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“I’ll pour robust well-being into her like a river,
    the glory of nations like a river in flood.
You’ll nurse at her breasts,
    nestle in her bosom,
    and be bounced on her knees.
As a mother comforts her child,
    so I’ll comfort you.
    You will be comforted in Jerusalem.” (The Message).

The above words take me back to Isaiah 40. We end where we started:

”Comfort, comfort my people,
    says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
    and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
    that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
    double for all her sins.” (1,2).

In Isaiah’s vision of the future, Jerusalem will enjoy ”peace…like a river”, ”the wealth of nations like a flooding stream”, and a mother-like ”comfort” (NIV). God’s blessing will be lavish and abundant.

We should also realise that His ”comfort” is real, and it is not to be hoarded:

”Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort,  who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer.  And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.” (2 Corinthians 1:3-7).

I seem to remember an article I read, written by someone – a believer – who admitted that he would go looking for comfort in pale substitutes for God. Then, he said, he learned, in his moments of pain, to pray, ‘Holy Spirit comfort me’, and he found God’s help to be real.

We can all go searching in the wrong places.

PRAYER: Lord, please forgive me for my feeble and futile attempts at self-medication. Rescue me from idolatry, and enable me to find all my satisfaction in you.

‘Rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad for her,
    all you who love her;
rejoice greatly with her,
    all you who mourn over her.
¹¹ For you will feed and be satisfied
    at her comforting breasts;
you will drink deeply
    and delight in her overflowing abundance.’

Many years ago I listened to a talk given by David Pawson, who was a high profile Bible teacher at the time. As I recall, it was entitled, ‘It is time for the Gentiles to repay their debt to the Jews.’ He highlighted how much the world owes to Israel, for all that she has contributed to the development and advancement of the human race, in so many fields.

But how much more does the church owe! In Romans 9:1-5 Paul writes:

 ”I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit— I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. ⁵ Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.”

Barry Webb writes that the church will ‘…always owe a debt to the mother who gave it birth. Zion’s children would always remember that they had been suckled at her breasts, and be thankful (10-11).’ In a footnote he adds: ‘There is a sense, of course, in which the church continues to draw nourishment from its Jewish heritage. The Old Testament is three-quarters of the Christian Bible! Cf. Paul’s image of the root and branches in Rom.11:11-24.’ ‘Isaiah’, p.248.

‘Before she goes into labour,
    she gives birth;
before the pains come upon her,
    she delivers a son.
⁸ Who has ever heard of such things?
    Who has ever seen things like this?
Can a country be born in a day
    or a nation be brought forth in a moment?
Yet no sooner is Zion in labour
    than she gives birth to her children.
⁹ Do I bring to the moment of birth
    and not give delivery?’ says the Lord.
‘Do I close up the womb
    when I bring to delivery?’ says your God.
¹⁰ ‘Rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad for her,
    all you who love her;
rejoice greatly with her,
    all you who mourn over her.
¹¹ For you will feed and be satisfied
    at her comforting breasts;
you will drink deeply
    and delight in her overflowing abundance.’

Long may be the wait during the season of protracted prayer. But when it is the time for God to move – to fulfil His Word – things can happen unusually quickly.

Isaiah is not speaking here about post-exilic Jerusalem, but looking on to the end of history. There is a similarity with Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 15: 51,52a:

”Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— ⁵² in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.”

If we sometimes feel God is not moving fast enough for our liking, we need to remember:

”The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” 2 Peter 3:9.

Hear the word of the Lord,
    you who tremble at his word;
‘Your own people who hate you,
    and exclude you because of my name, have said,
“Let the Lord be glorified,
    that we may see your joy!”
    Yet they will be put to shame.
⁶ Hear that uproar from the city,
    hear that noise from the temple!
It is the sound of the Lord
    repaying his enemies all they deserve.

The opening words of this section link with the second part of verse 2. But honouring God’s Word may get you into trouble (yes, even in the church) with other ‘professing believers’ who don’t see it as you do. They feel free to take liberties with God’s Book. It has to be said that religious persecution can be mean and nasty and cynical, and even violent.

‘What finally divides the true from the false in the church is faithfulness or unfaithfulness to the word of God. Clinging to the promises of God will always seem fanatical and foolish to those who have abandoned them…Religion that loses its anchorage in the word of God either becomes pathetically ineffective, or turns into a monster. Persecution is always ugly, religious persecution especially so, and ecclesiasticism is its native soil.’ Barry Webb: ‘Isaiah’, p.247.

”I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world.” (Jesus: Jn.17:14).

They have chosen their own ways,
    and they delight in their abominations;
⁴ so I also will choose harsh treatment for them
    and will bring on them what they dread.
For when I called, no one answered,
    when I spoke, no one listened.
They did evil in my sight
    and chose what displeases me.’

We have noted this point before, but it is worthy of repetition: we sometimes talk about the problem of unanswered prayer (or apparently unanswered). But God Himself repeatedly faces the problem of an un-answering people.

Why should we expect God to listen to our voices when we don’t listen to His? Mercifully, He does give us His attention, even though we are imperfect beings. But there are times when wilfully holding on to sin (or sins), and refusing to repent, will cause a blockage in our prayer life.

The Isaiah passage shows us that if we go our own way, even though we cover it in a veneer of ‘worship’, it will be ultimately disastrous – unless we turn back to God.

The God who wants our hearts also wants our ears!

