Part 7: Always Restoring Series

The Always God

Part 7 - Always Restoring

Good morning! Please turn in your Bibles to Isaiah 61. We’ll start off there, but like we often do, we will end up in a different place than where we started, so you might want to go ahead and bookmark John 9 as well.

We are getting close to the end of our series called The Always God. I hope you have enjoyed it as much as I have. It’s been a blessing exploring all the ways that God has moved and interacted with His people in the past and learning how He is still moving in these same ways today.

Next week, we will observe communion together, and I really hope you will be here for that service. This is something we only do about once a quarter, and it’s really the one thing that you can’t get from watching the service on YouTube. So if you are physically able, please join us in person next week as we celebrate the Lord’s table together.

Today, we are going to look at the God who is Always Restoring.

The word “restore” or “restoration” probably brings up something specific for many of you. If you are into antiques or carpentry, maybe you think about restoring a piece of furniture.

If you are a fan of HGTV, the word “restore” might make you think of Chip and Joanna Gaines, and the TV show. If that’s you, then the word “shiplap” also undoubtedly came to mind for you just now.

But for me, when I hear the word “restore,” I always think about Trish’s dad Bennie.

Bennie’s passion was the restoration of Ford Mustangs. Specifically, the 1966 Ford Mustang.

You talk about “Always Restoring…” well, Bennie was never finished with his Mustang. Trish told me about one family vacation down to Florida from Kentucky. As they were passing through Chattanooga, Bennie pulled into a salvage yard at one point. He told his family, “I’ll just be a minute.” And he came out with a muffler and exhaust assembly that ran all the way from the “backy-back” of their station wagon to the dashboard, and the Maffet family rode the rest of the way back to Frankfort with a Ford Mustang exhaust assembly dividing the passenger side from the drivers side of the car.

But here’s the thing with Bennie, and this seems to be a common theme with a lot of auto enthusiasts: the holy grail is getting the car back to its original. Factory. Condition. Trish remembers going to car shows with her dad, and him turning his nose up at anything anyone did to “soup up” a Mustang. FM Radio? Not for Bennie’s mustang. It had to be the original AM radio with the five pushbuttons. Bennie wouldn’t consider any color of paint that wasn’t an option from the factory in 1966.

And so I think about that when I think about the work God does to restore humanity to our original factory condition. God is always restoring. And there is no project too big, too broken, or too far-gone for Him to tackle.

Our Scripture passage this morning illustrates this beautifully. If you are physically able, please stand for the reading of God’s Word, from Isaiah 61:

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me,

because the LORD has anointed me

to bring good news to the poor;[a]

he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim liberty to the captives,

and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;[b]

2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor,

and the day of vengeance of our God;

to comfort all who mourn;

3 to grant to those who mourn in Zion—

to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes,

the oil of gladness instead of mourning,

the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit;

that they may be called oaks of righteousness,

the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified.[c]

4 They shall build up the ancient ruins;

they shall raise up the former devastations;

they shall repair the ruined cities,

the devastations of many generations.

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Pray with me.

[Pray]

I’d like you to underline, or highlight, verse 4: “proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” What was this about?

As we’ve talked about before, the prophet Isaiah was ministering in the Southern kingdom of Judah from roughly 740 BC to about 681 BC. The northern kingdom of Israel was wiped out by the Assyrian’s when Isaiah was in his early 20’s. And Isaiah knew through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that the day was coming when Judah would also be overrun and carried off to exile. This happened in 586 BC, about a century after Isaiah’s lifetime.