Weekly Bible Reading – Week 30
Last week we stood with Hezekiah while the armies of Assyria surrounded Jerusalem and the threats of Sennacherib seemed impossible to overcome. We watched Hezekiah carry that threatening letter into the temple, spread it out before the LORD, and pray. God answered. Jerusalem was delivered, not because Judah was strong enough to save itself, but because the LORD was faithful to his name and his promises.
That makes this week’s transition into Isaiah 40 especially beautiful. “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.” After chapter upon chapter of warning, judgment, political turmoil, invading armies, and coming exile, God begins to speak words of hope. Judgment will not have the final word. Exile will not have the final word. Israel’s sin will not have the final word. God will come for his people.
And as Isaiah continues, we discover that God’s plan is much bigger than simply bringing Israel home from Babylon. He is going to deal with the deeper exile of sin. He is going to send his Servant. He is going to bear the sins of his people. He is going to gather the nations. And ultimately, he is going to make all things new. This is one of the richest weeks of reading in the entire Old Testament. Let’s enjoy it.
Daily Readings
Day 207 – Isaiah 40-43: “Comfort, comfort my people.” Those words open a new section of Isaiah, and they are like water after walking through a desert. God’s people will experience judgment, but God has not abandoned them. A voice cries in the wilderness that the way of the LORD should be prepared because God himself is coming to rescue his people. Isaiah 40 gives us one of Scripture’s grandest pictures of God. He measures the waters in the hollow of his hand. The nations are like a drop from a bucket. He stretches out the heavens like a curtain. He calls the stars by name. Kings rise and fall, empires come and go, but the LORD does not grow weary. And this unimaginably great God tends his flock like a shepherd. That combination matters. The God strong enough to rule the universe is gentle enough to carry lambs in his arms. Then Isaiah introduces the Servant of the LORD. He will not accomplish God’s purposes through spectacle or brute force. “A bruised reed he will not break, and a faintly burning wick he will not quench.” He will faithfully bring justice, become a covenant for the people, and a light for the nations. So when you reach those familiar words in Isaiah 43, hear them in that context: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.” The God who created the heavens has not forgotten his people.
Day 208 – Isaiah 44-48: One of Isaiah’s favorite targets in these chapters is idolatry, and he exposes how ridiculous it really is. A man cuts down a tree. He burns part of it to warm himself. He uses some of it to cook his dinner. Then he takes the rest, carves it into an idol, bows down before it, and asks it to save him. Isaiah’s point is almost comedic. We keep trying to create gods that we can control. Of course, our idols usually are not carved from blocks of wood. We build them out of money, reputation, politics, comfort, careers, relationships, success, or our own plans. But they are no more capable of saving us. The LORD is different. He is not created. He is the Creator. He does not need us to carry him. He carries us. He does not need history to cooperate with his plans. He directs history toward his purposes. That becomes especially clear with Cyrus. Long before Israel’s return from exile, God names the ruler he will use to accomplish it. Cyrus does not even know the LORD, yet God can direct the decisions of kings and empires to accomplish exactly what he intends. “I am the LORD, and there is no other.” That is not merely a statement about theology. It is an invitation to rest. The future of God’s people does not depend upon everything going according to our plans. It depends upon everything going according to his.
Day 209 – 2 Kings 19, Psalm 46, 80, 135: Today we step back into the history behind some of the prophecies we have been reading. Sennacherib’s army has surrounded Jerusalem. His messengers mock Hezekiah’s trust in God and essentially ask the terrifying question: What makes you think your God will be any different from all the gods of the nations Assyria has already defeated? Hezekiah responds by going to the house of the LORD. He does not pretend the threat is imaginary. Assyria really has crushed nations and burned their gods. But those gods were only wood and stone, the work of human hands. The LORD is different. Hezekiah spreads the letter before God and prays. Then God acts. That story fits beautifully beside Psalm 46: “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” And then comes the command that we desperately need when everything around us feels like chaos: “Be still, and know that I am God.” Being still does not mean pretending nothing is wrong. Hezekiah knew exactly what was wrong. It means knowing that the crisis is not ultimately in control. God is. Kingdoms totter. Nations rage. Armies threaten. Plans collapse. But “the LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.”
Day 210 – Isaiah 49-53: Slow down today, seriously. Isaiah 49-53 contains some of the most important passages in the entire Bible for understanding Jesus and his mission. The Servant of the LORD comes into sharper focus. He is connected with Israel, yet he also has a mission to restore Israel. And restoring Israel is still too small a thing for him. God says: “I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” God’s rescue plan was never small. Then we reach Isaiah 52 and 53. The Servant will be exalted, but first he will be despised. He will be rejected and will suffer, and astonishingly, Isaiah tells us why. “He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities.” “The LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” This is substitution. The Servant suffers for the sins of others. The righteous one bears the guilt of the guilty so that they can be counted righteous. Centuries later, when Jesus walks toward the cross, he is not improvising. He is fulfilling the salvation God promised long before. Jesus did not merely come to show us how to live, He came to bear our sins. The Shepherd became the Lamb.
