READING: Isaiah 57-62
I memorized these verses many years ago, but I doubt I realized then how significant they are.
The people of God had wondered aloud why God was not responding to their religious activity; indeed, they asked, “Why have we fasted, but you have not seen? We have denied ourselves, but you haven’t noticed!” (Isa 58:3). The problem, though, was not that God was inattentive to their efforts. No, the problem was instead sin in their lives (and, these are the verses I memorized): “the Lord’s arm is not too weak to save, and his ear is not too deaf to hear. But your iniquities are separating you from your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not listen” (Isa 59:1-2).
Those latter phrases halt me in my tracks. God can save. God can hear. But, He chooses not to listen to us when our iniquities are ongoing. As one writer put it, “Sin is like a solid brick wall or a giant chasm that separates people from God, and the only thing that can penetrate that wall is a confession of sin. . . . sin hides the face of God ‘from hearing’ what the sinner says.”* The problem was not God; it was the people. The problem was sin.
If I want to be a prayer warrior today, I need to remember this reality.
PRAYER: “God, show me any sin that hinders my prayers today.”
TOMORROW’S READING: Isaiah 63-66, Jeremiah 1
*Smith, G. (2009). Isaiah 40-66 (Vol. 15B, p. 589). Broadman & Holman Publishers.