PRAYER: ”Oh! give me Samuel’s ear, the open ear, O Lord, alive and quick to hear each whisper of thy word; like him to answer at thy call, and to obey thee first of all.” James Drummond Burns (from the hymn: ‘Hushed was the evening hymn’).

“Your acts of worship
    are acts of sin:
Your sacrificial slaughter of the ox
    is no different from murdering the neighbor;
Your offerings for worship,
    no different from dumping pig’s blood on the altar;
Your presentation of memorial gifts,
    no different from honouring a no-god idol.
You choose self-serving worship,
    you delight in self-centred worship—disgusting!
Well, I choose to expose your nonsense
    and let you realize your worst fears,
Because when I invited you, you ignored me;
    when I spoke to you, you brushed me off.
You did the very things I exposed as evil,
    you chose what I hate.” (The Message).

If you have a building, however glorious (whether it’s the temple or a church), but the people in it do not humble themselves before God and His Word, what you end up with is ”self-serving worship” and ”self-centred worship”. It is a ”form of godliness” but lacking the ”power” (2 Tim.3:5). J.B. Phillips translates this verse: ”They will maintain a facade of “religion”, but their conduct will deny its validity. ” There is something here to steer clear of. Tom Hale says that God ‘detests purely ritualistic acts of worship. He adds that in God’s eyes, such acts are equivalent to brutality and idolatry; they are abominations.’ ‘Applied Old Testament Commentary’, pp.1072,1073.

Barry Webb comments that Isaiah ‘…was not against the temple, but against ecclesiasticism, that ugly distortion of true religion which inevitably reasserts itself where there is no recognition of the greatness of God or heartfelt contrition before him (1-2). ‘Isaiah’, p.247.

Prayer: Dear Lord, how we want to worship you with our whole hearts. Cleanse our services; purify the hearts of the worshippers. Deliver us from ritualism. Cause us to bring to you not only the offering of our lips, but also our lives. When you speak, enable us to hear and obey. Help us to bring to you Spirit-led worship, anchored in your truth. For your glory.

 This is what the Lord says:

‘Heaven is my throne,
    and the earth is my footstool.
Where is the house you will build for me?
    Where will my resting-place be?
² Has not my hand made all these things,
    and so they came into being?’
declares the Lord.

‘These are the ones I look on with favour:
    those who are humble and contrite in spirit,
    and who tremble at my word.

In a sermon on Isaiah 66, the eminent Bible teacher, David Pawson, said words to this effect, ‘It’s not your building that will guarantee you the presence of God, but the kind of people you get in the building. It will have to do with their hearts and attitudes. You can spend huge amounts of time and money on a shiny new building, and it will not guarantee you God’s blessing. This was so under the Old Covenant, with regard to the temple. It remains the case today.

What is God looking for?

Jesus spelled it out in His conversation with the Samaritan woman, and it chimes with Isaiah 66:2:

 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. ²⁴ God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” (John 4:23,24).

What God is looking for turns out to be who God is looking for:

“But there is something I’m looking for:
    a person simple and plain,
    reverently responsive to what I say…” (The Message).

PRAYER: Oh Lord, may I be that person.

This is what the Lord says:

‘Heaven is my throne,
    and the earth is my footstool.
Where is the house you will build for me?
    Where will my resting-place be?
² Has not my hand made all these things,
    and so they came into being?’
declares the Lord.

God is so immeasurably great, so infinitely big, that He cannot be contained in a building. He who made all things could never be confined to a structure of our making. You couldn’t make a building large enough for God.

Stephen declares, in his sermon recorded in Acts 7:

”“However, the Most High does not live in houses made by human hands. As the prophet says:

 “‘Heaven is my throne,
    and the earth is my footstool.
What kind of house will you build for me?
says the Lord.
    Or where will my resting place be?
Has not my hand made all these things?’ (48-50).

At the dedication of the temple King Solomon said, in his prayer:

“But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built!”

The rebuilding of the temple was a project which would occupy the returning exiles, on and off, for twenty years. Isaiah was not against this. Far from it. He ‘saw the future rebuilding of the temple as a sign of the approaching end, a sacrament of the coming kingdom. But at the same time he was painfully aware of the capacity of human beings to misuse it; to focus on the temple instead of the God of the temple, to corrupt it with perfunctory and impure worship. Isaiah understood very well that physical restoration was not enough. Unless there was spiritual renewal the future would simply repeat the sins of the past. He was not against the temple, but against ecclesiasticism, that ugly distortion of true religion which inevitably reasserts itself where there is no recognition of the greatness of God or heartfelt contrition before him (1-2). Where this is lacking, worship, in whatever building, becomes no better than pagan superstition, angering God and calling forth his righteous judgment (3-4).’ Barry Webb: ‘Isaiah’,pp.246/247.

I will answer them before they even call to me.
    While they are still talking about their needs,
    I will go ahead and answer their prayers! (NLT).

This probably refers to every need being met in the new creation. Nevertheless we do even now have remarkable foretastes of this truth in our own lives, where God meets a need even before we get to articulating it before Him. It is important to pray, but sometimes there can be wonderful answers to prayers not yet prayed.

‘God will anticipate their prayers with the blessings of his goodness. The father of the prodigal met him in his return. God’s readiness to hear prayer appears much more in the grace of the gospel than it did under the law.’ Matthew Henry.