Daily Devotion, July 14, 2021

 

Devotion:

Read Isaiah 49:5-6.

If you had to read these verses more than once, you are not alone. These two verses are a part of Isaiah 49:1-7 which is known as the second Servant Song in Isaiah. The first Servant’s Song is Isaiah 42:1-9, and the third and fourth Servant’s songs are Isaiah 40:4-9, and Isaiah 52:13-53:12.

If you are still confused, you are not alone. I was confused, too. God is calling and commissioning this servant with a mission and a message. This message is to be proclaimed not only to the remnants of the Hebrew people who had been in exile, but also to the Gentile people. God not only looks for the remnant people, but for the Gentiles, for God seeks everyone.

God’s message is, “that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Perhaps this servant of the Lord might have said, “Wait, pause, rewind, Lord! I know you are bringing your message of salvation to the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel, but are you really including the Gentiles in your gift of salvation?”  We pause too, when God sends us beyond our comfort zones.

This commissioning from God sends this one to the ends of the earth with this message of “salvation, as a light for all nations.” If we simply take this as a call to offer to the world a form of “cheap grace”---we will miss the depths of all of these Servant’s Songs. These songs come from the voice of the Suffering Servant of God. The suffering comes from taking upon one’s own shoulders, the hurts, heartaches, sufferings and sins of the world. This is God’s gift and message through his servant Isaiah, and through Jesus, his only begotten Son. And we are called by the Holy Spirit to be witnesses of this tremendous costly grace.

Jesus echoed Isaiah’s words throughout his ministry and particularly in Acts 1:8, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” God’s circle is far greater than we could ever imagine!

Personal Worship Option:

Isaac Watts' words from the hymn, “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” remind us that pride causes us to keep the circle too small and that God’s costly grace of “love so amazing and so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.” God seeks everyone.