The Word for Wednesday, July 8 Edition

Isaiah chapter 35:

The wilderness and the desert will be glad,
And the Arabah will rejoice and blossom;
Like the crocus
It will blossom profusely
And rejoice with rejoicing and shout of joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
The majesty of Carmel and Sharon.
They will see the glory of the Lord,
The majesty of our God.
Encourage the exhausted, and strengthen the feeble.
Say to those with anxious heart,
"Take courage fear not.
Behold, your God will come with vengeance;
The recompense of God will come,
But He will save you."
Then the eyes of the blind will be opened,
And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.
Then the lame will leap like a deer,
And the tongue of the dumb will shout for joy.
For waters will break forth in the wilderness
And streams in the Arabah.
And the scorched land will become a pool,
And the thirsty ground springs of water;
In the haunt of the jackals, its resting place,
Grass becomes reeds and rushes.
And a highway will be there, a roadway,
And it will be called the Highway of Holiness.
The unclean will not travel on it,
But it will be for him who walks that way,
And fools will not wander on it.
No lion will be there,
Nor will any vicious beast go up on it;
These will not be found there.
But the redeemed will walk there,
And the ransomed of the Lord will return,
And come with joyful shouting to Zion,
With everlasting joy upon their heads.
They will find gladness and joy,
And sorrow and sighing will flee away.

Divine restorations from the wreckage of the deeds of men have happened in the past; but the permanent restoration prophesied in Revelation has yet to come. Man remains man, and our world remains a swamp of sin, in which things that have been pulled out, cleaned up, and set on solid ground seem endlessly able to slide back down into the muck. Still, that which is decribed above sounds awfully good to me, whether permanent or not. And the permanent, ultimately, is coming.

Click here for more "Words for Wednesday."