The Servant’s Mission - Remember What God’s Done to Trust Him for What’s to Come
Isaiah 51:1-16
Jordan Byrd
I’m a child of the late 1900’s (...or 1990’s, LOL), So some memories of my childhood were captured or re-membered through watching home videos on VHS tape. Re-watching these memories helped remind me: Who I am. Where I’ve come from. And what shaped me for the present and the future. Today, the Good news I hope you’ll hear from God’s word in Isaiah 51 is this: Remembering what God’s done helps us trust Him for what's to come.
My Facebook account recently got hacked, I got locked out of it. And had to start a new account from scratch. Facebook has become a functional time-capsule for many of us. Memories popping-up – reminding us of the past: Who we’ve lived life with. Where we’ve lived life. And how those experiences shaped us for today. Since I had to re-start my Facebook account from scratch, I no longer had memories that popped up. Because there isn’t a history of experiences to pull from now. I lost access to almost 20 years worth of “imaged” pieces of my past experiences: College experiences. Friendship experiences. Family experiences. Connections to people. Places I’ve visited. Original thoughts and opinions I had. And meaningful quotes I shared.
When we forget our past – whether in this way, or other ways – it’s easier to doubt: Who really are my friends? Who do I belong with? What have I done with my life? Where do I come from? What am I known for? And the answers to those questions often shape how we make sense of our present and our future.
This is the context of Isaiah 51. God’s people had forcibly been sent into exile: Removed from their homeland in ancient Israel to other locations in the ancient Mediterranean. Removed from their Jewish way of life to foreign and unfamiliar ways of life. Removed from their leaders, neighbors, and relatives to oppressive leaders, segregation, and loneliness.
Have you ever started watching a tv show, all to find out it only aired for one season. The show abruptly ended, with no conclusion on the horizon. That is kind of how the story of the exiles went. They were living in the story God began through their forefather, Abraham. And then all of a sudden, their story was interrupted, with no more future restoration on the horizon. How often does your life feel like that? Where your life’s story gets interrupted? Job loss. A person close to you dies. You get a horrible diagnosis. Someone close to you causes un-imaginable hurt to you. Whatever it is, we get the feeling of having our life’s story interrupted.
And along with those interruptions, we find our life’s story taken over by competing story-lines: The exiles of Isaiah 51 experienced this. They were first forced to live into the Assyrian story. Then the Babylonian story. And then, by the time of Isaiah 51, they were forced to live into the Persian story. Through oppression and many years in a foreign land, among foreign people, and amidst non-Jewish ways of life – the exiles became shaped by these new stories. These foreign stories became the new, obvious story-line – for how they understood the world.
We see examples of this throughout Isaiah 51:2, their homeland is still in ruins and a wasteland, many years later. In Isaiah 51:4-5 and 13-14, the injustice and wrath of their captors has become a normal experience for them. In Isaiah 51:7, and 12-13, we see that their captors reproach and cast insults at them non-stop, leading to a constant state of fear. In Isaiah 51: 9, we see that they’ve been beaten so much, that they feel weak, without strength, to do anything about their situation. In Isaiah 51:11-12, we see sadness and sorrow has become their normal emotional state, because of their captivity.
In a similar sense, we too experience this same reality. Our stories get interrupted and taken over by competing story-lines: For followers of Jesus, we strive to live in God’s story, but competing story-lines interrupt, and pull us away from God’s story-line. The socially progressive story. The nationalistic: America First story. The “what makes me happy story.” The “climbing the company ladder” story. The “you only live once” story. The “make a name for myself” story. The “I have to be the hero (solve everything)” story. These are just some examples of competing story-lines that interrupt and pull us away from living in God’s story.
This is the same reality of the exiles in Isaiah 51. They became in-undated with unGodly story-lines and now they’ve shaped them. They’ve shaped them to see the world differently – to see the world as controlled by the violence of humans. To see the world as hopeless and full of constant sorrow. To see the world as inevitably unjust. Ultimately, they’ve been shaped to believe that their captor’s story is THE story – as the dominant story of life, and not God’s story.
