Looking to the distant future
Isaiah 11: The whole earth will be brimming with knowing God-Alive, a living knowledge of God ocean-deep, ocean-wide.
Isaiah doesn’t spend all his time looking to the future but when he does, he does it big time. He describes not only a 700 year distant future and the coming of the promised Messiah, but an even more distant future, thousands of years ahead. That future is my future too. People generally think that they have to go to the book of Revelation to look forward, but here in Isaiah we are also able to turn to the end of the story. It ends with a world that knows God. That “knowing” is anything but superficial. It’s as deep and wide as the ocean. Here we not only get a profound look forward, but a look backward as well. This is our purpose, God’s intention when he walked with Adam in the Garden. He desires a deep and intimate relationship with human beings who are the crowing act of Creation. Even as Isaiah describes the strong medicine that’s coming to his generation, he gives a glimpse of what that medicine is intended to accomplish. In this case, it’s to move people one step closer to what the Lord created humanity for in the first place.
Take Away: From the beginning our purpose has been to know the Lord and to live in a deep relationship with him.