The prophet Isaiah had a lot of things to say, and quite literally he had a captive audience. The people of Israel had been captured by the Babylonians and taken into exile. The Babylonian army believed that if they took a group of people out of their homeland, they would be more easily converted to the new government and rulers. So the people were trapped away from their homes. Isaiah was with them and he was their prophet.
As we have discussed before, Prophecy is and isn’t…prophecy is not the ability to “see the future” or “predict the end of the world.” Prophecy is the ability to have a connection with God, so that you are open to communicating God’s word and therefore you can tell people what God needs to say…but more than that it’s the ability to tell people what *CAN* happen if things do or do not change. The most important job of the prophet then is to give both a dose of reality and a dose of hope.
This passage in Isaiah is a dose of hope for the people of Israel. Hear again these words that Isaiah shares with the people:
Don’t remember the old things or consider the old days. I am about to do a new thing, can’t you see it? I’m going to make a way in the wilderness and water in the desert. Even the animals will praise me. I give my people everything they need—these are MY people and I formed them for myself so that they might give me praise.
These words gave hope to the Israelites…and we can use them today to give US hope. Hope for the journey to the cross, but hope for a resurrection community as well. Isaiah’s words ring true for us today, even if they were not spoken or written directly to us.
God pushes the people to think about things in a new way.
First, Isaiah says:
Do not remember the former things, or consider things of old. Now, he’s not telling people to completely forget the past…the things that God has done for them previously. What Isaiah IS telling them is that they should not dwell on the past. You know those quotes? The ones that say things like…you can’t change the future by repeating the past… or If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always got. Isaiah is reminding the people that dwelling on the past will not provide answers to the future. Yes…we should respect and honor the past, but we can’t pitch a tent and camp out there if we intend to move on into the future. To move boldly into the future, we must do things differently. We must “do a new thing”.
Isaiah tells the people that God is indeed “doing a new thing.” God was about to do a new thing — a different thing for the people of Israel. God's description of Israel's coming Exodus from Exile sounded like it would be different from the original Exodus. The days coming would be glorious in a different way. This is God’s way of saying, “Look what I’ve got in store for you...you just have to make a few changes in order for it all to work out”. See, for me, this is a new way of looking at the world…God isn’t just saying that there’s something new about to happen, but God pushes the people to think about things a new way…to look at the world as a place of possibility instead of a place of exile. There really are only two ways to look at any situation…is it a situation of exile, or a situation of possibility… and this scripture, this word from God is saying. STOP DWELLING IN EXILE and START LOOKING AT THE POSSIBILITIES!
This is the part of the Lenten journey where we know what is coming and we dread it.
Further…Isaiah makes it clear that these possibilities are all around. God is making a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Now, Isaiah does not say that God is making a nice paved road that is easy to travel, nor does he say that the river will be full of fish or never flood. But it *is* a road that will lead the Israelites back out of exile and it is a river that will provide water and sustenance. God doesn’t promise that things are going to be smooth and that everything is going to work out perfectly all the time. What God DOES promise is that the exile will end and that God will share in a “new thing” with God’s people. God is doing something extraordinary in the midst of something painful, and all God asks in return is that God’s people…God’s chosen people…do the thing they were created to do. God only asks for praise and worship.
This scripture is part of our Lenten Journey because it challenges us with the “wilderness” we are experiencing as we get closer and closer to Good Friday. This is the part of the Lenten Journey where we know what is coming and we dread it…a part of us aches at the thought of Jesus on that cross…of his horrible last days…of his burial, but know we have to get through all of that in order to celebrate Easter Sunday. On Easter Sunday, God did a NEW THING and we get to experience that in the resurrection…but before that day, we have to finish our time together in the desert…
And looking around, it’s easy to get taken in by all of the desert around us. We feel our own exile…we feel the weight of the world around us and we can see the need for hope. We can understand how the Israelites might have felt out there…so far from all the things they had wanted…so far from all the promises and joy that was supposed to come. So far from the realization of all our dreams. Yes…there’s a lot of wilderness ahead of us. Not just for the remaining dark days of lent and the crucifixion of Jesus but in our own individual lives and in the life of our church.
We must remember that we were created to praise God and that God WILL give us what we need to make it.
But Isaiah is a prophet…he is a hope-bearer. He has things to tell the Israelites and it’s a message that bears significance today. There is GOOD NEWS! God will provide a path out of the wilderness…it may be a path fraught with dangers and difficulties, but there IS a path. God will give us life and sustenance in our journey. And most importantly, we don’t do this alone! The prophet Isaiah ASSURES us that God is with us on our Journey and that God will sustain and protect us as we journey OUT of the wilderness.
And the only thing God expects in return is for us to do the thing we were created to do. Praise. We God’s people…people formed by God, CHOSEN by God, and CREATED by God for one primary purpose…that we might declare God’s praise. Everything else is secondary. God will bring us out of the wilderness…God will give us life and sustenance, God will be the source of our Hope.
And all we have to do is praise. In the midst of our own wilderness journeys, in the midst of our Lenten journey, we must remember that we were created to praise God and that God WILL give us what we need to make it. Leave the past to the past, don’t worry about the wilderness all around. Just know that God’s about to do a new thing here.
But what IS that new thing? Well, I think God has been doing a new thing in what we’ve built here together. And I believe that God is doing a new thing in helping us to hear scripture in new ways and consider new possibilities for how God calls us to love one another. The work within ourselves might just be the new thing God is doing! I’m so excited to see what happens next.