Expostulate

I learned a new word from Matthew Poole: Expostulate.  It means to "reason earnestly with someone against something that person intends to do or has done".  I like it.  Especially in regard to passionate praying.  And that is exactly what Isaiah is doing in chapters 63-66.

 Isaiah expostulates with God in 63:15, "Look down and behold".  Isaiah is asking God not only to look and barely see or glance but to look with regard and respect of His poor people in captivity.  Before verse fifteen, Isaiah recounts God's past mercies on His people.  Starting with verse seven, he lists God's steadfast love, great goodness, compassion, salvation, hurts for them, pities them, lifted them up and carries them.  Now in verse fifteen, Isaiah says, "Look down", really look!  Here we are, needy and hopeless, the same ones you had mercy on before.

Then Isaiah passionately begs God in chapter 64, "Oh that you would rend the heavens and come down!!!"  (How many times would we like for God to just come?)  He continues to exalt God in 2-5, "to make Your name known...You did awesome things...no eye has seen a God besides You".  And on in verses 6-7, Isaiah confesses the sins of the people and of himself.  More details of our fallible selves versus His infallible Lordship and loving Fatherhood in verses eight through nine.  (Beautiful reading that you do well to read in the quietness of your alone time.)

God talks back to Isaiah in chapter 65 and tells Isaiah the reason for His silence: SIN.  And in case He is not clear enough, in verse 12, He says, "I called; you did not answer.  I spoke; you did not listen.  You did what was evil and chose what I did not delight."  God had already told Isaiah in 58:9 that "you shall call and the Lord will answer.  You shall cry and He will say, 'Here I am'."

And with the same steadfast love, great goodness, compassion and pity, God continues in chapter 66:2 more directions for His slow to learn followers: "this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble, contrite in spirit and trembles at My word."  In other words, one who is subdued to the will of God, poor and low in his own eyes, listening to God's word with reverence.

Do we have the same God as Isaiah?  He answers when we cry out with a passion for obedience and His glory!  Some will say, "well He actually talked to Isaiah."  I would say, "Faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1)  We draw our hope in the complete and inspired Word of God.  We see witnessed in many God's dealings with man and that's when we tremble at the Word, God's Word of truth.

Note: As I expressed in last post, if you look at Isaiah's prayer in 63 and 64 compared with Jesus pattern for prayer in Matthew and Luke, you'll see hallowed exaltation of God and His kingdom, desire for God's will, and an asking forgiveness of sins and petitions.