Scripture Daily

Context No. 892 of 4322 · Isaiah

Context · Reflection

Isaiah 64:1-12: in context

1Oh that you would tear the heavens, that you would come down, that the mountains might quake at your presence— 2as when fire kindles the brushwood, and the fire causes the water to boil. Make your name known to your adversaries, that the nations may tremble at your presence! 3When you did awesome things which we didn’t look for, you came down, and the mountains quaked at your presence. 4For from of old men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen a God besides you, who works for him who waits for him. 5You meet him who rejoices and does righteousness, those who remember you in your ways. Behold, you were angry, and we sinned. We have been in sin for a long time. Shall we be saved? 6For we have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteousness is like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. 7There is no one who calls on your name, who stirs himself up to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have consumed us by means of our iniquities. 8But now, LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay and you our potter. We all are the work of your hand. 9Don’t be furious, LORD. Don’t remember iniquity forever. Look and see, we beg you, we are all your people. 10Your holy cities have become a wilderness. Zion has become a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation. 11Our holy and our beautiful house where our fathers praised you is burned with fire. All our pleasant places are laid waste. 12Will you hold yourself back for these things, LORD? Will you keep silent and punish us very severely?

This is a prayer from a people in ruins, and it opens with a cry: oh that you would tear open the heavens and come down, that the mountains would quake at your presence. The prophet remembers when God came down and did wonders they never expected, and then confesses the present misery: we have all become unclean, our righteousness like a filthy garment, we fade like a leaf, no one calls on your name. And then the turn: but now, LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay and you are the potter. The prayer ends looking at the burned temple and the wasted city, asking, will you keep silent and punish us forever?

What makes this prayer so honest is that it holds two things at once without flinching. It confesses real guilt, even our best deeds are like a soiled rag, we have been in sin a long time, God has rightly hidden his face, and at the same time it clings to relationship, but you are our Father, we are your people, we are the work of your hand. It does not excuse the sin to keep the relationship, and it does not let go of the relationship because of the sin. That is the posture the whole Bible keeps teaching, coming to God guilty and still calling him Father, admitting we are clay that has failed while insisting he is the potter who made us and can remake us. The cry for God to tear the heavens open is answered, centuries later, at a Jordan riverbank where the heavens are torn and the Father's voice comes down, and at last at a cross where the temple veil tears. God did come down.

Can I come to God the way this prayer does, telling the truth about my sin and still daring to call him Father in the same breath?

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