Isaiah 43: Created for Glory
Sunday, November 16, 2025
Just a few weeks ago we looked at Isaiah 44 in a Noontime we called Chasing Ashes. In that reflection we spent thinking about the little gods we harbor in our lives and about the time expend on worry when we might better spend it in conversation with God. For it is God who best knows us and who can best calm our fears. It is God who has the power to do the impossible in the face of overwhelming odds. It is God who love us beyond all measure and who years to bring us home. We also pondered how odd it is that God often chooses the most unlikely of us for his work; we reminded ourselves that when we are chosen by and in God, we have no reason to think that we will not be successful. Rather than shrink from God’s call as we focus on our inabilities, we might take the opposite approach and place all of our trust in the one who knows us and loves us best, this one who says to us: Fear not, my servant, the darling whom I have chosen . . . I will pour out my spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing upon your descendants.
In today’s Noontime we are again reminded: Fear not, for I am with you; from the east I will bring back your descendants, from the west I will gather you. I will say to the north: Give them up! And to the south: Hold not back! Bring back my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth: everyone who is named as mine, whom I created for glory, whom I formed and made. When we are regarded as this valuable, why do we doubt so quickly? When we are called this openly, why do we shrink away? When we are treasured this dearly, what and whom do we fear?
In today’s reading we find promises of restoration, forgiveness and redemption. See, I am doing something new! We are even chided a bit for not calling on God enough and we are reminded that God is eager to wipe away any and all of our offenses (v. 22-26). We have only to turn to God and ask.
Jesus also reminds us that we are created for glory; he tells us that we have but to ask forgiveness of the Father and the slate of our lives will be wiped clean in a stroke. (Matthew 7:7-8 and Luke 11:9-10). And so we pray . . .
Jesus tells us that when we knock, the door will be opened to us. Everlasting Father, reveal to us the wonder and glory that is ours so that we might see that our disabilities are our assets.
Jesus tells us that when we ask, we will receive. Comforting Spirit, bring us the peace that soothes and the serenity that heals so that we might understand that our vulnerabilities bring us closer to you.
Jesus tells us that when we seek, we will find. Brother Christ, teach us how to follow the Father and remind us that most often our weaknesses are our gift, for they lead us always back to you.
Amen.
A re-post from October 22, 2011.
Images from: http://theonlinebibleschool.net/mod/resource/view.php?id=227 and http://newlife.id.au/worship-and-prayer/some-thoughts-on-prayer/
The Noontimes 