Isaiah 43

Really raining, as I sit in Cup a Joe, and I realize that I have no umbrella, no jacket, my bike, a campus tour to give, my laptop, my backpack, and no phone to call someone for some sort of help. But it doesn't matter, really. Because I also have Isaiah 43. the greatness of which outweighs the little struggles.

I have called you by name, you are mine. 

Perhaps this is Gods way of giving me to give him more of my time. Hes like, here let me take that phone. Look at the rain pour down. There's nowhere you can go. You're just here with me. Hows that? don't you love it?

When you pass through the waters I will be with you


The literal waters. The pouring rain outside. The not real waters. The lonlieness. The stomach aches. The stress. The sense of not knowing. who I am, what I am doing, who to be with, when to be alone, where to go.

and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you


What if I think you're wrong God? What if I think I am indeed overwhelmed by these rivers? What if I am overwhelmed by myself? What about my friends downtown who are outside right now, my friends in Haiti who live in this mud, for whom the rain comes every night and seeps into their beds and their homes and they are all covered and mud and here I am in a coffeeshop writing on my laptop about being overwhelmed by the rivers when I know nothing of being overwhelmed by the rivers. And YET you meet us where we are. Our struggle becomes yours. You never are scornful towards where we are in our journey, whether good or bad.

When you walk through the fire you shall not be burned


and the flame shall not consume you.


Are you telling me that I am safe no matter what with you? that no matter where I am, how I am, what I am doing I will not be burned or consumed. That I really am yours? that you really have called me? Can I believe that? Can I rejoice in it? Can I trust you're using me when I don't see it?

For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. 


That is exactly who you are. I cry out or laugh with joy and either way, at the heights and in the depths, there is something solid to cling to, some truth that cannot be shaken, no matter whether I or the world affirms or denies it. That YOU are the Lord MY God. My savior. You said it. And everything you say is true. You said let there be light, and there was light. You stretched out the land and the seas, brought forth water from the rock, poured your spirit out and said that you are my Savior. You said it, so its true.

I give Egypt as your ransom. Cush and Seba in exchange for you. 


I must know what it is you say about me. Who it is that you say I am. And this is what you say, I give countries for your ransom. You have no idea of your worth to me. What I give in exchange for your soul. Why? Why, for me of all people? this deeply, terribly broken people we are? The depth of our own depravity horrifies even us..and yet you say...

Because you are precious in my eyes. And honored. And I love you. 


That needs no comment from me. when I read that I can only look at those words and my heart is quieted. Its feistiness and frustration and questioning and intellectualizing and hiding and all of that begins to quiet and let those words sink deep. As with Eve, I question your love. That you are really for me. That I am really precious in your eyes. Doubting that there is any way that can be true. Not because of you but because of me. And you say, there is no "unless" after I love you. You must not underestimate my love. It goes further than your brokenness and sinfulness and rejection of me could go.

Fear not, for I am with you.


Fear. Also one of the first things we see in the garden. They hid from you and they were afraid. And this thing, fear, has been with us ever since. I can feel it, settled in my stomach, I can feel it when I talk to people and interact with them, I can feel it often. The fear that says, what if I have gotten to far? What if I fail? what if I am not who you told me I am?

And you say

I will bring your offspring from the east and from the west I will gather you.
I will say to the north, give up, and to the south Do not withhold, bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth, everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.


Thats you. When I say "my daughter" you are the one I am talking about. When I say the one who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made-I am talking about you. You cannot deny this. Its is written, and you can't change these words. I have spoken them about you and whether or not they feel true or are believable, they are. And nothing can change them. They will be true forever. Nothing you can do can make them not true. There is no failure, no atrocity, and no accomplishment or glory or life mission or action or lifestyle or job that will make them any more or less true. They are as true as they will ever be right now, which is more real and more solid and more dependable than anything else in your entire world. More then people, more then mountains and oceans, more then your own heart and mind and thoughts and life. 


And later on you say

You are my witnesses, declares the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me. I, I am the Lord and beside me there is no Savior. 


As I read Isaiah 43, I realize again that God is worth staking your life on. Worth living for. Because he is God and he is for us. And he has already made us his own. Literally every line in this chapter in Isaiah is unspeakably crucial because he is promising the thing that we are searching for, the things books and movies and songs are about, the thing we seek at the depth of our heart. I cannot thing of anything that holds the hope this does. The fulfillment.

This is it.

Tell me I'm wrong, if you have found full life elsewhere. Tell me where your satisfaction, your meaning, your truth lies. I think about it a lot, for some reason. Meaning of life stuff. Some are happy going along with day to day things, but I haven't been for a long time. I want to know whats worthwhile. I want to know whats at the heart of this human existence. I want to know what people long for and where that longing is quenched. So far, Isaiah 43 offers something far more beautiful than anything I've encountered here. any other god I've bowed down to, and there have been many. This is the one for me. This God of Abraham, Issac and jacob. Who says the things I am afraid to even hope could possibly be true. This God who bought me at the cost of his Son. And made me his daughter. Who will not leave me as an orphan but is coming and is here. And will take me to Himself, forever. No matter what else, He is true. what he says is true. And he says I am the Lord, your Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your King. 

And I look at him and again and again I run away and then come back and say, I'll take it. I'll take you. Will you take me? And he says, every time,

I already have.