Better people for the worst of times: Message

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” (Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities).

“People are God’s method.  The church is looking for better methods.  God is looking for better people” (E.M. Bounds, The Power of Prayer).

He said, “Go and tell this people:

“‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes.Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts,and turn and be healed.”

(Isaiah 6:9-10)

Part 6: Message

              What a commission!  Most messages I’ve heard preached from Isaiah 6 end with verse 8 where the prophet answers, “Here am I.  Send me.”  However, to stop there is to fail to do justice to the story, as well as to the importance of the word that Isaiah was given to speak. 

              Deliberately numb the hearts of your audience and blind their eyes so that they won’t turn and be healed?  Isaiah is “called upon to preach a message that, given the already hardened hearts of his generation … will only push them farther from God.”[1]  The real healing will come much later.  Isaiah is not being called to succeed in the world’s sense.  He is being called to be faithful to what God has told him to say. 

              It is a hard message.  Yet, it may come as a surprise to us that this passage from Isaiah is quoted more often than any other in the New Testament.  For example, John quotes it to explain why the crowd listening to Jesus “could not believe” (John 12:39-40).  Evidently, the apostles and early followers of Jesus were well acquainted with lack of response to the good news they were proclaiming about Jesus.

              Our Lord told a story about four kinds of soil into which the word about Christ is sown.  One kind is the hard ground of determined unbelief.  During the summer of 1988 in Iceland our missionary team decided to bring a Christian rock band to tour the country and proclaim the good news through music and testimony.  After one concert at a well-known entertainment venue in a certain town, the owner of the venue said to the band leader, “Your music was fine, but religion here in Iceland is a private matter. We don’t talk about it in public.”  The evangelist responded, “Sir, I’ve noticed all over your country advertisements for condoms.  Isn’t sex a private matter?  Why can we talk about sex in public but not faith?”  The man stood by his statement about faith and would not be convinced otherwise.  Sometimes, hard soil only grows harder despite hearing God’s message.

              Jesus knows that “not everyone will believe” in him.  He knows that some will, however.  We know that to be true.  So, we keep on proclaiming him – not our own ideologies, political opinions or morality – we proclaim Christ Jesus as Lord and ourselves as the servants of all for Jesus’ sake.  Our role is to remain true to our King above all other loyalties and to share the liberating message of salvation as God prompts us.  We are not responsible for the results, only to be obedient.

              Repentance and forgiveness of sins must be proclaimed in his name among all nations, Jesus said, before he comes again (Luke 24:47).  Are we ready to bear that message to any and every person, in any and every place where the Holy Spirit might send us? 

[1]John Oswalt, The NIV Application Commentary, 2003, p.128