But they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. Isaiah 40:31 (ESV)
One of the thrilling experiences of living in Oregon is the opportunity we sometimes have of seeing a beautiful eagle soaring through the sky. The eagle is the grandest and noblest of all birds. That is why our Founding Fathers made the eagle a symbol of our nation’s strength and power and why the eagle is prominently featured on our nation’s official seal. In this Old Testament Reading for the 5th Sunday after Epiphany, Isaiah uses the image of a powerful eagle to describe how God restore His people and makes them strong and powerful once again.
As a nation, we have experienced many problems over the past few months. The insurrection that invaded our nation’s Capital came as a shock not only to people all across America but also across the world. If such gang violence could happen in our nation’s capital, it could happen anywhere. The continuing spread of Covid-19 has now caused over 450,000 deaths. On January 31, 2020 there were 8 cases of Covid in the United States; on January 31, 2021 there were over 26,000,000 cases.
But as bad as our problems might be today, the problems the people of Israel were facing when Isaiah wrote these words worse than anything we can imagine. Their nation had been defeated by the mighty Babylonian army; Jerusalem and the beautiful Temple had been leveled to the ground; thousands upon thousands of Israelites had been taken captive into Babylon to work there as slave laborers of the Babylonians. But now — finally — Isaiah is bringing them a word of comfort from God!
Don’t you know? Don’t you hear? Hasn’t it been told you from the beginning?... It is He – God! – who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers...
I once went to the top of the Empire State Building in New York City, and from the observation deck on top of that tall building I could look down and see people walking on the streets below, and they looked no larger than grasshoppers. That is what Isaiah is saying here. From God’s perspective, those mighty Babylonians are no larger than grasshoppers!
In case the people of Israel had forgotten what God was like, Isaiah reminds them (even as his words still remind us today):
The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might He increases strength.
Isaiah uses the image of a strong, soaring eagle to show how God can work in our lives:
Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.
Like many birds, eagles have fantastic vision. I was once riding in a pontoon boat on a lake in Pennsylvania when the owner of the boat handed me a box of Cheetos and said, “Throw some of these into the water and see what happens.” I did, and within seconds sea gulls that had been flying hundreds of feet above the water swooped down to grab those Cheetos. An eagle can spot a rabbit over two miles away. Now, apply that vision to God seeing His people. Proverbs 30 says: Three things are too wonderful for me; four I do not understand. When he lists those four puzzling things in life, the first is: The way of an eagle in the sky. As it is hard for us to understand how an eagle can soar in the sky, so is it hard for us to understand the ways and doings of God.
Now, to the exiles in Babylon, Isaiah promises that if they would wait on the Lord, then God would renew their strength so that they would mount up with wings like eagles. We are going through bad times these days to be sure. The roll out of the vaccine for Covid-19 is going much slower than we would like. New strains of the virus are making it even more threatening. Businesses are struggling…and many are going out of business. Our Congress seems to be in a gridlock that prevents help from coming to those who need it. Public health officials are warning that the epidemic may will get worse before things start to get better. But what we are going through isn’t one-fiftieth as bad as the exile that the people of Israel went through in Babylon. And yet to them came this promise from God – the same promise that God makes to us in Jesus Christ:
They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.
Amen.
Rev. Paul D. Doellinger
February 4, 2021