BEHOLD YOUR GOD

In Isaiah 40, the prophet speaks to a group of broken Israelites. The nation that once shone like the stars in the sky had been blackened by exile.

As Israel looked back from Babylon, the promises of God seemed buried. How would God give Israel an everlasting kingdom when they were slaves in a foreign land (2 Samuel 7:13)? How would God make Israel a blessing to the world when a curse had fallen on them (Genesis 12:3)? How would God raise up from Israel a serpent-crushing king when they were under Babylon’s heel (Genesis 3:15)?

We can ask similar questions when we remember God’s promises from the wreckage of our circumstances. We can look ahead to a life of unwanted singleness and ask, “How can God satisfy me?” We can look back at a devastating failure and ask, “How can God forgive me?” We can look up from the crater of some loss and ask, “How can God comfort me?”

In those moments, we need God to do for us what he did for Israel. We need him to come alongside us, remind us of his promises, and then say, “Behold your God” (Isaiah 40:9).The God who speaks his promises to us is the same God who said, “Let there be light,” and the darkness fled (Genesis 1:3). When he speaks, stars burn and planets lock into orbit; rivers run and oceans fill earth’s floors; valleys sink and mountains race to the sky. The grass in all the world may wither, and the flower on every hillside fade, but the word of him who made them will stay and stand forever (Isaiah 40:8).

Your problems may be massive, but your God is mighty. The sun will fail to shine sooner than his word will fall to the ground — no matter how big our problems.

Excerpt taken from God is bigger than your problems article.