"do You Not Know? Have You Not Heard?"

“Do You Not Know? Have You Not Heard?”

Isaiah 40:21-31

For the past year and a half or so, how many times have you heard the phrase: “When will we get back to normal”?

It seems that this pandemic just goes on and on and on.

Lately I’ve been hearing this phrase “When will we get back to normal?” morph into: “Will we ever get back to normal?”

I’d imagine the Israelites also talked about and wondered if they would ever return to Jerusalem, and, if and when they did, would things ever be like they were before?

In our Old Testament Lesson for this morning Isaiah is speaking to the Hebrew people during a particularly bleak and desperate time.

It’s the 6th Century BC and they have been invaded, their Temple in Jerusalem has been destroyed, they have been forcefully removed from their homes and exiled as captives to Babylon.

Following all this, they were left with questions like, “Is God not powerful?”

“Is God not faithful?”

“How do we find hope while we are in exile?”

“How do we move beyond exile?”

“Is there life after exile?”

And now the Prophet Isaiah is trying to convince them to return to Jerusalem and build the Temple and the city again.

“The time of exile is over; come back home.”

But their faith in the power of God had been fading and they had become convinced that God wasn’t the One in control.

So, Isaiah has to remind them.

“Do you not know? Have you not heard?” Isaiah asks them.

Like a good prophet he is drawing them back to the faith that defines their identity.

And they know the story.

They know about God’s call to Abram—the covenant that God established with him.

They know about the birth of Israel in Egypt.

They know about Moses—how God used Moses to set His people free.

They know that they sinned in the wilderness and were forced to endure forty years of wandering in that land.

And they know how God, in His grace and love, fed them with manna and quail…

…and led them by a pillar of smoke by day and a pillar of fire by night.

They know, but they need to be reminded.

They know how God enabled them to enter the Promised Land and establish a nation there.

And they know how they rejected God’s kingship by demanding a human king.

And they know how their human kings led them and how they failed them.

They know how they rejected the advice of God’s prophets and how they decided to rely on alliances with pagan nations rather than relying on God.

They know how this led to the destruction of Jerusalem and to their enslavement.

(pause)

They know this.

They just need to be reminded.

They need to be reminded that Israel has suffered before and that suffering was not the end—that God freed them—redeemed them—brought them back.

They need to be reminded of all these things, because God is about to do it again.

Their lives may seem hopeless, but that is not the truth.

If these exiles were dependent on their own power, they would be slaves forever.

But they are dependent, not on their own power, but on God’s power.

God “gives strength to the weary,” Isaiah reminds them, “and increases the power of the weak.”

“Even youths will grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.

They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

I want to ask you this morning: Are you feeling discouraged, beaten down, and worn out with life?

Are the problems you are facing so overwhelming that it seems like there will be no end to your struggle?

Do the obstacles in your life keep you from being able to imagine what might be possible tomorrow?

Are you on the verge of giving up any hope for true healing to take place in your life?

Are the wrong choices of your past more than you can deal with?

Are you feeling alone and powerless?

Experiences of crisis and trauma can make it easy to forget things.

I’m not sure about you, but there have been times during this pandemic that I have struggled to remember what life was like before.

What was it like to be able to come to church and go to the store and school and work without having to wear a mask?

What was it like not to hear stories of deaths and full hospitals on the news…

…and not to worry that children who are too young to be vaccinated will become sick?

What was it like before we had to shut down and we had not lost so many people to death, nursing homes or fear of gathering together?