Daily Devotions
Isaiah
"Return for Your servants' sake"
Text: Isaiah 63:17
PLEA TO GOD TO RETURN TO HIS PEOPLE
Isaiah continued to seek the LORD in humble prayer. He was pleading from as many angles as he could think of.
“O LORD, why have You made us stray from Your ways,
And hardened our heart from Your fear?
Return for Your servants’ sake,
The tribes of Your inheritance.
Your holy people have possessed it but a little while;
Our adversaries have trodden down Your sanctuary.
We have become like those of old, over whom You never ruled,
Those who were never called by Your name.”
Isaiah 63:17-19
1. Pondering on why Israel continued to be straying.
a) Israel had strayed from the ways of the LORD.
b) The nation had also hardened its heart.
c) Isaiah wondered:
i) Why had the LORD not done anything to help the nation?
ii) There was a bit of misgiving concerning God’s part.
2. Pleading for God to return to Israel.
a) The tribes of Israel were God’s inheritance.
b) The people were His servants.
c) He pleaded with the LORD to return for the sake of their being His servants.
3. Pleading for God’s people.
a) God had sanctified them.
b) Israel were His own holy people.
c) God had given them a holy sanctuary too.
4. The sorry plight of His people.
a) His sanctuary was trodden down by wicked adversaries.
b) Israel was like a kingdom that God had never ruled.
This was to describe the sorry state the nation was in.
c) They were like people who were never called by His name.
This was to describe the pitiful people called by God’s name
(2 Chronicles 7:14).