You don’t have to have been a live for very long before you realise that the world can be a cruel place. If we have enough money, we might be able to shield ourselves for a while, but eventually the bubble bursts. None of us can scape suffering in some form or another. It is a world under a curse (Rom.8:19-21). It is broken, and at some point the sharp edges cut into our experience of life.
Becoming a Christians doesn’t change the reality of the world we live in. I am changed, but the world is still the same, and remains characterized by darkness, suffering, loss, confusion and pain. The Bible never denies the reality of the falleness of our world, not the struggle it is to live in it. What it does offer is the chance to find in our faith the resources we need to live in this world in a way that honours Christ and is faithful to His call on our lives. Isaiah 35 offers one such resource. Suffering is complex and multi-layered, and so is the Scripture’s dealing with it. But one layer is here.
Isaiah captures the reality of our world with great poetic power: it is a desert, a parched land, a wilderness. It is a world of suffering and of bodies that don’t work the way they should. But he also foresees a Day when this world will be changed; when there will be a new creation of splendour, of healing, and which will be saturated with the manifest glory of the Lord.
And the reality of that hope carries with it the resources to steady, strengthen and encourage the Church in the midst of struggle (vv.3-4). We take each painful step down the Highway of Holiness because – in pat – we know that when we ‘enter Zion’ we will know it was worth it! It is the same psychology of discipleship that we in Jesus (Heb.12:2), and in Paul (II Cor.4:16-17, Rom.8:18).
And this is how Jesus uses the passage when John’s disciples come to ask Him if He is the One (Matt.11:4-6). Imprisoned and facing martyrdom, John is asking deep questions. And Jesus doesn’t just answer John’s question, He speaks to the fear that lies behind the question. Jesus is saying to the fearful hear: Be strong, do not fear. Jesus invites John to look out through the bars of his prison window, to glimpse the foreshadowing of New Creation that is in Jesus’ ministry, and to remember that faithfulness to Him will be worth it when John enters Zion with everlasting joy.
Questions:
Is this just ‘pie in the sky when you die’ kind of thinking? Would it be a problem if it was?
What do we lose when we dismiss or shrug off a vision of the New Creation? … or let it remain insubstantial, or uninformed by Scripture?
How would you describe the New Creation to someone who wasn’t a Christian?
How does the healing of the environment, or the healing of human bodies that awaits us in the New Creation affect our engagement with environmental and medical issues today? How does the connection in Is.35 between that healing and the seeing of the glory of the Lord affect your answer?
Do you find the idea of the New Creation compelling? …exciting?
How does being a Christian change the way we experience suffering and struggle in this old, fallen creation?
What does it look like to walk the Highway of Holiness in the midst of suffering?
What is the connection between ‘holiness’ as the way to Zion, and the joy that awaits us when we get there?
Do you think joy and gladness will be your experience of New Creation life?
