Isaiah 61.1-11, Luke 1.57-80 - Lectionary for 1/1/10

Today's readings are Isaiah 61.1-11 and Luke 1.57-80.

As we start the new calendar year, let's spend some time looking at our Old Testament readings in particular.  I'll try hard to bring out the overall Law/Gospel themes within the readings. 

In Isaiah 61 today we see a passage which, if we needed to classify it as either Law or Gospel, we'd say is almost entirely Gospel.  Yet there are two chilling statements.  See in verse 2 how this is the time both for God's favor and his vengeance?  Our God is the God who rightly takes revenge.  Our wrong does not go unnoticed.  The evil of mankind is not without its recompense.  Though our Lord seems slow to punish sin, he does promise vengeance.  In verse 8 we see that our Lord hates "robbery and wrong."  He will judge them at the appropriate time.

This ought to be enough to silence our arrogance.  It ought to be enough to remind us to look for God's mercy and not to think we can flee his anger by ignoring him.  The God who is faithful to his promises will keep those promises, including his promise to pour out his wrath on evil.  And he defines evil as everything which is not in conformity to his love, all which is not true to his character.  Indeed, all of us fail.  We are all condemned under the curses mentioned in verses 2 and 8 of Isaiah 61.  The weight of the Law in those simple statements is sufficient to crush each and every one of us.

What hope is there then?  In this Gospel-filled passage, we see that our Lord is proclaiming good news to the poor.  He binds up the broken-hearted.  He gives captives liberty.  He releases from prison.  He pours out his favor.  He gives relief to those who are mourning.  He plants God's people where they can take root, grow and flourish.  When we confess that we are sinners and that he is, in fact, our righteousness, we see we are recipients of all this favor.  We read on in verse 4 and see that our Lord repairs our ruins.  We see that we are used by the Lord to provide for others.  We see that God's people are sustained and blessed by foreigners, who also receive blessing.  Our Lord has prepared an everlasting covenant, an enduring heritage for his people.  He has clothed us with royal robes of salvation. He makes righteousness and praise grow where before there was nothing but loss and destruction.

Thanks be to God that he has done all this through our Lord, Jesus Christ, who gave himself to bear the weight of the righteous condemnation of God in our place so we could turn to him in belief.  May he ever conform our lives to his Gospel promises, making us his chosen people forever.