Isaiah 51:15-16 “I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar— the Lord of hosts is his name. And I have put my words in your mouth and covered you in the shadow of my hand, establishing the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth, and saying to Zion, ‘You are my people.’” Today's episode talks about how God was reminding His people what He had done for them in the past to protect them and therefore they had no reason for fear. It also talks about how God is calling us all to go out and spread all He has given us to others. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Remember What God Has Done For Us
Isaiah 51:15-16 “I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar— the Lord of hosts is his name. And I have put my words in your mouth and covered you in the shadow of my hand, establishing the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth, and saying to Zion, ‘You are my people.’”
This was the verse that we used to go with the monthly bookmark that we do monthly at my prayer group. It seemed to go well with the words of prophecy that we received and discerned for that month. We were working on January’s discernment. After reading this verse again this morning I wanted to get a sense of what others said about it. I wanted to make sure I really understood what it meant so I could help you understand what it means. I am glad I did because I definitely would have missed the context of this verse.
The first line, “I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar— the Lord of hosts is his name.” This is meant to remind the Israelites of when God saved them from Egypt. However, not so much about how He parted the Red Sea so they could pass through on dry land, this is more to remind them of what happened after they crossed safely. God sent the raging waters to destroy those who chased after them. This is God reminding them that He is there protector and that He is there savior. A few verses earlier in Isaiah 51:12-13 it says, “I, I am he who comforts you; who are you that you are afraid of man who dies, of the son of man who is made like grass, and have forgotten the Lord, your Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth, and you fear continually all the day because of the wrath of the oppressor, when he sets himself to destroy? And where is the wrath of the oppressor? God is trying to remind the Israelites who they are. They are the chosen people of God. They have His protection. Throughout this chapter He is trying to remind them of who they are and that they don’t need to be afraid. They don’t need to be afraid of their enemies, they don’t need to be afraid of anything because God is on their side.
This is a great reminder to us as well. We don’t have to be afraid of the current president, the last president, or the next president. We don’t have to focus on how bad the world around us is getting. We don’t have to focus on all the messes in our life. We need to focus on how God is Sovereign over all of these – He is the Almighty. Everything He wills comes to pass. And God has promised Jerusalem that the day will come when her exile will be finished, and she will return. If God has promised it, then His people can count on it, they can rely on it. God is trying to remind the Israelites that He is the Lord of hosts and if He saved them before He can save them again. I think He is also telling us this too! God rolled back the seas so His people could pass on dry ground and then let them roar again to protect those same people. What has God done in your life that you can look back to and know that you will be ok in this tough time as well? What has He done in the past that proves to you that He will show up in this present situation as well? If you can’t think of something He has done personally in your past, you can look to what He has done in scripture. Hebrews 13:8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” What He has done in the past that He can do again.
The last part of the verse says, “And I have put my words in your mouth and covered you in the shadow of my hand, establishing the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth, and saying to Zion, ‘You are my people.’” This part of the verse is reminding us that we have a part to play in God’s plan. Yes, He is there to protect us and He also wants us to go out and spread His message to all those we meet. He doesn’t want us to sit around and worship Him and praise Him and yet keep Him to ourselves. He is protecting us and filling us up with His graces so that we can share them with all we meet. This might make us nervous to think about talking about God to others. I know I get nervous thinking about it. What if I don’t know what to say? What if they ask questions and I don’t have any answers? What if I say the wrong thing, or say something that isn’t true? In this verse God is reassuring us that when we say yes, when we step out in that call, He will be putting the words in our mouth. God isn’t asking us to know everything, He isn’t asking us to be an eloquent speaker or have all the right words, He is asking us to be an empty vessel. He is asking for our “yes” and then He will give us the words to say.
God is calling each and every one of us to go out and to pass to others all He has given us. Each month when we review and discern all the words that God has given us throughout the prayer group meetings, we realize that God is giving us this call over and over again. He doesn’t always say it in the same way, and yet it is always there. Go and tell my people, go and spread my love, my hope, my love, my peace, my forgiveness. God would not keep telling us every single week if it was not important to Him. He also probably wouldn’t keep telling us this if we were doing it. So, why aren’t we doing it? Why aren’t we passing on what the Lord is giving us? What is stopping us? This will be different for each one of us. I can’t answer these questions for you. I can tell you when I started to read the Bible more and learn more about my faith, I started to want to share more with others. Maybe it is the enemy telling us we don’t know enough to share with others?
Although, when God is asking us in prayer group to share with others, it is not knowledge of the scripture He is asking us to share. He is asking us to share His love, His peace, His joy, His forgiveness and other things like this. These are things we don’t need to be super smart and have the Bible memorized to share. We can share these things without knowing much scripture at all. However, we do need to have these things in our life if we want to share them. If we don’t know God’s love, peace, joy, forgiveness then we can’t share it with others? God wants to give us all of this and more and all He asks is that we share it with those around us. We don’t have to go up to strangers and share it, we could start right in our own home with those we spend the most time with. I have included in this episodes the bookmark that we worked on yesterday. I think hearing an example of God’s call for us to go out and share all He gives will help you understand a bit better. Also, as you can see in the bookmark, He doesn’t start by directing us to go out and share. He starts by calling us closer and then telling us how special we are and reminding us how amazing He is. Then He asks us to go out and share it with others. I will leave you with His words today. Here are the words we felt God wanted us to use for the January 2023 bookmark:
Come closer to me. Come deeper with me. Come into my presence because I want you, my diamonds, to sparkle so that all those around you will want to come and be in your presence to absorb your light. Your light is my life in you. I am the God who loves you. I am the God who protects you. I am the God who never stops caring for you. I give you my abundant blessings. No matter what is going on in your life right now I take each step that you take. When you feel you can’t stand I am there to carry you. What I share with you , you must share with others. It is I who sends you to share my way, my truth and my life so that others may grow in me and love me. Arise and go forward with the name of Jesus on your lips.
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless all those listening to this episode today. Lord, we love you and we are so grateful for your words above. We are grateful that you want to spend your time talking to us when you have so much to do. We are grateful for your protection and that we are your chosen people. We are sorry we get it wrong so often and we just ask for your forgiveness. We love you Lord. We thank you for your protection and we thank you for putting the words in our mouth. Please give us the courage to use those words to help bring others to you Lord. We love you and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’ holy name, Amen
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. I look forward to seeing you again on Monday. Remember, Jesus loves you and so do I. Have a blessed day!