” ‘For Yah, the Lord, is my strength and song; He also has become my salvation.’” Isaiah 12:2b..
Gracious God, how we long to become more like You in character; loving and kind and compassionate. So please help us to grow up in You. This we ask and receive by faith, in the powerful name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
There is so much that we can learn from this song of praise of the prophet Isaiah. Lessons of faith, and making the right choices, and now we are going to look at what seems to be the process of growing up in Jesus Christ.
When the prophet said that the Lord had become His salvation, after having been his strength and song, I immediately recognized progression and growth.
The Lord is my strength. One of the things that strengthens us spiritually is witnessing God at work in our lives. Making a way for us where there is no way. As we saw in our devotional yesterday, our testimony exerts an influence over us as well as over those with whom we share it. Another source of spiritual strength is our faith in God’s promises.
With every announcement of doom YAHWEH would send to the people through His prophet, He would remind them that He would preserve a remnant. Every time the prophet had to take this message to the people His faith in the goodness and mercy of a God who delights in forgiveness would be strengthened. Overtime this strength would turn into praise. He would sing of God’s goodness!
The Lord is my song. I can resonate with this expression from the prophet. I love to sing of God’s goodness in my life. Nothing strengthens me and moves me as deeply as singing does when my heart is overwhelmed. This aspect of my spiritual life developed as a result of some of the amazing interventions of God in my life from which I drew strength. These became my songs in the night!
He also has become my salvation. I think of Paul and Silas singing as they sat in their prison cell. They had been beaten with “rods”; their feet are in “stocks”; they are in the maximum security section of the prison. And they are singing! God is so moved by this praise that He shows His pleasure sending an earthquake powerful enough to shake the very foundation of the prison and cracks it wide open.
The prisoners can escape, but decide to stay where they are! As if that was not enough, the jailer and his family request baptism that very night! That night God had become their salvation in more ways than one, and this salvation had been extended to those who heard them sing (testimony) and saw God at work in their lives, through nature!
When you experience something as great as this, you can never be the same again! Your devotion to the Lord of your life is both deepened and strengthened! For the rest of your life you want to sing His praises! You accept the salvation He offers; the salvation He has become to you!
These are some of the experiences that produce growth and strength! All may not be as dramatic, but they are just as powerful! And they help us to grow up in the Lord!
NOTE: Some corrections have been made to this devotional.