Holy God

My mother asked me to call the men for supper. (I was about twelve and not yet one of the “men.”) I rang the dinner bell which hung by the back door, hollered toward the barn that supper was ready. No response. So I let off a particularly nasty string of expletives. My mom was standing right behind me. In the only time I can ever remember her being angry, she grabbed my ear, pulled me into the kitchen and rapped my knuckles with a wooden spoon.

Isaiah isn’t talking about potty mouth in our text, however. He is experiencing his total unworthiness to be standing in God’s holy presence; he knew he was not worthy.

In our modern interpretations of Christianity, we tend to understand God more as a friend to whom we cozy up for a comfy chat. We seem to have lost the sense of God’s utter holiness. We seem to have forgotten the “fear” in Luther’s “we are to fear and love God?” We may have lost sight of the fact that we can only stand in God’s holy presence because of God’s overwhelming grace, shown to us in Jesus Christ.

We would do well to remember.

Holy and awesome God, thank you for welcoming us into your presence through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. — DAB