I will make a way

18 “Stop dwelling on past events and brooding over times gone by; 19 I am doing something new; it’s springing up — can’t you see it? I am making a road in the desert, rivers in the wasteland”. Isaiah 43:18-19  CJB (Complete Jewish Bible).

It’s hard to look forward with faith when the present and the past have been tough going.  The situation with the Covid-19, and now Omicron virus, is not getting any better at this point.  Most of the world is now infected and affected by it.  Here in New Zealand, leading data modeler Michael Plank says it could get worse, and even says that up to half the population could be infected with it.  Our Prime Minister is saying the Government was planning for scenarios of up to 50,000 cases a day to make sure it was well prepared, but stressed “it was not based on modelling.” ^[i]

What?  I mean what will we do, how will we get on, how will we live? Be informed but not consumed by the media.

I am of the firm belief that the virus is not of God, BUT, He will use it for His glory, and He is doing something in the midst of it.  If we will slow down, listen, we will more likely hear and see what He is doing.  Life, worship (church), work, and family may not be what they were.  But God is still on the throne, He is still Lord, He is still in control of the universe, He is still on-task and working towards His great master plan.

Maybe life for you is confusing, uncertain, unknown, unplan-able.  The verse in our text for Brief Word this month, has inspired me, and I know it is a word to some of you.  “I will make a way”.  Yes He will.

Isaiah writes prophetically to Israel as they were stuck in desperate circumstances.  They were in captivity and exile.  God wants them to see the new work He will do, so He reminds them not to remember the former things.  (Isaiah 43:18 NKJV).  If they become stuck in their situation and the discouragement of the past, they will never go forward to the new things He has for them.

It’s very interesting here and I have written about this before.  (Brief Word #101 Remember or Forget July 2020).  Israel was told to look to the past by remembering the wonderful things God did for them at the Red Sea (Isaiah 43:16-17).  But in Isaiah 43:18, they are told forget the former things, don’t even consider the things of old.  We learn from this that there is a time and a place when we must remember the past in terms of God’s work on our behalf.  But also there is a time and place to leave the past, forsake and forget it, with all its discouragement confusion and pain, and move on to what God has for us in the future.

Leaving the past and letting it go can be an issue.  It’s a tough ask.  But God’s grace is available to help us do that very thing.

What is there in your life and mine right now that we need to release, let go of, leave, and give to God?

We can also make an idol of the new things, which is another an issue.  (Acts 17:21).  Let’s not fall into that trap.

We can though hold these in balance, and as we walk softly with the Lord we will know and hear His voice about what to remember and so learn of God’s grace from our past, and what to let go.

“I will make a way.”

Here’s three things I believe will be a help in regards to how we are to live and what to do in the current climate.

Firstly, don’t try to figure it all out.

Isaiah says in another place, As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:9 NKJV.

And Job says much the same thing.

⁷ “Can you fathom the mysteries of God?
    Can you probe the limits of the Almighty?
⁸ They are higher than the heavens above—what can you do?
    They are deeper than the depths below—what can you know?
⁹ Their measure is longer than the earth
    and wider than the sea. Job 11:7-9 NKJV.

John MacArthur explains it like this.

This book (Job) begins with a scene in heaven that explains everything to the reader (1:6-2:10).  Job was suffering because God was contesting with Satan. Job never knew that, nor did any of his friends, so they all struggled to explain suffering from the perspective of their ignorance, until finally Job rested in nothing but faith in God’s goodness and the hope of His redemption. That God vindicated his trust is the culminating message of the book. When there are no rational, or even theological, explanations for disaster and pain, trust God.

The major reality of the book is the inscrutable mystery of innocent suffering. ^[ii]

Notice those words, “… they all struggled to explain suffering from the perspective of their ignorance … ”

We too will struggle to comprehend life and issues and things when we know nothing about them.  Especially things that God is doing, but which He has in His infinite wisdom not revealed to us.  There will be many things I’m sure that God does, and Heaven knows what is going on but we don’t.

We try to explain those things to our detriment.  We just cannot explain it fully because we do not have the knowledge of what is happening from God’s perspective.  Some things are just unfathomable, un-understandable (bad gramma but great doctrine!).

So don’t try to figure everything out.

Secondly, trust.

Trust.  What a little word with a big meaning.  When we can’t figure things out, when we can’t see what is going on or make sense of it all, just trust.  Trust God.  Trust His plan.  We have the evidence of His goodness and the hope of His redemption.

We can trust God, because He says “I will make a way.”  He will.  He is bigger, more powerful, more able, more knowledgeable, He sees and knows much more than we do.  We can trust Him.

God loves to open to us revelation and show us things, He really does, so let’s press in.  God loves us and does want to reveal to us more of His perspective.  Clarity comes from communion.  The greater the communion the greater the clarity He is able to show us.  But what we don’t understand let’s just leave it with the Lord.

Thirdly, make hay while the sun shines.

In other words take advantage of any and every opportunity to work, serve, minister, do what we do, exercise our gifts, be active for the Lord.  It’s about not being paralysed by anything, not being immobilised by our lack of understanding of what is going on.

Let’s just get on with living for Jesus.   Let’s be active in serving Him, trusting Him, being a living example of Jesus to a needy world.

“I will make a way.”  He will, we can’t.  The way through is not ours to make but it is ours to find.  In God’s love and grace He will open to us the way we are to go when we need to know.  God will make a way for you and me.

You can trust Him.

^{[i] www.1news.co.nz 23/1/22.}

^{[ii] John MacArthur www.blueletterbible.org.}