Letting God’s Face Shine

Isaiah 64: 1-9; Psalm 80: 1-7, 17-19

Isaiah 64 is a plea for God to come down from the mountain and show God’s power. Israel is under the Babylonian captivity, and they remember how God showed God’s face to Moses. But alas, Isaiah moans, God has hidden God’s face from us. He admits the fault of the Israelites who have turned their backs to God. They have transgressed, committed iniquities, so God hid God’s face and delivered them to the hand of their sin. Yet Isaiah pleads, “You are our Father.” He uses the metaphor of God being the potter and his people being the clay – the work of your hands. “Don’t remember our sins forever – consider that we are still your people.

Psalms 80 asks for the Lord, the Shepherd of Israel to come and save them. The psalmist asks to be restored and to let God’s face shine upon them three times. He asks for restoration and to let God’s face shine upon them so that they may be saved. The third time he asks the same after requesting God to give them life, then they will call on God’s name.

What I found interesting in both of these passages is the writer acknowledging the power and majesty of God. Isaiah asks the majesty of the Lord to tear open the heavens. The psalmist asks the majesty of the Lord to stir up God’s might and come and save us.

Isaiah acknowledges the sins of Israel. This is a true confession with repentance and a plea not to remember their sins forever. In the Psalm the psalmist is crying out, how long Lord till you restore us and shine your face upon us. Isaiah tells the way for God to meet you – to gladly do right and remember God in all your ways. But how difficult it was for Israel to do so, they sinned, and God was angry.

Psalm 80:17 gives a hint of true salvation that will come from Christ- the one mentioned here at God’s right hand. Could this be the Messiah, the one they long for to save them? The one mentioned here whom “God made strong for yourself.”

We know that Christ came to die for all our sins and iniquities- our lack of keeping up with the law. The Holy Spirit can give us the power to remember God in all our ways and do right. Due to this we can have God’s face shine upon us. So we can have the love of Christ – the reflection of God’s face shine through us.

 

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