August 28, 2024 | Be God's Light
We All Have Gone Astray
Scripture: Isaiah 64(NIV)
1 Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down,
that the mountains would tremble before you!
2 As when fire sets twigs ablaze
and causes water to boil,
come down to make your name known to your enemies
and cause the nations to quake before you!
3 For when you did awesome things that we did not expect,
you came down, and the mountains trembled before you.
4 Since ancient times no one has heard,
no ear has perceived,
no eye has seen any God besides you,
who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.
5 You come to the help of those who gladly do right,
who remember your ways.
But when we continued to sin against them,
you were angry.
How then can we be saved?
6 All of us have become like one who is unclean,
and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;
we all shrivel up like a leaf,
and like the wind our sins sweep us away.
7 No one calls on your name
or strives to lay hold of you;
for you have hidden your face from us
and have given us over to our sins.
8 Yet you, Lord, are our Father.
We are the clay, you are the potter;
we are all the work of your hand.
9 Do not be angry beyond measure, Lord;
do not remember our sins forever.
Oh, look on us, we pray,
for we are all your people.
10 Your sacred cities have become a wasteland;
even Zion is a wasteland, Jerusalem a desolation.
11 Our holy and glorious temple, where our ancestors praised you,
has been burned with fire,
and all that we treasured lies in ruins.
12 After all this, Lord, will you hold yourself back?
Will you keep silent and punish us beyond measure?
Devotional
When I was growing up, I helped my dad for endless hours in our back garage, where he repaired and repainted wrecked cars. There we had a bucket of used, dirty rags. They had been used to wipe the grime and grease off damaged car parts. The rags were used to clean the cobwebs, dust, and dirt off the walls, so as not to interfere with the paint jobs. They were utilized when we hosed down the cement floor then dried up the muddy puddles left behind. The rags were sometimes soaked with paint, primer, and thinner.
Imagine what my mom would have said if I had used those filthy rags to help her do the dishes, dust the furniture, or clean the picture window in the living room! That’s the point Isaiah made when he said, “all our righteous acts are like filthy rags.” We simply can’t make up for sins by faking God out with good deeds.
Rather, we are called to let God remake us as He desires: “Yet you, Lord, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand” (v. 8). Take a moment and sing the words of this hymn to the Lord, offering yourself to Him as you do:
Have Thine own way Lord
Have Thine own way
Thou art the potter I am the clay
Mold me and make me after Thy will
While I am waiting yielded and still
Have Thine own way Lord
Have Thine own way
Search me and try me Master today
Whiter than snow Lord wash me just now
As in Thy presence humbly I bow
Have Thine own way Lord
Have Thine own way
Hold over my being absolute sway
Filled with Thy spirit till all can see
Christ only always living in me
Poem
Sheep
Bleating lamb within a stall
Ewe will lick you cleaning
Bounding forth, a free-for-all
To the pasture greening
Nibbling on the tender grass
Chewing cud while resting
Hooves sink in some deep morass
Butting heads a-testing
Wandering off away from flock
Danger there is lurking
Horns in thorns do interlock
Freed by shepherd’s working
Following the shepherd’s voice
Safety now be finding
Rod and staff make path your choice
In the fold abiding
