Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins
Comfort? What an outdated word. We don’t want comfort today. You have to have people outraged if you want to them act and bring about change. You need push and prod to keep people on their toes. And so the world doesn’t do comfort today. And we are run ragged in battle after battle, our sanity sacrificed on the altar of someone else’s idea of progress. And in the world it never ends – there will just be something new to be outraged or fight against next year.
Yet, our LORD cries out “Comfort.” And through the prophet Isaiah, He actually tells us what drives all this hectic chaos in the world. Sin drives us. We wish to justify ourselves, we wish to vilify others to make ourselves feel better. Sometimes this is just mere virtue signaling; sometimes actual fights and wars break out. And it’s all sin driving warfare and hatred and fear. It’s sin that we cannot stop or break.
But Christ Jesus has done so. Upon the Cross, the warfare wrought by sin is ended. It is finished. The strife is o’er, the battle done. And your iniquity is pardonned. And should some huckster try to manipulate you or browbeat you with fear, know that Christ Jesus there upon the Cross took up all the weight and burden of your sins. Double it. Twice over. There is nothing left for you to fix with God – He has fixed it for you.
So, comfort. Hear the Word of the Lord proclaiming your forgiveness. Receive the Holy Spirit who comforts you (there’s a reason He’s called the Comfortor) with the Gospel of Christ Jesus, and rest securely in Him.
