The Source of Help, Reflection on Isaiah 50:4-9

Isaiah tells Israel about the one chosen by God to teach, to sustain. This chosen one has listened to God and has accepted punishment by the enemy.

The Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced.

                   and

The one who vindicates me is near.

Christians read back into this and the other suffering servant songs as we contemplate the crucifixion and the resurrection. The servants' people did not accept him, but God sustained him through it all.

Read Psalm 31:9-16 in response to the words from Isaiah:

Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eye wastes away from grief, my soul and body also.

For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my misery, and my bones waste away.

I am the scorn of all my adversaries, a horror to my neighbors, an object of dread to my acquaintances; those who see me in the street flee from me.

I have passed out of mind like one who is dead; I have become like a broken vessel.

For I hear the whispering of many— terror all around!— as they scheme together against me, as they plot to take my life.

But I trust in you, O Lord; I say, “You are my God.”

My times are in your hand; deliver me from the hand of my enemies and persecutors.

Let your face shine upon your servant; save me in your steadfast love.