A God We Can Trust – Isaiah 12:2-6

A text – Isaiah 12:2-6

² Surely God is my salvation;
    I will trust and will not be afraid,
for the Lord is my strength and my might;
    he has become my salvation.”

³ With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. ⁴ And you will say on that day:

“Give thanks to the Lord;
    call on his name;
make known his deeds among the nations;
    proclaim that his name is exalted.

⁵ Sing praises to the Lord, for he has done gloriously;
    let this be known in all the earth.
⁶ Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal Zion,
    for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.”

A reflection:

Our Psalm today is not found in the Book of Psalms but in Isaiah. It is a passage that praises God for being big, and strong, and also mindful of us. Someone we can trust.

Most Old Testament scholars say that this psalm was written by an anonymous prophet who preached and wrote when the Israelites were in exile in Babylon and when many or most of them had lost their faith. The prophet was trying to light a spark in them because they didn’t think it was worth reciting the old scriptures or singing the old songs; after all, God had let them be exiled. But this prophet used lines from familiar hymns they knew, and he put those lines into a new song. We don’t know if it helped, but we can hear how hard he tried to reignite their faith in a big, strong God who was surely mindful of them and their plight.

This time of the year brings earlier and earlier darkness. We might not feel merry and bright, as we think we should. But this psalm in Isaiah 12 tells us no matter how dark it is where we are, God is still God, and our God is worthy of trust. Just wait for the light to appear, and we will see it together.

A prayer:

Lord God, Thank you for loving us. Thank you for the psalm in Isaiah 12 that reminds us how powerful and also how caring you are. Help us never to forget this fact: even when things are hard for us, you are still there and powerful and listening.  Amen.