Where God Looks (Isaiah 66:1-5)

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Thus says the Lord:

“Heaven is my throne,
    and the earth is my footstool;
what is the house that you would build for me,
    and what is the place of my rest?
All these things my hand has made,
    and so all these things came to be,
declares the Lord.
But this is the one to whom I will look:
    he who is humble and contrite in spirit 
    and trembles at my word. (vv.1-2)

As humans, we tend to be impressed by great buildings and monuments to our accomplishments. Here, God says that even the greatest building (the Temple) cannot compare to what he has made in the act of creation. Anything we have built is ultimately dependent upon what God has done anyway. The encouraging part is in verse 2 when God reveals what captures his attention and what brings him near.

But this is the one to whom I will look:
    he who is humble and contrite in spirit
    and trembles at my word.

God is paradoxically drawn to those who are “humble and contrite in spirit” for life in God’s love is not about our impressing him with our "great" accomplishments but about our humble yet eager response to his presence with us. Do we tremble at his word? Are we quick to respond, or are we like those who reject both God’s word and God’s people?

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Hear the word of the Lord,
    you who tremble at his word:
“Your brothers who hate you
    and cast you out for my name's sake
have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified,
    that we may see your joy’;
    but it is they who shall be put to shame. (v.5)

While in this life, the humble may be rejected and mocked by influencers and instructors, they will not be rejected nor distanced from the Lord, and in the end, the Lord will render to the mockers and trolls their recompense (v.6) while the humble will be filled with joy!

This passage reminds me of an incident from the ministry of Jesus that is recorded for us in John 9. It tells us about the fallout from a miracle...of a time when Jesus healed a man who had been born blind. After the healing, because its timing violated the Pharisees' interpretation of the sabbath rules, the man was repeatedly questioned by the Pharisees. Finally, they "cast him out" when his insightful responses hit too close to home. Thankfully, the story doesn’t end there. Jesus heard about it and went to find the formerly blind man who had been banished by the religious leaders. It was then that the man’s eyes were opened to believe in Jesus—he was able to see spiritually as well as physically! It is in the hard times that Jesus invites us to believe in him, to trust him enough to cast our cares/anxieties on him, and he will exalt us as he draws us close!

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. (1 Peter 5:6-7)

Today, as I humble my heart before the Lord, I will remember that he is near and that he is for me. He sees my situation; he loves me anyway. He does not require or desire sacrifices but only a humble heart that longs to obey. When I read the Bible today, I will lean into the tremble, the challenge, and the wonder of what God has said!

O Lord, you know my weaknesses and my failures, and yet as I am humble before your presence and your word, you look to me like I am a great building. You do not come to me because I am sanctified and lifted up, but the opposite. You sanctify me and lift me up because you have come near, because you have brought it to pass. Thank you for your love and the transformation you bring! Cause me to care more for the humble and contrite in spirit than for the supposedly great works of human pride. 

Psalm 21 — Humble Glory & Deliverance from the Proud

This post originally appeared on my Honest2God blog in 2014. I am reposting it here because it is still relevant today, for we are surrounded by the manifested selfishness of a society of fallen souls. We all seek to establish and expand our own kingdoms, and in the process, we treat others with disrespect. This psalm is a powerful reminder that those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted (Luke 14:11). As we lead the people of God, we should do so in a way that best reflects the love of Jesus!

Psalm 21:5-7, 11-12

This is a psalm of David, presumably written by or for King David and using the third person "him" most likely to refer to himself and any godly descendants to follow. I like his statement in v. 6b and desire that I, too, might be glad today with the joy of the Lord's presence. So having sorted out the pronouns, the author is speaking of the king (David), and by extension of the people of the king, to God,

⁵ His [David’s] glory is great through your [God's] salvation;
    splendor and majesty you bestow on him.
⁶ For you make him most blessed forever;
    you make him glad with the joy of your presence.
⁷ For the king trusts in the Lord,
    and through the steadfast love of the Most High he shall not be moved.

The king’s glory was not in his own achievements so much as it was great through what God had done to save and deliver him time and time again. David didn’t have to promote himself, but it was God who bestowed splendor and majesty on him. God’s consideration of us is usually better than anything we would honestly think of ourselves. Self-glory is always at the expense of others and, in the end, poisons our own lives. But the humble glory that God gives to those who trust in him and are “glad with the joy of your presence” results in our being firmly established. Following the plan of God is not some dour task demanding grim determination, though often difficult (as it was for David), it is filled with joy and the greatest of loves.

