Verse for the week of February 7th:
And one called to another and said:
‘Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of host; the whole earth is full of his glory.’
(Isaiah 6:3)
This verse is from the call narrative of the prophet Isaiah. The prophets in the Old Testament typically have some type of encounter with the presence of God that overwhelms them and calls them to go forth and proclaim that messages that God places in their hearts and on their lips.
Isaiah has this vision of the LORD being in a throne room with Seraphs all around saying/singing to one another ‘Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of host.’ This vision confirms to Isaiah that God is holy.
What it means to be holy is literally to be set apart. Thus, the Seraphs are acknowledging that God is distinct and different than anything else—that God is all by Himself and thus worthy to be praised
The vision confirms to Isaiah that he is unworthy to be a servant of God. Isaiah states in the next couple of verses that he is a man of unclean lips and that he is lost. He understanding that he has no standing before God and seeing this presence and seeing God leads him to a stance of confession and repentance for his faults and failings.
In order to help Isaiah become the prophet that God desires for Isaiah, God gives him the vision of the Seraph taking a piece of coal from the altar and touching Isaiah’s lips thus symbolizing that now Isaiah’s lips are made clean and have been purified from their unrighteousness.
God restores to Isaiah that he can go forth and proclaim God words since his lips are now clean.
Hopefully, this story can tell us about ourselves. While we may not have a vision like Isaiah, his call story can be a model for us in our own lives.
The purpose of God’s Law is to confront us with the fact that we are unworthy and people of unclean lips and can not compare to God’s holiness. This is not be completely discouraging, for God’s grace and the gift of baptism tell us that even in our unworthiness, God comes to us and the water cleanses us and makes us new (it is similar to the seraph that comes and touches Isaiah’s lips with the coal). The gift of baptism then should empower us to go and be the church that goes and tells the story of all that God has done. We are called through baptism to go and proclaim the Word of the Lord to the world. The messages has power not because we are worthy servants/messengers but because the holiness of the LORD comes to us it is God’s holiness that enables God’s Word to go forth and change the world.
How have you experienced God’s holiness and forgiveness that empowers you to be a messenger of God?
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