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Redemption for a Generation, Pt. 1
Isaiah 59:9-21 (NLT) says,
9So there is no justice among us, and we know nothing about right living. We look for light but find only darkness. We look for bright skies but walk in gloom.
10We grope like the blind along a wall, feeling our way like people without eyes. Even at brightest noontime, we stumble as though it were dark. Among the living, we are like the dead.
11We growl like hungry bears; we moan like mournful doves. We look for justice, but it never comes. We look for rescue, but it is far away from us.
12 For our sins are piled up before God and testify against us. Yes, we know what sinners we are.
13 We know we have rebelled and have denied the LORD. We have turned our backs on our God. We know how unfair and oppressive we have been, carefully planning our deceitful lies.
14Our courts oppose the righteous, and justice is nowhere to be found. Truth stumbles in the streets, and honesty has been outlawed.
15Yes, truth is gone, and anyone who renounces evil is attacked. The LORD looked and was displeased to find there was no justice.
16He was amazed to see that no one intervened to help the oppressed. So he himself stepped in to save them with his strong arm, and his justice sustained him.
17He put on righteousness as his body armor and placed the helmet of salvation on his head. He clothed himself with a robe of vengeance and wrapped himself in a cloak of divine passion.
18He will repay his enemies for their evil deeds. His fury will fall on his foes. He will pay them back even to the ends of the earth.
19In the west, people will respect the name of the LORD; in the east, they will glorify him. For he will come like a raging flood tide driven by the breath of the LORD.
20“The Redeemer will come to Jerusalem to buy back those in Israel who have turned from their sins,” says the LORD.
21“And this is my covenant with them,” says the LORD. “My Spirit will not leave them, and neither will these words I have given you. They will be on your lips and on the lips of your children and your children’s children forever. I, the LORD, have spoken!
In Isaiah 59, the state in which Israel is prophesied to be is relative to the current state of America. We can quote verse 1 of the chapter, which says, “Behold, the LORD’S hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear.” However, the next verse reads, “But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.” The question is not God’s ability or inability to save, but the issue that has endangered people in sin’s deadly grip. It is concerning the unrepentant heart who chooses in what appears to be an inescapable path towards eternal destruction. This reveals our dire and extreme need for redemption!
We live in a nation that knows nothing about justice. We are living on our heads! Our upside down thinking has caused us to abort a baby for $400 and adopt for $40,000. The culture has attempted to redefine marriage as a grown-up dating service. More people are in slavery today than in all of human history through the human and sex trafficking industries that very few have been willing to go to battle against. We have a political realm infiltrated with an innumerable amount of scandals as men and women act as though they are their god rather than turn to the one true God! Christian believers have become so timid to share their faith as a result of the possibilities of harassment, persecution or punishment in one way or the other. In moments of catastrophe, we have youth who are turning to drugs, pornography, alcohol, sex and gangs to find fulfillment and belonging because the church has become so dead with religion that no one is turning to the cross as a result of a bad and wrong representation concerning who Christ really is! Even though many of us have experienced the glorious light of the gospel of Christ, we are stumbling as if it were dark and walking as if we are zombies because we have no fire for God burning within our souls. We look for salvation and justice but cannot find it because we have turned out backs not only to the cross but also to the empty tomb. We growl as hungry bears in our selfish ambitions that we are willing to destroy anyone or anything to gratify our desire for pleasure, yet mourn as doves because we discover that these lovers will only leave us alone, burdened and empty. We have rebelled against God’s commandments through our self-centered Christianity, and we have denied the real Jesus through both our words and actions. People would rather live in poverty through laziness and taking advantage of the system than to be honest, walk in truth and work to be the best they can be in this life! The list can go on for a very long time, but it is time that we acknowledge our heart issues of sin, repent and walk in the fulness of God’s grace, love and mercy!
Before we go any further, we must define what redemption really is. *Redemption is not prostituting God’s grace for a poor gospel. Redeem literally means to buy back. It is “to pay the required price to secure the release of a convicted criminal, the process therein involved, and the person making the payment” (Holman Bible Dictionary). It is paying the sacrificial price necessary to see an individual, city or generation free from the bondages of sin so that they can live out their purpose in God in the newness of life! It is why Jesus is called the Redeemer! He paid the sacrificial price, paying a debt we could never afford to pay, to buy us out of the bondages of sin and give us eternal life in the presence of a loving Father!
The Jesus of Isaiah 53 in comparison to the Jesus of Isaiah 59 seem like two natures that are entirely diametrically opposed one to the other, but 53 had to come before 59 could be fulfilled. In Isaiah 53, this Jesus wore a crown of thorns, but in Isaiah 59, He wore a helmet. In Isaiah 53, Jesus appears as a lamb led to the slaughter, but in Isaiah 59, Jesus appears as Lion of the tribe of Judah, girded with armor and ready for battle! He appeared weak in Chapter 53, being wounded for my transgressions and bruised for my iniquities while being numbered with the transgressors, but He suffered and died because a resurrection day was coming that would redeem us back to Him and empower us to be witnesses throughout the world. Isaiah 53 was the plan of salvation, but Isaiah 59 is the activation of my redemption! Jesus is truly our Redeemer!
Redemption came through His sacrifice at Calvary and was sealed through His resurrection. Jesus is not sitting in heaven in His lazy boy, twiddling His thumbs and shrieking back in complexion and fear because of the turmoil in this world. He is not caught by surprise. That is why He is in constant intercession for you and me! How could you not be confident in your walk with God when knowing that the Redeemer is praying for you? It is time for us to be aligned with the will of heaven through prayer and worship and begin to activate our redemption!