Seeing the Messiah and understanding that it is God’s great love for all that God has created that will move the Lord one day to right all wrongs, Isaiah began to praise God
“I will recount the gracious deeds of the Lord,
Isaiah 63:7-9 (NRSVUE)
the praiseworthy acts of the Lord,
because of all that the Lord has done for us
and the great favor to the house of Israel
that he has shown them according to his mercy,
according to the abundance of his steadfast love.
For he said, “Surely they are my people,
children who will not act deceitfully,”
and he became their savior
in all their distress.
It was no messenger or angel
but his presence that saved them;
in his love and pity it was he who redeemed them;
he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.”
The Lord’s Hesed
That phrase steadfast love is God’s hesed, the overflow of God’s faithfulness, God’s grace.
The Bible addresses the topic of love between God and humanity, as well as people with each other. Like English, the Hebrew language has one word for love, אהבה | ahava. However, God characterizes God’s own love with the word חֶסֶד | hesed (Exodus 34:6-7), for which there is no clear English translation. Often, we will see hesed translated as “lovingkindness,” but this word also encompasses goodness, faithfulness, mercy, devotion, favor, and loyalty.
Of the 250 times that hesed appears in the Hebrew scriptures, perhaps the most famous incidence is in Psalm 23, beginning “The Lord is my shepherd.”
“you anoint my head with oil;
Psalm 23:5-6 (NRSV, emphasis added)
my cup overflows.
Surely goodness and hesed shall follow me
all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord
my whole life long.”
God’s Grief
But God’s people returned God’s love with stubbornness. They grieved God’s Holy Spirit. God’s correction came swiftly.
“they rebelled
Isaiah 63:10 (NRSVUE)
and grieved his holy spirit;
therefore he became their enemy;
he himself fought against them.”
In Isaiah 63:11-14, the people’s attention turned to the past, when God performed powerful miracles among them. God led them out of a life of captivity and enslavement, rescued them from their enemies, put God’s Holy Spirit among them, gave them the Lord’s own name and claimed them as God’s people. God made them strong and wealthy, and God gave them rest in God’s Spirit.
As Isaiah recalled all this history, he began to pray for God’s rescue now, appealing to God as their Father, just as Jesus taught his disciples to pray to the Father, in Jesus’ name – in the character and will of Christ – through the power of the Spirit, and they would be granted whatever they asked.
Father, Son, and Spirit
Christians reading through Isaiah see Isaiah calling upon all three Persons of the Godhead, for he speaks of the Messiah, of God the Father, and also of God’s Spirit. Even after two thousand years of deep probing, the full nature, the innermost nature, of God as expressed in the trinity is not fully grasped. There is one God, which the Bible clearly teaches, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. But Christians see God existing in three Persons, illustrated in Jesus instructing his disciples to baptize all believers in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
God is eternal, with no beginning of any kind. There is no such thing as God having partly existed as the Father, and then later more fully existing as the Son and the Spirit. God, the triune God, fully existed as we know God now, from always, from before the beginning.
Although they are distinct, both the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit are every bit as much God as God the Father is God. All work together with one mind in all things. The best we can do is to try to understand what the scriptures reveal about God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and try to relate the three Persons of the one Godhead without making too many mistakes or distortions.
God the Father is revealed chiefly in the Old Testament. God is described as having planned the creation of the universe and sustains all things by the power of God’s word, God’s word being the Son. God the Father is the rightful Judge over all yet has placed the Son upon the throne of judgement. We understand that it is God the Father Who planned salvation through redemption.
The Lord Jesus Christ is described as the only begotten Son of God the Father, because both the Son and the Father are of the same divine substance. It is not that only the Father existed, and then God begot a Son, and now the Son exists. Both the Father and the Son are eternal, timeless, infinite. But at a moment in time, the Son took on the form of a human being, and for that limited time emptied himself to be the servant.
God the Son is revealed chiefly in the Gospels. Jesus was both fully God and fully human. He is the word by which the Father spoke and brought all things into being. He is the word which sustains all things. It is through Christ that the world is judged. And it is through Christ that God’s plan of salvation is fulfilled by the Son’s life, ministry, death, and resurrection. Now resurrected, Jesus reigns over his body, the church, as Lord.
The Holy Spirit is the power who brought forth life from the void, the agent of creation, the power that anointed kings and prophets, the essence of God’s life that fills hearts with joy. God the Holy Spirit is revealed chiefly in the Epistles. The Spirit calls men and women to faith in Christ, making them alive with the same resurrection power that raised Jesus from the dead, and makes believers increasingly like Jesus through the work of sanctification.
Faith works together with the triune God. We are redeemed through faith in God the Son. We receive a new spirit and a new name. God seals us with the Lord’s Holy Spirit, then leads us through life enabling us to learn to live by the leading of God’s Spirit, and to lay claim to every spiritual blessing.
We abide in the Son, we walk in God’s light and love, abiding in the Son through the power of the Holy Spirit, and we are blessed by the Father.
God’s Goodness and Grace
Isaiah’s prayer began with agonizing over what felt like God withholding His compassion.
“Look down from heaven and see,
Isaiah 63:15 (NRSVUE)
from your holy and glorious habitation.
Where are your zeal and your might?
Your great pity and your compassion are withheld from me.”
Isaiah acknowledged how far they had strayed from the faith of the patriarchs.
“For you are our father,
Isaiah 63:16 (NRSVUE)
though Abraham does not know us
and Israel does not acknowledge us;
you, O Lord, are our father;
our Redeemer from of old is your name.”
Isaiah was not blaming God for their sin. But Isaiah was acknowledging the spiritual truth about sin.
“Why, O Lord, do you let us stray from your ways
Isaiah 63:17-19 (NRSVUE)
and let our heart harden, so that we do not fear you?
Turn back for the sake of your servants,
the tribes that are your heritage.
Your holy people took possession for a little while,
but now our adversaries have trampled down your sanctuary.
We have long been like those whom you do not rule,
like those not called by your name.”
Hang onto that, for resolution comes in the very next chapter.
Heavenly Mother & Father are one. The Divine Feminine and Masculine. Same soul body that can manifest as a human being for divine guidance and protection for their Children whom they created. They have many incarnation bodies that fulfill their divine plan and purpose’s “worlds without number” The Savior was Married. The Divine feminine has come and is preparing the way for Their return. There is so much more to learn… thank you for your study 🤗
Wasatchwakeup.com
Thank you for commenting!
I am not familiar with the material that you wrote about. Where does it comes from?
Wasatchwakeup.com
Julie Barnett