I "GO a’ WANDERING”

 OCTOBER 18, 2022

Isaiah 53:6 

We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Yesterday we looked at Adam and Eve and their hiding from God because of disobedience. Yet the Creator, out of love seeks them and calls out to them. Our God is a God who seeks and pursues us out of love, we said.

In our verse today from that beautiful passage in Isaiah 53, we see a comparison made between sheep and humans. Those who tend sheep say that they will wonder off out of fear, lack of attention, something catches their eye and they want to inspect it, need more personal space, or they are not walking straight. So, Isaiah 53 says “we all” have gone astray and turned to our own way.

Perhaps, you have sung these words at church, “Prone to wander Lord I feel It, prone to leave the God I love.” Sounds like the description of the sheep above doesn’t it? Elsewhere in the song we sing and acknowledge that without God’s grace wanderers we will always be. Do these words sound familiar? “Let thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee.”

The Good News of the Bible is that while we “go a’ wandering” God has provided a way for our return to the flock, to where we belong. The suffering Servant described in Isaiah 53 is descriptive of our Lord Jesus Christ, and it is on him that “the Lord has laid the iniquity of us all" and provided for our reconciliation with him.

Now that’s our good, good Father. As yesterday, so today we see that God is love and calls out to those in hiding, calls out and searches for the fearful, the distracted, those wandering on the crooked path and makes a clear path of a safe return home to the fold through Jesus. That is a story worth sharing don't you think?

Oh, to grace how great a debtor
daily I'm constrained to be!
Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee:

prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here's my heart, O take and seal it;
seal it for thy courts above.

Amen