Isaiah 43:1-7    

               January 10, 2009 

“I’D GIVE IT ALL UP FOR YOU”

            His face fills the TV screen.  He tells us that he never dreamed, never anticipated that in his 50’s he would have had a heart attack.  He tells us that he should have taken better care of himself, that he should have had regular check-ups.  He tells us he should have had more respect for his family by taking better care of himself. 

            Even though it is a commercial that is trying to sell a product, we do understand what the man was saying, don’t we?  Haven’t each of us been faced with a truth more than once that clarifies life for us in a hurry?  After the speeding ticket has been placed in our hand, don’t we suddenly realize we should have been paying better attention while driving?  After the cholesterol check comes back with a shocking number, don’t we begin to immediately think of some foods we know we shouldn’t be eating, or the exercise we can no longer afford to ignore?  Have any of us put off servicing the car or an appliance only to face a repair that is one of those “pay-me-now-or-pay-me-later” kinds of things?  Well, we’re at the “pay-me-later” stage.

            The people of God found themselves in exile after attack, capture, and the forced walk from Jerusalem to Babylon.  Yes, they had been over-run by the enemy.  Yes, their Temple had been destroyed, their homes had been turned upside down, and many of their friends and relatives had been killed.  But they, too, had been warned.  They, too, had been told more than once that their lifestyles, their apathy or outright defiance in their relationship with God, their blindness to warnings of approaching danger could lead to destruction and death.  They had not heeded the signs, and now they found themselves as prisoners in a foreign land.  Parts of Isaiah 42, the chapter preceding our text, has the prophet naming the harsh truth that the people of God had been a part of the problem.  They had not heeded the warnings; they may have heard, but they had not acted, changed, repented.

            Turning the page to Isaiah 43, we expect judgment.  We assume we will hear about more punishment.  Ah, but maybe the people of God had finally heard.  Maybe they no longer could point the finger of guilt only in the direction of their captors.  Maybe they now saw how their own lives and faithfulness might have been compromised, how they could have been living, worshiping, and serving differently.  Instead of hearing judgment; instead of being hit with hard truths, this is what they heard.

            “But now thus says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.”

            Have you ever experienced forgiveness when you knew you only deserved punishment?  Have you ever been given a second chance?  Has another ever made the decision to trust you again after there is no doubt that you had broken that trust?  Experiencing any grace in this life through any other human being gives us an idea, helps us to understand, allows us to stand in awe of the reality that through the cross of Jesus Christ we belong to God.  You and I are the redeemed.  Oh, the price had to be paid; ransom had to be given, and it was.  God’s own Son, God’s flesh and blood, Jesus, took our place.  We are in the embrace of almighty God because Jesus submitted to another form of exile, submitted to execution, absorbed the sins of all humanity in his perfection, allowing us to sense and see that we still belong to God.  “I have called you by name,” God tells us.  “You are mine.”

            I have read literally thousands of passages in Scripture throughout my life, but I don’t think I have read a text ever that was filled with more love than the Old Testament text before us today.  Knowing these words were proclaimed to God’s people in exile, knowing that they lived in this pain partly because of their own unfaithfulness, and then reading these words of grace and love and allegiance should fill all of us with hope. 

            “When you pass through the waters,” God said, “I will be with you.”  The swollen, raging rivers shall not overwhelm you,” God says.  The deep, the raging storms whose waves consumed lives, swallowing people into the unexplored abyss, filled ancient peoples with terror.  God did not tell God’s people, God does not tell us that we would escape the waters; God told God’s own that God would be with them.  That is not all.  God proclaimed through the prophet, “For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior” (verse 3). God has not let them go; God has not abandoned or disowned them.  God is their Savior.  Regardless of everything, even in the midst of consequences for sin, God promises presence; God promises salvation. Why?  Because “I have called you by name, you are mine.”

            That is not all.  How many times have we heard a loved one watching another suffer proclaim, “I wish I could trade places with them”; “I wish it could be me.”  How many times have we said, “I’d give up everything for you; I’d trade the moon for you?”  Words of love and devotion.  Words of caring and compassion.  That is exactly what God said to God’s own suffering in exile.  God names some of the richest, most powerful countries in the world at that time, and God essentially said, “I’d trade them all to have you.  I’d give it all up for you.”  Listen to the second part of verse 3 and then verse 4.  “I give Egypt as your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in exchange for you.  Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you, I give people in return for you, nations in exchange for your life.”  Now, it wasn’t that God hated Egypt or Ethiopia.  God was trying to tell God’s people that even the affluent and large countries were not as valuable to God as God’s own.  “You are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you.”

            The words spoken by God in Isaiah 43 were not just meant for the people of God in exile.  God wants us to hear them, too.  We are God’s own, sealed by God’s love at baptism, called by name, deemed daughters and sons.  We are the baptized, the family of God, who were promised forgiveness, renewal, and salvation through water and Word.  There was a ransom paid for us, as well…it was Jesus for us … it was his death for our salvation.  We are the baptized, the children of God.  Hear some of the words from this text again and personalize them…let them penetrate your heart.  “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.  When you pass through the waters, I will be with you…  For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.  Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you, I give people in return for you … Do not fear, for I am with you.”

            We are here to hear that Word.  We are here to receive that assurance.  We are here to be reconnected to the God who loves and saved us.  We are here to be embraced by our Savior.  And we are here to love him back in praise and through acts of love.

            Sometimes it is important to be reminded of why we are here.       Amen