COMFORT FOR GOD’S PEOPLE
2nd Sunday in Advent
Isaiah 40: 1-11
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text for this mornings meditation is recorded in the book of Isaiah, chapter 40, verses 1 through 11, particularly these words: “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.” This is our text.
In the name of our blessed Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, dear Christian friends. If ever there was a time when the world and most of its people were feeling sorrow for themselves — it is today. Today, people are afraid to go out in the streets for fear of being robbed or attacked, so they are flocking to the gun stores to buy guns and get concealed carry permits. People do not trust the politicians that they themselves put into office – especially with a newly elected, almost unknown president about to be sworn in. The events in India of last week, reminds us that terrorists are everywhere and anywhere in our world, and their hope is to control our lives through the fear that they can create. Civil war continues in Africa. Unrest continues in the Middle East. Everyone gets nervous every time they go through security measures at the airport, because those measures remind us that there are terrorists out there who want to bring that plane down.
And add to all that, the recent economic turmoil that has made not only our elderly, but even the middle aged, nervous about their retirement benefits and savings. Our young people are worried about the increasing cost of higher education. Our workers are worried about downsizing going on in many major companies. And because of the credit crunch — the number of home foreclosures this year will probably hit record levels.
With all the bad news around us — it is easy to fall into a real depressed mood. It is easy to get the idea that everything is bad and nothing is good.
But there is something that we need to cheer about. There is something that is great going on in our world right now. There is something fabulous happening for all people, everywhere. And our text for today tells us about it.
In our text we read, “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.” God — has comfort — for his people. The times of Isaiah were very much like the times of today. Israel had just finished a very bad war — which they had lost. The people were discouraged. They thought that they had no leaders. They thought that God himself had abandoned them. The children of Israel had fallen onto bad times and they were hurting economically, socially, politically, emotionally, and spiritually. At this low ebb in the life of the nation, God sent Isaiah to them with these words, “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.”
The message of God, which Isaiah was to share, was THREE-FOLD. Tell Jerusalem, “That her warfare is ended,” — “that her iniquity is pardoned,” — “And that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.”
God comforts us with that same three-fold comfort. First of all, OUR WARFARE IS ENDED. You may not have known it, but you have been at war. Paul tells us in Ephesians, “For we are not fighting against human beings, but against the wicked spiritual forces in the heavenly world, the rulers, authorities, and cosmic powers of this dark age. And this advent season, God’s Holy Word of comfort comes to us and tells us, “Your warfare is ended.”
Oh no!! We didn’t win the war. In fact — when we are really honest with ourselves — we have won none of the battles in this war on our own.
But God has taken our side — in fact, God has become one of us. It was the miracle which we call the INCARNATION — where God took on flesh, and became a human being. It was the miracle of the birth of God — a child born of the Virgin Mary, born in a stable in the town of Bethlehem.
Yes, our Warfare is ended. Take comfort people of God, because those rulers, those authorities, those cosmic powers against which we wage our war, have been defeated, BY OUR GOD!! God himself took on flesh in order to win the victory for us. And by His perfect life, his innocent suffering and death, his resurrection from the dead — He has indeed conquered the enemy — the War is over. Our God is the victor. His victory is our Victory. “Our Warfare is ended.” Take comfort people of God.”
Secondly, our text tells us to be comforted because “OUR INIQUITY IS PARDONED.” The Children of Israel suffered much at the hands of their enemies because they never consistently trusted the Lord to help them in their times of trouble. They trusted their own power. They trusted alliances with other nations. But they did not trust their God — and they suffered because of it!
You and I and people of our day suffer much because we do not take God at his word. Our God tells us that through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven and that we have the promise of eternal life with him in heaven.
Some people believe that their problems are just too big for God to handle. Some people think they are so sinful God can’t help them, or worse yet, doesn’t care about them. Some are looking for a way to buy their forgiveness, and there are a lot of false religions and cults just waiting to take their money. And there are others who point to their good works or their family heritage as if God owes them his love and grace. All of these are vain and false. The simple truth is — as our text says, “Their iniquity is pardoned.”
You can’t buy it, and you can’t earn it, and there is nothing you can do that is so bad that God will deny it to you if you repent — for God promises, “You are saved by grace, through faith, it is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.”
Take comfort people of God, “Your iniquity is pardoned.”
And lastly, the people of God are comforted with these words: “You have received from the Lord’s hand double for all your sins.”
These words repeat and emphasize the previous two: that the punishment time is over, that sins are forgiven, and that the people will receive mercy and every blessing from their God. In the Old Testament justice required an “eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But if someone was truly repentant and sorry, he didn’t just pay back what was stolen, but he paid back double for his crime. If someone stole $100, then true repentance and justice demanded that they pay back $200. That was considered fair. Remember Zacchaeus, the short tax collector in the New Testament. He promised Jesus that if he had cheated anyone, he would pay back 4 times what he stole. He must have been very, very, very, very repentant.
In our text, God’s people are comforted because they have already paid the price for justice — they have received double for all their sins — their debt is paid, even doubled.
Our debt is paid — not by us, but by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. When Jesus said on his cross –”It is finished”, he meant that our debt for sin was paid in full and that we were right with God. There is nothing more that we can add to the payment Christ has already made through his life, death, and resurrection — We are right with God, by grace, through Faith in Jesus Christ. That was the comfort for God’s people in the Old Testament — that is the comfort of God’s people today!!
This advent, as we look forward to the Birthday celebration of Jesus Christ our Lord — Let us take comfort. God cares for us. — God loves us. — God has redeemed us and made us his own through Jesus Christ our Lord. To God be the glory, now and always. Amen.
May the peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting. Amen.
