July 7, 2024 - Isaiah 40-42

So much judgment against the people and rightly so!  But to those who will go into exile, wondering if their God had forgotten them, the prophet speaks for God: “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.  Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry 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” (40:1-2).  Johann Olearius, in the 17th century, captured, in a hymn this wonderful announcement.  And here’s the thing for us:  these words spoken to and about Israel?  This is the promise given to us, also!

Comfort, comfort ye my people,

speak ye peace, thus saith our God;

comfort those who sit in darkness

mourning ‘neath their sorrow's load.

Speak ye to Jerusalem

of the peace that waits for them!

Tell her that her sins I cover,

and her warfare now is over.

Yea, her sins our God will pardon,

blotting out each dark misdeed;

all that well deserved His anger

He will no more see nor heed.

She hath suffered many a day,

now her griefs have passed away;

God will change her pining sadness

into ever-springing gladness.  -- Johann Olearius (1671)