We live in a similar context where we’re constantly tempted in the same way as the exiles: Where we’re tempted to believe: other story-lines, as THE story – as the dominant story of life, and not God’s story. But the prophetic word from God in Isaiah 51 paints an alternative. Isaiah 51 describes a way out of these competing story-lines. Isaiah 51 describes a way to re-enter into the story of God that has been interrupted in our human experience. Isaiah 51 describes a way for us to trust that God’s story is the story of the future: That God’s story cannot be permanently interrupted or overtaken. That God’s story is THE story of life: The story of justice, joy, restoration, comfort, and peace. All throughout Isaiah 51:1-16, there is a clashing of these two dynamics: The exiles claiming the reality of their captivity is THE reality for their future. And God interjected, claiming: No. Re-wind my story, remember what I’ve done in the past, and that will help you trust me for my restoration to come. Isaiah 51:1-16 is an invitation to the exiles, and us today. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what's to come.
Competing stories and story-lines can always seem bigger and more important than they are. Part of that is that many of them we only experience in the moment. So, it’s all we see and experience. It’s the water we swim-in. It’s hard to see the world otherwise. Or, at best, we can look back at a story’s history, which gives that story-line some teeth – to see how it’s impacted more than just you, and the people, community, or nation around you. But even the most historic story-lines have competition. And those stories ebb and flow in authority and power.
Take a look at this timeline. This timeline attempts to capture world history. You can see the ebb and flow of cultures, powers, and people-groups throughout history. One striking example that stands out from this visual is that the story of the United States, the culture of the United States, and most of what we think is “normal” – is not much in the grand-scheme of world history. We’re still barely into that story-line in history, yet many people put a lot of confidence, or trust, in that story to shape what’s to come. But in reality, it’s just another of the many competing story-lines happening in the world right now.
Another more recent example of this can be seen in the history of technology: Most of us can’t imagine life without the internet at our finger-tips on a portable device, but that history is really not even 20 years old yet. The iPhone ushered in a lot of this era, and that came out in 2007. We’re still barely into that story-line in history, yet many people put a lot of confidence, or trust, in that story to shape their daily life, and what’s to come: tomorrow, next week, or next year. But in reality, it’s just another of the many competing story-lines happening in the world right now.
As we look to God’s word in Isaiah 51, we encounter God inviting the exiles, and us today to contrast his story with the competing stories that we allow to pull and drive our lives. Throughout the first sixteen verses of Isaiah 51, God constantly calls the hearers of this prophecy to remember His story – to recall how God has acted throughout history, to re-wind, and consider how God has faithfully acted in his story.
In Isaiah 51:1-2, God invites the exiles to remember the rock from which their existence began. The imagery here is an artist turning a raw piece of material into something new, and for a new purpose. And that is what God did through Abraham and Sarah. God made a people who were not a people out of an elderly couple, who were childless and barren. God raised up a mighty nation, essentially, out of death or life-lessness. Exiles: Remember what I’ve done. Remember that MY story is the dominant story, not the story of your captors. They are not the Lord overall, I AM.
God also invites the exiles to remember the life and beauty of the Garden of Eden that he fashioned for Adam and Eve and the animals: Just as I made a nation of nothing, I too can restore you from captivity. God promises to restore them to an existence of life and beauty like the Garden of Eden (vs. 2). Exiles: Remember what I've done to trust Me for what's to come. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what's to come.
God invites the exiles to remember how he delivered them from the bondage of Egypt (vss. 9-10: How God dried up the Red Sea, and made a road for their people to cross to escape Egypt’s power. How God overcame Egypt, and cut it to pieces: Rahab is a reference to Egypt, which Isaiah identifies in Isaiah 30:6-7, …to that unprofitable nation, to Egypt, whose help is utterly useless. Therefore I call her Rahab the Do-Nothing. (Isaiah 30:6-7) … God recalls how generation after generation has looked back on that deliverance to spur their reliance on God and spur faithfulness to live in His story (Isaiah 51:9a). Exiles: Remember what I’ve done to trust Me for what's to come. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what’s to come.
God reminds the exiles how the universe and the earth exist, because of Him (Isaiah 51:13, 15, 16). God reminds the exiles how the waves of seas roar, because of him. God reminds the exiles that they exist, and the world around them continues to function because of Him, and not because of their captors. Exiles: Remember what I’ve done to trust Me for what's to come. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what’s to come. Remember that my story is longer and more dominant and more encompassing than the story of your captors.
If we look at the broad view of Isaiah 51:1-16, we see that God can confidently promise restoration to the exiles because of His past actions. God is able, but can the exiles trust that His future is worth their hope? God invites them to re-wind, remember, and recall God’s abilities over their story with Him. And in remembering what God’s done, will help them trust Him for what He’s still to do. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what’s to come.
