eventually their nation began to fall apart.  First it split into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah, then the kingdom of Israel was captured by the Assyrian empire and scattered through out it’s territory.  The other kingdom, Judah, is who Isaiah wrote this book to.

The book actually overlaps the time in history when Israel was taken captive.  Judah was facing the same fate about twenty years later and most of the book is about how Judah should deal with the Assyrian invasion.  Isaiah tells us that he wrote during the reign of four kings in Judah.   About the first third of the book deals with the time of the third king in his list, Ahaz.  Ahaz was faced with invasion by his “cousins” the Israelites who wanted him to fight against Assyria.  Against Isaiah’s warnings he chose to actually make an alliance with the Assyrians.  Ahaz also worshipped false gods from the surrounding kingdoms.  During the reign of Ahaz people were proud, relied on their own strength and wisdom, and mistreated the poor and weak in the kingdom.  The other two thirds of the book deal with a second invasion by Assyria during the reign of Hezekiah.  Unlike his father Hezekiah tried to turn the people back to God.  But there was still much pride and self-reliance.

As the people of Jerusalem (the capital of Judah and place where the temple or center of worship of Yahweh) saw much of their surrounding territory captured and destroyed and their own city put under siege they wondered about all of the promises God had made to the Israelites, from the promise to Abraham to use his descendants to bring goodness to all the world to the promise to David (the second king of the united nation of Israel) to make his kingdom, his dynasty, last forever.  Now that kingdom was on the brink of destruction.

As we have seen in earlier chapters the invasion was stopped when God destroyed 185,000 Assyrian troops outside the walls of Jerusalem in one night.  Before that event though Isaiah gathered together several messages that he had shared with the people before.  He placed them in this book and shared them again with the people.  The messages have been about God’s faithfulness in the past, his instructions for the present (their present, about 702 BC), and reminders of his promises for the future.  In chapters 40-48 we read a lot of the “what” relating to this information and in chapters 49-55 we have been told “how” God is going to fulfill his promises.  The how involved a Servant.  We have seen that the servant will be both a king and one who suffers.  We have also seen that that Servant is Jesus.  So far in history Jeus has been the suffering Servant but a day is coming when he will be the conquering and reigning king, not just of David’s promised forever kingdom but of the who earth.  And his kingdom will be populated by people from all the nations of the earth.

Each of the mini messages recorded in chapters 40-55 have ended with a short song honoring God for who he is and what he is doing in human history.  Today’s reading is in the middle of the last of these mini messages.  Yesterday’s reading described several things that would happen to the Servant as he suffered in the place of each of us.  The Servant, Jesus, took the punishment (or would take if you were hearing this in Isaiah’s time) for our rebellion and disobedience (sin).  Today’s reading starts out with a response to what god has done, how he has provided a way for our relationship with him to be fixed.

In Isaiah 54:1 the people of Judah (but think of them as examples for all of us) are told to shout out in joy.  Why?  Because they have been like a woman trying to have children who has not been able to do so.  God tells them that they will have a bunch of children.  Verse two tells them to make their houses bigger.  But according to verse 3 the bigger houses will not be big enough for all of Judah’s “children” and they will fill the world.

Verse 4 tells them to not be afraid, and idea that filled many of the first mini messages.  They are also told not to feel ashamed or disgraced.  Why?  Because God is like a faithful husband.  According to verses 7-8 God did reject the Israelites but it was only for a time.  The book of Hosea compares God to a man who is married to an unfaithful woman, she cheats on him.  In that book Israel or the Israelites are that woman.  Hosea sends his wife away but then takes her back.  That is the same picture we have here.  God must deal with unfaithfulness, cheating.  We need to see how serious it is to turn our backs on God.  Hebrews 9:27 says it is appointed for each of us to die once and then we will be judged.  According to Revelation 20 at the judgment if we have not turned back to God we will be sent away forever, the second death, a permanent separation from God.  But look atht second half of Isaiah 54:7 and 54:8.  In both of those verses we see that God has great compassion.  The word in Hebrew comes from a root that relates to a mother’s womb.  In other words God loves us like his little babies.  He says in the second half of verse 8 that this love has the quality of everlasting lovingkindness.  The word lovingkindness in Hebrew is “hesed” and it is a huge word.  It contains all the ideas of faithfulness, promises kept, love, care, and commitment.  To add everlasting to something that already contains that idea only magnifies how serious God is about us.  And remember this message is being given to a city under siege who is being asked to trust God and wiat for him to save them.  That would be very hard but we must remember, remember, remember.  When God does good things in our lives we must remember.  And we need to learn the promises he has made and hold onto them.

Verses 9-10 continue to remind and promise.  But notice that God is also aware.  He says “this is like…”  he knows what they are going through and tries to help them understand.  That is awesome.  God wants us to know so we can trust.

Verses 11-16 describe what their city will eventually be like, a lot of precious stones in the walls.  This description is very similar to one in the book of Revelation (Revelation 21:10-27).  That chapter in Revelation describes a time after the main part of human history, after a seven year period at the end of that main part during which most of the promises to Israel will be fulfilled (Daniel 9:24-27), after 1000 years of Jesus reigning over the earth and all the nations on it (Revelation 20:2-7), and after the final judgment of unbelievers (Revelation 20:9-15).  So this part of Isaiah is a promise of a great future, but one that is still distant.  That future though needs to be the ultimate hope for the people of Judah and for us too.  Judah, as I said, would eventually be rescued from their current invasion but they would be taken into captivity about 100 years later and also suffer other times of trouble in their history.  We need to be careful not to doubt God as we pass through our times of trouble.  Remember the trouble in life is something that we (together and individually) brought on.  God is patiently working out the best plan to help the most people miss that final judgment.  So in the mean time we live in the mess we made.

IN the last few verses of today’s reading we again see a reminder of God’s power (he made the guys who make the weapons so we don’t need to worry about them).  Although God has allowed evil empires in the past there is a time coming when he will reign them all in (v. 15) and his servants (think of people who obey him and honor him) will be taken care of.  We will be vindicated by him, that means that God will make it all right.  2 Thessalonians 1:5-10 tell us that when Jesus returns that he will settle the score and punish all the people who have treated his servant badly and have not turned back to him.

God help me see what you are doing for me.  Help me remember what you have done.  Help me remain steady in the face of trouble.  Help be learn your promises and cling onto them.  Help me live for eternity and keep eternity with you as my ultimate and most important goal.  Lord help me.