LOOK TO THE ROCK

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

“Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and who seek the Lord: Look to the rock from which you were cut and to the quarry from which you were hewn; look to Abraham, your father, and to Sarah, who gave you birth. When I called him he was only one man, and I blessed him and made him many.”

Isaiah 51:1-2

This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

If you were looking for someone to give you guidance in developing or improving a relationship with the Lord, perhaps there would be no greater person to turn to than a prophet.

In biblical times, prophets were chosen by God to bring messages to His people. They were ordinary citizens who God decided to use in extraordinary ways and when we study the Old Testament scriptures, we find a large number of prophets who had books named after them, one of which we have been studying for months now.

As Isaiah, Chapter 51 opens up, we find the prophet Isaiah speaking words of truth to anyone who heard or read them and that includes us today. His words in just two verses were critical and fundamental to the Israelite people who were enduring the hardships of captivity and they are equally critical and fundamental to our Christian walk today as we seek ways to deal with the difficulties life brings our way while seeking to live in a way that the Lord finds pleasing and favorable. Look again at the words of Isaiah here:

“Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and who seek the Lord: Look to the rock from which you were cut and to the quarry from which you were hewn; look to Abraham, your father, and to Sarah, who gave you birth. When I called him he was only one man, and I blessed him and made him many.”  Isaiah 51:1-2

Note here that Isaiah’s words are not merely suggestions but rather commands.

1. Listen to me.

If we are to hope to receive the messages the Lord is sending to us through His messengers, we much shut our mouths, clear our minds, and open up our ears, minds, and hearts to receive the words of the Lord. In the case of this particular message, the audience is anyone who pursues righteousness and seeks the Lord. That means this word of the Lord not only speaks to the exiled Israelites but to us as well as we read these words more than 2,000 years later.

So what truth does Isaiah want to receive? It comes in the form of a second command:

2. Look to the rock and to the quarry.

If you only read verse one, you may think Isaiah is speaking about the Lord as the rock but as we look at verse two, we clearly see that the rock he refers to is none other than Abraham, seen by the Israelites as their founding father. You remember the story, right?

Abraham was told by God to leave everything, his country and people and father’s household, traveling with his family to a place that was undisclosed. All the Lord said was that He would show Abraham where to go (Genesis 12:1). In exchange for this, here’s what the Lord promised:

“I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Genesis 12:2-3

And so Abraham set out with his family and did as God asked him. There was only one problem with the rest of the things the Lord said. Abraham and his wife Sarah were old with Sarah well beyond the years of child bearing. Yet, the Lord did not go back on his promise and as we know, she bore a beautiful son Isaac who would carry on the lineage of Abraham, a lineage that led to the formation of a great nation.

So why the reference to Abraham and Sarah as the rock and quarry that all who sought the Lord and righteousness were to look to?

Because in them, we find the Lord bringing hope into the most improbable of circumstances and showing us that indeed He was capable of doing all things.

So for the Israelites who were in the midst of captivity and yearning for the day when they could return to their homeland and the Lord’s good favor, looking to the rock meant staying encouraged because the Lord keeps His promises and one of them had been that the exile would only last seventy years at which time He would restore His people back to Judah and Jerusalem to rebuild their lives and their faith in Him.

For us today who are going through difficulty, we look back to Abraham and Sarah and see that the Lord can make the possible from the impossible; that through Him, the improbable can be probable. Thus, when we seek Him and Him alone in our deepest times of need, we do so with a hope through His promises that can be found in no other place.

What are those promises?

He said He would never leave us nor forsake us.

He said He listens to our prayers when we raise them up and answers according to His will.

He said He is for us and with us.

He said He would meet our needs.

and He said we would have a life eternal after death when we believe in His Son Jesus.

Abraham believed in God and this faith alone and it was this faith and belief that was credited to Him by God as righteousness or in other words, the right way to live in His eyes (Genesis 15:6).

We would be well served to place our fullest trust and confidence in the promises of God as well and we can do just that if we simply listen to the words of the prophet and look to Abraham, the rock.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.

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