In Sunday’s first reading, the prophet Second Isaiah writes in the voice of an individual who is God’s servant. This servant represents all the exiled Israelites whom the Babylonians took captive after destroying Jerusalem. They are weary of exile. God is their only help in this long testing at the hands of their enemies.
Isaiah’s poetry describes the mission of God’s servants. The prophet calls us to open ourselves to God’s call as an everyday task. “Morning after morning God opens my ear that I may hear.” Isaiah warns that speaking God’s word and sustaining faith in God may not lead to popularity or even to a fair hearing, but rather to struggle, betrayal, and physical suffering.
God’s faithful servant
The Holy One has given me
a well-trained tongue
that I might speak to the weary
a word that will rouse them. Morning after morning God opens my ear that I may hear;
and I have not rebelled,
have not turned back.
I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those
who plucked my beard;
my face I did not shield from insults and spitting.
The Holy One helps me;
therefore, I am not disgraced;
I have set my face like flint,
knowing that I shall not be put to shame.
Isaiah 50.4-7
- Who are the weary in your own family or among your coworkers?
- What is a word from God that sustains you?
- Who in your community of faith awaits a word from God that will sustain them?
- What words do you speak that rouse the weary in your life?