Readings:
Isaiah 65-66
Proverbs 29

Isaiah 65-66

It’s kind of heartbreaking to hear God lamenting like this, that he was ready to forgive and reconcile but nobody ever came to him.

I was ready to be sought by those who did not ask for me;
I was ready to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, “Here am I, here am I,”to a nation that did not call on my name.

Isaiah 65:1

This made me think of the prodigal son, and how many times his father would’ve looked out to see if he was coming home. He was ready to bring him back into the fold at any time, but he had to come home.

This was the same with Israel. God was standing with open arms, but nobody came over the horizon on a journey back to reconciliation with their father in this story.

God once again promises to preserve a remnant to inherit the promises of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He also gives a little bit of a glimpse of not just Jerusalem after the exile, but the new Jerusalem of heaven.

Isaiah ends with a prophecy that the remnant that God preserves will eventually go out to all nations and bring people to worship God and honor his name, and he says he’ll even make some of them priests. Under the old covenant that is not possible, because people from far away lands couldn’t possibly be of the line of Aaron. But in the new covenant the priests are not hereditary, they are called from all peoples.

Tomorrow’s Readings:
1 Chronicles 1-3
Proverbs 30
James 1