The 58th chapter of Isaiah ends with this declaration...."The mouth of the LORD has spoken." Do you sense in those words as I do....a little bit more of an emphasis than what we usually read with...."Thus saith the LORD"....which itself should be enough to prostrate us before our God? Would you consider taking an hour just to read and meditate upon that 58th chapter of Isaiah?
Let me set up what you would be reading. God is telling the House of Jacob that they....on outward appearances....seemed to be seeking the LORD....daily....reading their torah....praying....and taking pleasure in that they were doing all of this.....but God did not seem to be acknowledging their holy efforts....for they remained a nation torn apart.
God told them....through Isaiah....that their pleasure was not a holy pleasure....but a pleasure that emanated from their evil nature. He said that He was not going to hear prayers of this kind....for they were doing all of this out of greed....and that the pleasure they experienced came from exploiting others....from trying to get everything that they said that they deserved!
God described to them the type of fast that He required....one of a humility so strong and deep that it would drive them to prostrate themselves on the ground before Him....and then He asked them if they thought if that was what they thought they were doing?
Folks....This chapter is for us evangelicals in America today. We can pray with the best of them....and have our rallies...and try to legislate a holiness of which we have no idea what that even is ....and we will proclaim to anyone who will hear that we are doing it all for the glory of God! Folks...we are not doing all of this MAGA glorying in God....for God! We are unknowingly doing it.....for ourselves....and there are few pastors to tell us this from their pulpits....because of the darkness that we are living in!
God then tells them how to emit light in this darkness....and to be guided by Him....and to take real pleasure in Him....and to become...."The repairer of the Breach....the Restorer of Streets to Dwell In"....and it begins with thinking first of others....others first....and of turning away from doing their own thing on the Sabbath....which today is our Lord's Day....but take delight in it!
If we honor this day folks....and have compassion upon those who we now have no compassion....He will guide us....in what is ahead...."The mouth of the LORD has spoken."
Addendum: Returning for a moment to the basics on salvation....the second thief on the cross had faith....alone. There was nothing possible that he could add to that confession of faith in Jesus. If you add a good work of any kind to your belief in what will save you....then you are not trusting wholly in what Jesus did on that cross. If that second thief on the cross had said to Jesus...."Jesus....I was baptized by John the Baptist....remember me when you come into your kingdom." He would not have heard Jesus say...."Today you will be with Me in Paradise"....but even if had been baptized by John the Baptist....but did not mention that to Jesus....because he was not trusting at all in that baptism....he would have heard Jesus say those wonderful words. It is not taking the Lord's Supper....it is remembering the Lord's Supper in the taking of the Lord's Supper. It is not confession of sin....it is confession of faith in Jesus....in the confession of sin.
