Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins. – Isaiah 40:2

Today’s Scripture Reading (June 16, 2017): Isaiah 40

Our lives contain watershed events after which the circumstances of our lives seem to have changed. In my life, there have been several of these moments. I was alive (barely) when John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, but I can’t say that remember what live was like before and after the event. I do remember humankind’s first steps on the moon – and hope to be alive when humans make their first steps on Mars. But for me, two watershed events changed the way that I see the world. The first was the dismantling of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Until I saw the pictures of the wall coming down, I could not imagine a unified Germany or even a possible peace between East and West. East and West still have a lot of differences that separate them, but without the Wall and the Iron Curtain, peace still seems to be possible.

A second watershed event was the September 11 attacks in 2001. I live in North America, and the reality is that the actual place of war during my lifetime has always been located someplace else. For the first time in my life, war came to my continent, my shores. I was vulnerable to attack. There was both a new fear and a new enemy that was present in my life. I distinctly remember walking outside the day after the attacks and realizing that for the first time in my life there were no planes in the skies – not even any helicopters roaring overhead. Life had changed.

There is a distinct change in tone between Isaiah 39 and Isaiah 40. The change in tone is significant enough that many experts have postulated that Isaiah 40 and forward was written by one or maybe two different individuals that were separated from the first Isaiah by time. I concur with this thought and believe that Isaiah 40 was probably written around 170 years after Isaiah 39. Judah is firmly in the grip of its Babylonian Captivity. The world looks very different from the way it did when the first Isaiah wrote chapter 39. Instead of judgment, there is a need to speak comfort. All that has been prophesied has come true. And the people have started to wonder if God will ever bring them back.

So the Second Isaiah is instructed to “speak tenderly to Jerusalem.” The penalty for sin has been paid. This is the beginnings of God’s plan to bring Judah home. It won’t be long now. It is almost time for the people of God to come back home.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Isaiah 41