Isaiah: When You See God’s Mission

The call of Isaiah (Isaiah 6:1-13) into God’s mission takes a shape similar to that of Moses. In the calling of Moses we noticed several elements of the call narrative: the revelation of God, the motive of God expressed, the commission of God, the objections of Moses, God’s reassurance, and God’s signs. Notice these same following elements in the call of Isaiah.

Revelation. Dated to the year that King Uzziah died (ca. 742 BC), Isaiah has a visionary experience that brings him into the very presence of God.

In vivid detail, the text paints the visions for us: the throne, God’s robe filling the temple, doorposts and thresholds quaking, smoke filling the temple and multi-winged angelic beings, calling to one another in antiphonal worship:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.”

Objections. To this revelation of God, Isaiah can only respond that he is doomed; in contrast to God’s holiness, Isaiah can only confess that he has unclean lips and that he lives among unclean people.

Reassurance. In response to this confession, one of the angelic beings takes a coal from the altar and touches Isaiah’s lips to symbolize that God had taken away his sin, thus qualifying him to accept God’s mission.

Commission and Motive. Here the Lord asks, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” To which Isaiah, cleansed, can now say, “Here am I. Send me!” His mission is to preach to a people whom Isaiah knows will not listen to him. They will not repent, but God will send Isaiah anyway as a sign that God has not given up on his people.

Signs. While there are signs associated with Isaiah’s mission (see Isaiah 7), I think it is fair to say that for the people of Judah, Isaiah is the sign. Isaiah is to preach to a people who will not listen and he is to do it until God says otherwise (see Isaiah 6.11-13).

Isaiah was to serve during a time of pruning … until there is nothing left but a “holy seed” left as a “stump” in a wasteland. What starts out as an amazing revelation of God concludes in Isaiah being given a very difficult job

While Isaiah cannot make the people come to God, his mission serves a signpost pointing the way back to God. Sometimes, our ministry is just like this. The successes seem far apart and the defeats come more often than we think they should. Yet, in the midst of that we assent: “Here am I! Send me!”

But it happened to me . . .

The act of forgiveness mostly benefits the one doing the forgiving. However, getting to the place of forgiveness in real life can be a long and sometime arduous journey. When I’m hurt, I often want the other to hurt as much if not more than I did. Yet, if I hang on to the hurt, I discover that it has a way of rotting within me then festering into anger, resentment, and hate.

Only an act of forgiving the other can release me. Should I chose not to let loose of my pain through forgiveness, I find that I am the one in increasing pain, while the other seems to live life as if nothing ever happened.

Lewis Smede, several years ago in a book called The Art of Forgiving: When You Need to Forgive but Don’t Know How (1997) explored the nature of forgiveness. In his book he looked at the several levels at which we experience the hurt of offence or betrayal.

For example, when someone cuts us off in traffic, we are usually offended, but because this was an anonymous stranger (usually), we quickly let it go and move on with life. Such cases rarely involved the need for forgiveness.

However, if a stranger assaults us, we may find that this hurt is so great or so personal, that we will struggle with finding the place of forgiveness for this stranger because what happened us is deeper, more personal.

More likely, forgiveness is in order when there is a personal relationship—when someone hurts us who should have known better.

Sometimes, this is a very personal matter in that the person hurt us directly but sometime it is more indirect, such as when a person in a position of power and responsibility—who is suppose to protect me or at least act in my best interest—hurts another. In this kind of loss, there is the loss of innocence and trust that is hard to measure. The pain is real and it is as if it happened to me.

So why be concerned about issues of forgiveness? After all, the people who hurt others don’t deserve to be forgiven. Yet, as we noted above, “unforgiveness” binds the one that holds the grudge inside.

Yet, there is a deeper reason to forgive: it is the way of Jesus. The one who was betrayed, insulted, assaulted, and blasphemed in the worse possible way, still prayed, “Father, forgive them because they don’t know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).

Because of Jesus, we now have the power to forgive because he has forgiven us—freely, fully, and forever.

The Quest for Church Health

A perfectly healthy church is an ideal that will not be realized this side of heaven. However, a church can choose to participate with God in becoming more whole and complete. Accordingly, no matter where a church is now, that church can make a commitment to allow God to heal it, to love it, and to lead it to becoming more like Jesus.

Family therapists know they cannot help a family if no one in the family is committed to getting well. Likewise, a church will only become healthier if a critical mass of the members is committed to the journey.

Along this journey to deeper health, it may be helpful to have some signposts and markers for what a healthy family looks like, and, correspondingly, this would be true of healthy churches. According to Curran, Traits of a Healthy Family (Minneapolis: Winston Press, 1983; adapted slightly), a healthy family will:

1. Communicate and listen to each other
2. Affirm and support one another
3. Teach respect for others
4. Develop trust
5. Have a sense of play and humor
6. Exhibit a sense of shared responsibility
7. Value a sense of right and wrong
8. Have a strong sense of “family”
9. Have a balance of interaction among the members
10. Have a shared religious/spiritual core
11. Will respect the privacy of one another
12. Foster family table time and conversation
13. Share leisure time together
14. Admit to and seek help with problems

While no church is perfect, any church family can become better at expressing the above values. However, this will require intentionality and effort from everyone.