Day 211 – Isaiah 54-58: What comes after the suffering Servant of Isaiah 53? Joy. Isaiah 54 begins, “Sing!” The barren woman is told to rejoice because God is going to enlarge her family. The disgraced bride is welcomed back by her faithful husband. God’s covenant love will not depart from his people. Then Isaiah 55 opens the doors wide: “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters.” Come without money. Come and eat. God’s salvation cannot be purchased because God himself provides it. These chapters also remind us that receiving God’s grace should transform the way we live. Isaiah 58 confronts people who appear deeply religious. They fast and perform religious rituals, yet they oppress others, quarrel, and ignore those in need. God is not impressed by religious performance disconnected from love. True worship changes the worshiper. Grace received from God begins overflowing toward our neighbors. The invitation of Isaiah 55 and the challenge of Isaiah 58 belong together. We do not serve others so that God will finally love us. We love others because we have freely received the mercy of a God who invited thirsty sinners to come and drink.
Day 212 – Isaiah 59-63: Isaiah 59 begins with a painful diagnosis: “The LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save.” The problem is not that God has become weak. The problem is sin. Isaiah describes a world filled with violence, lies, injustice, and darkness. Humanity cannot repair what it has broken. Then God looks. He sees that there is no one capable of fixing it. So God acts. “He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no one to intercede; then his own arm brought him salvation.” That is the gospel pattern again. We cannot rescue ourselves, so God comes to rescue us. Then the light begins to shine. “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.” Nations are drawn toward the light. Zion is restored. Good news is proclaimed to the poor. The brokenhearted are bound up. Liberty is announced to the captives. Those words from Isaiah 61 should sound familiar. Jesus will eventually stand in a synagogue in Nazareth, read them aloud, sit down, and say, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” Isaiah has been telling us that God will come to save. Jesus announces that he has arrived.
Day 213 – Isaiah 64-66: Isaiah ends with a prayer that should resonate with every believer who has ever looked at a broken world and longed for God to do something about it: “Oh that you would rend the heavens and come down.” Come down. Make your name known. Set things right. But Isaiah also recognizes the problem. We are not merely victims of the world’s brokenness. We participate in it. “All our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.” So Isaiah appeals to God as Father and Potter. “We are the clay, and you are our potter.” The book then ends with something far greater than Israel simply returning from Babylon. God promises: “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth.” That is where the story is heading. The Bible begins with God creating the heavens and the earth. Sin corrupts that creation. Humanity is driven from God’s presence. Violence, death, exile, and rebellion spread. But God refuses to abandon his creation. The final answer to exile is not merely going back to Jerusalem. It is new creation. And Isaiah ends looking forward to a day when the nations will gather, God’s glory will be declared among them, and all flesh will come to worship before the LORD. What an ending. And what a promise.
Deep Dive: Salvation Is Bigger Than Coming Home
One of the easiest ways to misunderstand the prophets is to think their message is simply about Israel leaving their land, spending some time in exile, and eventually returning home. That certainly matters. But Isaiah keeps showing us that Israel’s physical exile points toward something deeper. Humanity has been living east of Eden since Genesis 3. We are all exiles. The deepest problem is not geography. It is sin. That helps explain the enormous scope of Isaiah 40-66. At first, the promise sounds like a new exodus. God will make a way through the wilderness. He will lead his people home. Mountains will be lowered and valleys lifted. Water will spring from the desert. But then the promise grows.
Israel itself needs to be rescued. So God sends his Servant. And strangely, the Servant is both connected to Israel and distinct from Israel. He represents the people faithfully where they have failed. In Isaiah 49, his mission includes bringing Jacob back to God, but even that is “too light a thing.” He will also become a light to the nations so that God’s salvation reaches the ends of the earth. Then comes Isaiah 53. How will the Servant rescue the people? By bearing their sin.
He does not merely lead Israel out of Babylon. He deals with the reason exile exists in the first place. Our transgressions. Our iniquities. Our guilt. And once sin has been dealt with, Isaiah’s vision becomes bigger still. The barren rejoice. The thirsty drink. The nations come. The poor hear good news. The captives are freed. The glory of God rises.
And finally: New heavens and new earth. That is the ultimate end of Christian hope. Sometimes we reduce salvation to, “When I die, I get to go to heaven.” Praise God that believers who die are with Christ. But the Bible’s final hope is even larger. God is redeeming a people and restoring his creation. Jesus did not come merely to help us escape the wreckage. He came to make all things new. And that means whatever feels broken today does not get the last word. Not sin, cancer, war, grief, or death.
The Servant who was pierced for our transgressions has risen. The King is coming. And the God who said, “Comfort, comfort my people” will one day wipe away every reason his people ever needed comforting. We are not wandering toward nowhere. We are following the story toward new creation.