Comfort, comfort, my people, says your God. Speak kindly to Jerusalem. Call out to her that her warfare has ended. 40:1-2a.
LORD, thank you for your Word. For your comfort. Thank you for your proclamation that my warfare has ended. I receive this promise. May I walk in it. May you bring it to pass, quickly.
Clear the way for the LORD in the wilderness. 40:3b.
This new season feels like a wilderness right now. Unfamiliar boundaries and territory. Direction over previously untrod ground. Not knowing what the resources are, where to find them, and when they will be available.
I trust you who is the bread of life for manna. Water from you, the Rock. Shoes that will not wear out to share your Gospel of peace. Pillar of fire by night and cloud by day to be led by your Spirit.
Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Let every valley be lifted up, and every mountain and hill made low. Let the uneven ground become a plain, and the rugged terrain a broad valley. 40:3c-4.
Your word in this season is to clear the way for you. But why do you need a straight, level path? Maybe it’s I who needs it, to open up in me and around me for you to do the new work you intend.
To simplify. Make straight. Take obstacles out of the way. Anything that impedes your new calling, this new day. Impediments caused by my old thinking and fears. Impediments of habits, old expectations, old ways of doing things, old wine skins, and shrunk cloths. Impediments caused by circumstances of life that I have caused, whose usefulness, if there ever was any, has expired, and can and should change.
LORD, teach me what these are. Open my eyes to impediments in my life to your new call, to your purposes. And empower me. To overcome inertia. Fears. Traditions. Too familiar ways. To step with freshness and eagerness into your new call. Most importantly, to receive you and welcome you, to follow you in every new way in which you are leading.
All flesh is grass … the people are indeed grass … grass withers … but the Word of our God stands forever. 40:6c-8.
I am mere mortal, and live in a temporary frame. But you are eternal. Your purposes are eternal. Please help me walk in them.
Behold, the LORD God will come with might, with his arm ruling for him. Behold, his compensation is with him, and his reward before him. Like a shepherd, he will tend his flock. In his arms he will gather the lambs and carry them in the fold of his robe. He will gently lead those who have young. 40:10-11.
What contrasts. Triumph and tenderness. Victory, and loving kindness. Judgment, yet with compensation and reward. Lord of lords, and the Good Shepherd. Creator and Father. Judge and Savior. Beginning and the end. Not domineering for dominance sake, but to be pastoral. Truth and grace. Living Word and refreshing, empowering Spirit. This is who you are. I trust you to come with might, tend, carry, and lead.
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