The Gift of Comfort

 

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. A voice cries: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” (Isaiah 40:1-5 ESV).

 

Typically we see the word “peace” coupled with “comfort.” Our reading today is from a Messianic Prophecy given by the Prophet Isaiah. God doesn’t skimp on His provision for us through the grace of Jesus’ work in redemption. Even when we find ourselves wandering off the path like the hapless sheep we are, we get a second chance and a third, and a fourth—as many as we need. The work of the Holy Spirit is to bring us right back to the path in the wilderness that leads us to God.


I am actually writing this devotional on a cool, overcast day. It is also Friday after Thanksgiving. This day has become “Black Friday” in the retail sales businesses of our country. It is known as a “black” day because the hope of these businesses is that the increased traffic and ultimate sales promotions will bring increased profits to get their accounts “in the black,” which is a common way of saying “profitable.”

 

The real “Black Friday” was the day that Jesus died on the cross. Since a Savior is what our world needs; the comfort Isaiah calls out for God’s people, when our guilt was expiated, our valleys filled in, and those mountains in our life we are trying to ascend were brought low happened that day. God comes to us in our pain and weakness just as we think we cannot take one more step. That is the good news we long to hear, when we stop to listen to our soul’s greatest need. That’s the comfort of our hard won peace!