The Servant Who Brings God Near

Isaiah 50:1 (ESV) Thus says the LORD: “Where is your mother’s certificate of divorce, with which I sent her away? Or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold, for your iniquities you were sold, and for your transgressions your mother was sent away.

The Lord did not divorce Israel. They must have thought so. Because they were busy entertaining other lovers (idolatry) and He was disciplining them for their sins. Sometimes our relationship with the Lord can feel very much like a divorce. We fall into a terrible season of sin and experience God's chastisement upon us forgetting its ultimate intention. Perhaps we have gone too far. But God affirms in this passage there is no separation from Him!

Then Isaiah brings them back to remembrance of how they came to being asking why they forsook the one who made them and did not respond to His call.

Isaiah 50:2 (ESV) Why, when I came, was there no man; why, when I called, was there no one to answer? Is my hand shortened, that it cannot redeem? Or have I no power to deliver? Behold, by my rebuke I dry up the sea, I make the rivers a desert; their fish stink for lack of water and die of thirst.

On the heels of that question, we come to the third servant song of Isaiah:

Isaiah 50:4 (ESV) The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain with a word him who is weary. Morning by morning he awakens; he awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught.

This picture of Christ emerges once again in the darkness of Israel's seeming abandonment. There will be a man who stands in the gap and responds to God's Word completely. He will suffer for serving the people the truth. 

Isaiah 50:5–6 (ESV) The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I turned not backward. 6 I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.

We find in the servant's work the nearness of God. 

Isaiah 50:8 (ESV) He who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me? Let us stand up together. Who is my adversary? Let him come near to me.

The precious gift Jesus bestows upon all who trust Him is the nearness to God the Father He enjoyed on Earth. We have courage because we are in Christ. 

In the servant's work, we find our justification. 

Isaiah 50:9 (ESV) Behold, the Lord GOD helps me; who will declare me guilty? Behold, all of them will wear out like a garment; the moth will eat them up.

We have a man who has taken our sins even when He had none. We have a man who was divorced for a moment from the Father so that we could be bought back. We have a man who has made us pure and undefiled through faith. 

The question goes out from Isaiah to anyone who hears:

Isaiah 50:10 (ESV) Who among you fears the LORD and obeys the voice of his servant? Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the LORD and rely on his God.

If you feel like life is dark, there is one who lights it up. He did what we could not do so that we could have what He enjoyed - fellowship in the Light of God.