Year 9, Day 27: Isaiah 43

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Isaiah 43 helps us start to make the transition between the Assyrian and the Babylonians.  God defeated the Assyrians and sent them packing, but that wasn’t enough.  The Hebrew people of Judah repented for a little while but then went back to their old ways.  That’s the trouble with humanity.  We repent, we try, but we don’t live sin-free.  We don’t have it within ourselves to be free from sin.

This is why we need a savior.  This is why we need a redeemer.  We need God.  We need Hm because we cannot do it ourselves.  Only God can take us and promise a future when we’ll be able to live the right way.  Only in God do we have that hope.  We can live in this world on our own without Him, but we’ll never get it right forever.  We’ll always make mistakes.  We will always need a God with is other to make us right.

This is why God looks to His people and tells them to fear not.  Yes, God knows they have made mistakes.  God knows that they have gone to their own devices and abandoned His statutes.  He knows this; we cannot hide it from Him.  That being said, that is why He brought Assyria!  That is why He will bring Babylon.  The people are in need of judgment, but not abandonment!  The point of judgment isn’t punishment, it it repentance and redemption!

I love the exchange between god and His people that begins in verse 8. “Bring out the people who have eyes but do not see.”  That is so true for all of us.  We can try the best that we can, but who among us can actually know the future?  We can make the best choices, but they will always be in the moment and not with the full wisdom of God.  Even our choices made with the best of intentions don’t always work.  We have eyes, but we sure can’t see like God can see.

We does He redeem us?  Yes, because we need Him.  That isn’t why He redeems us, though.  He tells us why He redeems us.  He redeems us for His sake.  He redeems us because He is righteous.  He redeems us because He sees that we are in need and He gives us His aid.  He redeems us because it is who he is.  He redeems us because He is God and capable of doing it.

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