October 8 – Strength in Fellowship (Isaiah 50:4-9)

“He wakens me morning by morning, wakens my ear to listen like one being taught.”(Isaiah 50:4)

IN WORD:
Isaiah spoke words of judgment and words of mercy to a crowd that was skeptical of both. His calling flew in the face of other “prophets” who were representing God falsely. The judgments on other nations god told through him were welcome news; the judgments he foretold of God’s chosen people were not. In short, he followed a calling that often went against his culture and challenged his courage. He represented a holy God to an unrighteous people.
So do we. Our calling is strikingly similar to Isaiah’s. We may not be assigned the task of foretelling judgment with the specifics Isaiah saw, but we are assigned to live purely, speak truthfully, and witness to both the holiness and the mercy of our God. Sometimes the message is popular. More often, it is not. Our calling, like Isaiah’s, often goes against our culture and challenges our courage. It sets us up for total dependence on our Creator.
Isaiah could fulfill His calling because he could hear the voice of God. When we think we might have heard something that sounded like it could have been the voice of God, we go out into our world with fear, trembling, and very little conviction. When, on the other hand, God wakens us in the morning and tunes our ear to His voice, we can walk in the strength of faith. Our teachable nature becomes the key to our confidence.

IN DEED:
Those who are not teachable are trying to talk themselves into security and confidence. They appear sure of themselves, but deep down they aren’t. Those who are teachable, however, hear from God. There is no greater boost to one’s faith than to know that however strange or countercultural the voice we’ve heard, it is the voice of the Almighty — the invincible warrior of God, the Sovereign who sways human affections, the Beginning and the End. There’s a calm assurance in the one who knows he or she is in fellowship with the Creator. A heart sensitive to Him will go forth in intensely certain faith. It has met with God.

“God desires and is pleased to communicate with us through the avenues of our minds, our wills, and our emotions.”
-A.W. Tozer-