Dwell in the Word: Isaiah 43:1-28
Consider these questions as you dwell in Isaiah 43:1-28:
1. In Isaiah 43, God emphasizes that He is the only Savior and that no one else can save His people. How does this exclusive claim of God's salvation resonate with the message of Christianity today, which also teaches that Jesus is the only way to salvation?
2. The passage speaks of God doing something new to rescue His people and blots out their transgressions. How does this anticipation of a new thing relate to the concept of the New Covenant in Christianity, and how does Jesus fulfill this promise?
3. The text mentions that God will not remember the sins of His people. How does the assurance of God's complete forgiveness and forgetting of sins impact the way Christians should view their own past mistakes and approach forgiveness and reconciliation in their relationships with others?
Transcript:
As we come to Isaiah 43 today, what we find is not only a word that is good news, it talks about God being the savior of his people. But at the end, we do come to a word of judgment because the people have not listened to God. They have not followed His ways. They have not stayed with Him and His commands. But as we start out, we get this idea that God is the only one who can save His people. There are some really famous verses in here. There are some really beautiful passages. I'm the Lord who created you, O Jacob, I formed you. Then this phrase, Fear not for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name. You are mine. God lades hold of His people. He calls to them and He makes them His people. He holds on to them. They are His. He has this type of relationship with His people. Then we get some really solid imagery here, and it calls back to times in Israel's past, particularly with two incidences. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you.
What would that naturally have called back upon for the people of Israel. What would those phrases of water and rivers? Well, it would have gone back to when they crossed through the Red Sea on dry land and when they crossed through the Jordan, right? These were things that God did to rescue His people. But then God takes it to another level here too here. When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. He is the one who has saved them. He is their savior, the Lord, their God. We see that He does all of this. There's all this different imagery that God is using that He has, Hey, look, I've used other people to ransom you. I have done all this stuff. So don't fear. I'm going to bring your offspring back from the East. You've been sent into exile. You have been sent away in punishment for your sin. But I'm going to call the people back. God is doing all this. Then what else do we see here? That all the nations gather together in the people's assembly, who among them can declare this and show us the former things.
Again, this idea that God is unique, that God does something more than the pagan gods can. In fact, He says, Let them bring their witnesses to prove them right. Let them hear and say, 'It is true. ' He is calling out the pagan gods, the people who worship pagans, and even the people among the Israelis and the people of Judah who would have turned away to the pagan gods. Show me, God saying, do this. But God is calling out to the people. He's reminding them. There's all these other things, but who is it that lay hold of you? Who is it who has possess you? And notice what we see at the end of verse 10 here, Before me no God was formed, and nor shall there be any after me. Basically, he's saying, I'm the only God. All these other things that are made, they're fake. There's no one like me. I am unique. And then verse 11 drives it home to the Nth degree, right? I am the Lord, and beside me there is no savior. In other words, no one else can save you. There's no one else who can do this.
Now, in our time, there's this distaste for the idea of exclusivity, the idea that only Christ can save. But we see here, in what Isaiah is saying, why that is the case. There are no others. There's no other path of salvation other than the Lord God, the one who lays hold of His people, the one who saves Him. There's none other who have ever been made. There's none that are going to come after Him. Who else could possibly rescue the people of God other than God Himself? And so, as we continue through this passage, we see in verses 18 and 19, this idea of God doing something new to save His people, that He's the only one who can do it, and He's done things in the past. Again, we called back to those imageries of passing through water and passing through the river. But remember not the former things nor consider the things of old. Now, that's not saying don't remember what God has done, but say you're not going to be rescued in those same ways. Behold, I'm doing a new thing. Now it springs forth. Do not perceive it. I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.
God is going to do something new to rescue His people. We can see here, this is pointing forward to the idea of this one who is going to come, this one who is going to rescue the people of God from their sins. We see that there's a new covenant being made, and we look forward here in this Book of Isaiah in many ways to Christ, and we can do that again here. We see another verse that really drives home this new thing that God is doing, this thing that He has done for us in Christ. As we see in verse 25, I am He who blocks out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins. God is taking this to the highest level here, right? He is the one who's going to blood out your transgressions. You're not going to do this. Even though you have rejected doing the sacrifices. We read that above in verses 24 and some other spots. Even though you've done these things, Look, I'm the one who is going to blow out your transgressions. I'm the one who's going to save you, and I will not remember your sins.
Now, you and I have the idea of forgiveness, but how often do we forgive people, but yet we are looking over our shoulder, wondering if they will wrong us in that way again? But what does God say? I will not remember your sins. They're going to be wiped away, as we see in other language in scripture, as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. God does not remember them anymore. But we see here at the end of this passage that something is going to happen. It says here in verse 27, your first father sinned, your mediators transgressed against me. That's the message of the Old Testament, right? That Adam sinned and we fell, all of us into sin. The mediators that God has put out there to mediate between us and Him have transgressed as well. No one has been able to fulfill what we needed perfectly. What does God say? He says there's going to be utter destruction in Jacob, which means among the people of God, all of this is going to be torn down. This points us forward once again to Christ.
God is doing something new. All the things that have been put in place, the mediators that they had, whether that was the people of the Old Testament who acted as mediators, or whether it was the priests and the sacrificial system, all of that has failed. They've transgressed against God. So something new needs to happen. We know the reality of that because it has come. It's not something new that needs to happen to us. It wasn't the time of Isaiah, but it's not to us. We have the perfect mediator. Our mediator has not transgressed against God because it is the Lord Jesus Christ. In Adam, the first Adam, we fell. But now in the second Adam, Jesus Christ, he has perfectly mediated so that our transgressions have been blotted out and our sins will not be remembered. So may you and I remember that good news and may we live in light of it as we love and serve our neighbors today.