We too are faced with the same question: God is able, but do we trust that His future is worth our hope? God is inviting us to re-wind, remember, and recall God’s abilities – revealed in his story in Scripture. Revealed in the life of his Son, Jesus. Revealed in our story unfolding within His story – remembering God’s faithfulness to our particular situation: Provision when there was none. Recovery when it didn’t seem possible. Hope in the midst of loss.
Jesus is the clearest example of remembering what God’s done in order to trust Him for what’s to come: We see this most poignantly at Jesus’ death. Multiple times throughout the Gospels in the Bible: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John – Jesus predicts his death and resurrection three days later. Meaning, Jesus was aware of the threat to his life, but also the hope he had in his Heavenly Father to bring him back to life. Jesus, growing-up as a Jewish man, would be well-aware of God’s past actions, like delivering Joseph from the slavery in Egypt. Or delivering Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego – from the fiery furnace. Or delivering Jonah from death in the sea and in a fish. Jesus grew-up in the wake of Isaiah 51, where God’s people were shaped to face the future with confidence in God’s goodness and deliverance, because of God’s past actions. We see that because of his awareness of God’s past actions, Jesus could entrust his life to his Heavenly Father on the cross, saying, “Into your hands I commit my spirit” – remembering what God had done to help him trust Him for his death to come. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what’s to come.
We are here today, following Jesus, gathering on this property, invested in guiding others to experience abundant life in Jesus, because many people before us remembered what God had done, to help them trust Him for what would come after them: you and me, this church’s continued witness.
Jesus remembered what God had done, to trust Him for what was to come for us: resurrection hope and restored creation. The saints of the past remembered what God’s done, to trust Him for what’s to come for us as a church today.
How might God’s invitation in Isaiah 51 apply to you today? Where do you need to be reminded of what God’s done, to help you trust Him for what’s to come? – for your own life? Or for the life of others (friends, kids, grandkids)? My oldest son, Pace, recently had a dental procedure, which was scary for him, and for us, as his parents. Right before the procedure, I reminded Pace, just like God carried Joseph through being sold into slavery, and God carried Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego through the fiery furnace, God will carry you through this scary situation. There are two things at play in that moment: One, I have to remember what God’s done, to help me trust Him for what’s to come. Two, Pace has to remember what God’s done, to help him trust God for what’s to come. For both of us, this involves knowing the history of what God’s done. I might have a more advanced awareness of God’s story, than Pace has. But, Pace also has an awareness of God’s story: Through Bible stories we read to him. Through Bible story shows we have him watch regularly. Through mentioning those stories in everyday conversation with him. Through hearing Bible stories in Impact on Sunday mornings.
Parents, grand-parent’s, aunts, uncles, siblings: How are you daily informing the next generation in God’s story? How are you reminding them – that God will carry you and them to a better future, just as he did for the exiles of Isaiah 51, for Jesus, for the saints before us, for you in your own crummy situations? These are Simple acts of faithfulness we can take to help our kids, friends, relatives, brothers and sisters in Christ – to remember what God’s done, to help us trust Him for what’s to come. Remember what God has done to trust Him for what's to come.
Compare and contrast God’s story with your current story.
If you’ve never surrendered your life to God, through faith in Jesus, I invite you to remember what God’s done, to help you trust Him for what’s to come. God has a hopeful future for you to live into, by being part of his story. Compare and contrast His story, with the story you’re currently following for your life. Reflect on Isaiah 51, and remember that God's story is THE dominant story. It’s the story of the future. Please find me or another trusted follower of Jesus to help you take a step toward becoming part of God’s story going forward!
How are you remembering God’s story?
If you’re already following Jesus, and striving to live in God’s story, How are you being reminded of what God’s done so that you can trust Him for what's to come? How are you remembering God’s story? How are you keeping his story at the forefront of your life? How are you allowing His story to inform how you face what’s to come? God’s story has proven time and time again to be the story worth living in – to be the story-line that leads to the hope, restoration, justice, peace, and abundant life – that we long for.
Repent from any story-line you’ve allowed to skew or dominate the one true story-line of God’s good future for you. Maybe that looks like investing more in God's kingdom, than making America first. Maybe that looks like putting someone else first, rather than your own happiness. Maybe that looks like God’s bringing about justice, rather than progressive, human-powered, law-enforced justice.
Remembering what God’s done will help us trust Him for what's to come. Remember what God’s done to trust Him for what's to come.