The True Fast (By Rev. Deacon Margaret Friesen)

TEXT: Isaiah 58-61

OBSERVATION
If you have not been able to keep up with the readings, please take some time to watch the two Isaiah videos. You might also want to read last week’s Bible Blogs.

• As noted previously, Isaiah is full of prophecies about the Messiah and promises for a future hope. In today’s chapters, we hear about the kind of fasting God desires, then a chapter that decries the blatant sins of the Hebrew people, and then a triumphal declaration of the return of the captives and then the Messianic news that the Lord has anointed Jesus who has come to free the captives.
• Chapter 58 – The true fast.
• Chapter 59 – Injustice and transgressions will reap only more evil.
• Chapter 60 – How incredible it will be when the exiles return to home – full of celebration and joy.
• Chapter 61 – God has anointed Jesus the Messiah; God is anointing us, the church to do good on the earth; to proclaim liberty, to comfort those who mourn, to bring praise rather than a faint spirit.

 
INTERPRETATION

• We are told that the outward signs of fasting are totally inadequate. God seems to be saying that only when fasting leads to changes that will see the hungry get fed, the naked being clothed, the prisoners freed, and the needy being comforted—that’s when God is honoured.
• Notice the poetry in these chapters – highly descriptive language is used and concepts are repeated in colourful paired phrases… (58:8) your light shall break forth like dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly…(11) you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water whose waters never fail”.

The poetry stimulates me to think in pictures and to imagine what could be—to tap into my own creativity.
 
APPLICATION
There is much to think about in all these chapters –what is true fasting and why do it? What does God promise his people  in response to a true fast (58:8-14)?
How does God view our sins and wickedness (59:1-18)?
The return of the exiles is beyond description for the joy (60:17).
Who is the Anointed One? And what does God promise to do through this Messiah?
 
QUESTION
Have you heard God’s call to you to bring good news to those who are oppressed? To those who are broken-hearted? This is God’s call, not just to the individual but to the church as a whole. Take some time to reflect on God’s call to you, to us—the church.

PRAYER
Ah Lord God, we are a broken and exiled people who call to you for mercy. We ask for help in our need. We pray for full salvation for our body, mind, spirit. Show us the path that leads into Your Presence. And please use us in your kingdom.
 
Song: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus