Thought on Isaiah 62:10

"Go through the gates; prepare ye the way of the people; cast up, the highway; gather out the stones; lift up a standard for the people." (Isa.62:10)

Isaiah’s vision showed him the gateway of the new Age, the Messianic, swinging open to reveal that fair land which lay beyond, and in his ecstasy he cried out to his own people to enter quickly and prepare the way for the millions of humankind that were to follow. Preparation had to be made and the newcomers encouraged. Isaiah knew that his own people Israel were destined to play an important part in that preparation and encouragement when the time should come. What he did not know was that nearly three millenniums were to measure out their spans and a new people, the Christian Church of this present Age, also be present on the scene when at length the shouting millions would surge through that gateway. Not only purified Israel, but also the glorified Church, are to gather out the stones and lift up the standard.

We are accustomed to blame First Advent Israel for knowing "not the time of their visitation" (Luke 19:44) and failing to measure up to their responsibility and duty when their Age was giving place to the Age of the Gospel. Are we so quick to realise that we in our turn, when this Gospel Age is giving place to the Messianic, have the same responsibility and duty? The gateway is swinging open: before long it will be time to call people to enter. What are we doing in the meantime, to gather out the stones and lift up the standard? There are many in the Christian world today who look upon the apathy and unbelief of the masses and cry out for revival, but the basis for revival is all too often seen as little more than a profession of belief in the Lord Christ and conversion to a more moral life thereafter.

One tends to forget that true revival is powered by the dynamic energy of the Holy Spirit, and that in the context of this end‑of‑the‑age period in which we live the Holy Spirit is to be poured out upon all flesh (Joel 2:28; Acts 2:17)—when the gates of the Messianic era are opened and the work of world conversion really becomes effective. Our mission now, and one that we can neglect only to our own loss, is to do what we can, while those gates are in the act of opening, to gather out the stones of ignorance and misunderstanding concerning the Faith, and lift up the standard of the Divine Plan for human salvation that some at least may hear, and heed, and believe, and be ready. After all, the commission to preach the Gospel to the whole creation has not yet been revoked. The popular idea of Christianity is a travesty of the real thing

AOH