Isaiah 40:1-2 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.
In Chapter 39 Isaiah predicted that Judah would go into exile in Babylon. They did in 586 B.C. However, no sooner than disaster was declared upon God’s people in Chapter 39 there was a declaration of hope for the future that rested in the promise of the Covenant keeping God-YHWH. Isaiah 40 calls for God’s people to stop looking down at their problems and start looking up to their God.
In the midst of disaster YHWH says, “Comfort, Comfort.” The repetition of the word intensifies the affection and fervent love God has for his people and his ability to accomplish his purpose in and through them. Our God is constantly wooing and speaking to his people with the words of comfort. This passage declares that the Children of Israel should comfort one another with the reality of his promise. Your problems have been many and your sin, catastrophic, declared God through His prophet. Now that I have brought you through this disaster, take comfort in ME. I am your God and you are my people.
The Israelites go into exile not because of a lack of God’s power but because of sin. He says in verse 2 “speak tenderly” as to win back their hearts of His people. In spite of and in light of their rebellion God still identified them as “my people.” Now YHWH proclaims that the “hard service” is over as the words here in the passage are military in nature. In other words because God so desires to fulfill his plan through his chosen people Israel they can fall back from work and “demobilize.”
Then YHWH declares some sweet words as He says, “your sins have been pardoned.” This is a beautiful thing to a renegade crew who would have gone into deep despair, confusion and doubt. Without these words they would be blaming God for their predicament and not realizing that exile is not their permanent position. They went into exile in far from their homeland physically and far from feeling like God’s chosen and favored people.
As we journey into Camden to plant a Christ-centered Church, with the help of Almighty God we will seek to show off the Glory of Christ in every area of life! I hear the Lord wooing our team by His Spirit and reminding us of His purpose, plan, and love for Camden. I am encouraged that the Grace of Christ “demobilizes” our feeble attempts to put on our sinful uniforms of false and empty righteousness. The Gospel strips us down and exposes our rebellion and displays how our so-called righteousness is non-existent and how we are actually spiritually, emotionally, financially, and psychologically NAKED! We need to be suited up in the righteousness of Christ that comes by Christ Alone.
Through the Gospel we hear the blood of Christ from the Cross crying out, “You are pardoned! You are released! Your sins have been atoned for!” In a city that almost every agency, surrounding township, and person watching the news media has given up on; in a city where there are more drug dealers than high school graduates: in a city that has seen its mayors removed in handcuffs for criminal behavior; in a city where funding streams have been allocated to cosmetics--the riverfront developments--and not to the people who most need it, can there be any hope? In this historic city, where many of the residents feel outcast, abandoned, neglected, and abused, and where a third of the police force was recently lost on one day, residents wonder if there is hope of renewal and restoration.
EFC declares that right now, in Jesus’ Mighty Name, there is One who has not given up on the people of Camden. There is One whose perfect plan is capable of restoring this city. His name is the Lord Christ! His Gospel is the only authentic tender word. So as a church plant team shall we not declare the comfort of Christ through His Gospel? Shall we not pray that people might cease warring as Christ has suffered all the real warfare with Satan for our sins on the cross? And shall we ourselves not repent and embrace the reality of the pardon that comes from Jesus, as in Him the wrath of God is forever satisfied? Let us pray earnestly and continually that God would be with us and before us in a city in need of a holistic Gospel witness.
Reflection passage: 2nd Corinthians 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.
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