Isaiah 25:9 And it shall be said in that day, See, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD… Interwoven with all human experiences there is the consciousness of a conflict, an oppression, a captivity. But men expect deliverance. If it were not so, effort would be paralysed, and history would end. This hope is not illusive; the God who has implanted in the hearts of all men an anticipation of deliverance is a God who will give deliverance. But deliverances do not come when men desire them, hope for them, expect them. Often there is long delay. I. GOD KEEPS MEN WAITING. I. Let us notice how true this is of the history of our race. The race is wrestling with a mighty sorrow. We look through the ages, and we see that every age has its burden of woe. We go among the diverse peoples of mankind, and we find that there is not a tribe which does not exhibit tokens of the strife. The eternal God has spoken, and His voice has told the world that the secret of the world's sorrow and strife and pain is the world's sin. And the honest conscience echoes back the truth of God. but the same Voice which tells the world of sin, tells also of a Saviour. But how long man had to wait before his hope was realised! And, even now that Christ has come, His advent proves to be, not some grand final stroke of triumph, but only the beginning of another waiting that, perhaps, must be longer still. 2. How true is this principle with respect to the history of the Church. God is fashioning to Himself a new race out of the ruins of the old. But think how the Church has had to wait. 3. How true is this same principle of the history of the nations. Each nation reproduces, on a smaller scale, the history of the race; and each has its burden and evil, each has its hope. But the nations likewise wait for their deliverance from thrall and pain. How impressive an example of waiting is the history of the Jews! Our England, too, is only gradually emerging from what it has been to what it shall be. So of the various nationalities of Europe, of the swarming multitudes of Asia, of the tribes of dark Africa, and the rest — who would dare to think that the goal of their history is reached! 4. But this principle is still further true in regard to individual men. Men of science, like Galileo; men of enterprise, like Columbus; men of letters, like Milton — these, who have done the most permanent work for the world, have often not been duly recognised as benefactors till they were gone. Does not our own spiritual history illustrate the same truth! How long it is, sometimes, before we reach a settled peace, an unquestioning faith; how long before we gain an established strength of purity, and are made perfect in love! II. WHY DOES GOD KEEP MEN WAITING? 1. It is in accord with God's universal way of working, so far as we know. We could conceive of a universe in which everything should be immediate and final; but that is certainly not the method of our universe. The records of geology tell of the earth's slow development; the researches of biology attest the gradual unfolding of life; the annals of history show civilisation, science, and culture only progressing by degrees. So when God, in His providential and spiritual dealings with men, keeps them waiting, this is only in harmony with His general method and plan of work. 2. We must remember the bearing, on this subject, of man's own free will. Even when on God's part all is ready, this sometimes interferes to cause long delay. 3. Great moral purposes are served by God's law of waiting. It accomplishes a three-fold result: it is for the discipline of effort, of patience, of faith. Of course, we may fail to abide the test; but if we yield ourselves to it rightly, God's principle of delay tends to the working out of one or more of these results. III. THE WAITING DOES END SOME TIME. Otherwise, the problem would be insoluble, the instincts of man's own nature would belie themselves, and the very government of God itself would be purposeless. And while, unless man's own perverseness frustrates God's designs, the waiting will end some time, it is suggested by these words of Isaiah that the deliverance, when it does come, will be a glad surprise. It is said that the poet Cowper, so much of whose life had been passed in bitter bondage, and who died at last in despair, wore on his face after death an expression of astonished joy. So it is true of the lesser deliverances of life, that God surprises His people at last with the swift removal of their fears, and with His more abundant benediction. And of the great deliverance which the day of God shall usher in at last, it is said, "As the lightning cometh forth from the east, and is seen even unto the west; so shall be the coming of the Son of Man" (Matthew 24:27) — so sudden, so swift, so full! What a paean shall then be sung over a transfigured world! (T. F. Lockyer, B. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation. |
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