In this psalm, David, the king, represents all who would trust the Lord for their honor and glory. David worked diligently as a shepherd in obscurity even within his own family—until the time that the Lord chose to elevate him. Saul persecuted David for years, and yet David spared Saul’s life several times (see 1 Samuel 16-31), and though a proficient warrior, he refused to take things into his own hands (his military advisors told him to kill Saul), trusting in the plan of God. Why? Because he knew the steadfast love of the Lord for him! The steadfast love of God is something we all need to be reminded of amid a culture of self-promotion, self-esteem, and selfishness. Amazingly, we matter more to God than we do to ourselves!  

I wrote a major paper in the first year of my doctoral program about the “humble glory of God,” and this passage fits into that model. In that paper, I included an original poem, Scent of Glory, that begins like this,

Born to share glory, not seek it.

Yet sniffing, climbing, grasping, fighting, expecting,

We hunt along a different path

Twisted we claim it, kill it, and die

Poisoned by pride.

And then later,

Glory is given not grasped,

Belonging to God—Father, Son, Spirit—

Shared in Trinitarian community of love.

Yet he invites us in as family, to eat once again

What we once lost by taking.

His invitation to “come up” is far better than the humiliation of falling from our self-claimed glory (Luke 14:7-11). 

The second section of this Psalm that stood out to me, in this reading, was v.11-12. While the king/person that trusts in the Lord is established and unmoved, the person who is filled with the pride of self-promotion will not ultimately succeed. These verses contain some very military language that we would like to be true of us in our conflict with our enemies today.

Though they plan evil against you,
    though they devise mischief,

                they will not succeed.
For you will put them to flight;
          you will aim at their faces with your bows.

When I read the phrase “aim at their faces with your bows” I can’t help but picture the humorous scene in the movie, Fellowship of the Ring, where Gimli the Dwarf covers his own fear of the forest by bragging about how stealthy he is, only to look up to see a bunch of Elfish bows pointed at his face. It seems that prideful people are like that…surprised to learn they’re not “all that.” 

The humble glory of God has a much better shelf life than any works of human pride.

God is still in the business of confronting the pernicious idol of our own pride. In the midst of cultural discord, political campaigns, and sadly, even in church conflicts, pride is not absent. I pray that we might be delivered from the attacks of the proud, yet often that means we need to be delivered from ourselves. 

We are to be different, following the example of our gift-giving Savior, Jesus Christ, and considering others first. 

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. (Phil. 2:3-4)

Lord, have mercy, Christ have mercy!

The Danger of Pride

Don't believe your own press reports!

Recently, while reading 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles, I noticed that both Judean King Amaziah and his son King Uzziah started their reigns well, “doing what was right in the eyes of the Lord” (2 Chron 25:2; 26:4) but later, after initial successes, they became proud and suffered for it. 

First, Amaziah changed his battle plans to obey God and trusted that the Lord would make up for his sending Israelite soldiers home with pay. Then, after defeating a smaller army of Edomites, he called out the King of Israel over atrocities committed by his spurned mercenaries. At that point, Jehoash [king of Israel] warned Amaziah [king of Judah] via a don't-get-too-big-for-your-britches kind of parable. His punch line is found in 2 Kings 14:10,

Photo by Hidde Rensink on Unsplash

“You have indeed struck down Edom, 

                   and your heart has lifted you up.

Be content with your glory, and stay at home, 

 for why should you provoke trouble so that you fall, 

                         you and Judah with you?”

The northern kings were not known for speaking the truth, but this statement was startlingly insightful and accurate. However, Amaziah didn’t listen and attacked Israel anyway. He lost. In fact, Jehoash’s ravaging army tore down a large section of Jerusalem’s city wall and looted all the gold and silver furnishings from the Temple!

Photo by Randy Fath on Unsplash

What was it that changed? Where did it all go wrong for Amaziah? First, he didn’t serve the Lord “with a whole heart.” Secondly, after defeating the Edomites, Amaziah did something very strange—he brought back the idols which he had captured and worshipped them. Such an act makes no sense. Since those idols had not been able to deliver Edom from Amaziah's own hand, why would he worship them? Probably because they were a symbol of his own accomplishment. If this was his reasoning, then it seems more like our behavior today, where we glory in our perceived successes instead of in God’s past deliverances. How often do we memorialize our own victories and “worship” what we have taken from others? Such idolatry of the heart is rooted in pride.

Years later, Amaziah’s 16-year-old son Uzziah (aka, Azariah) became king. “He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord… as long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper” (2 Chron 26:4-5). He fought successfully against the Philistines and the Arabians while other nations opted to pay tribute to him. He strengthened and upgraded his army and fortified Jerusalem with towers and even installed ballistic machines of war upon them (v.11-15). But, then things changed... and 2 Chronicles 26:16-20 tells the tragic story,  

But when he was strong, he grew proud, to his destruction. For he was unfaithful to the Lord his God and entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense. But Azariah the priest went in after him, with eighty priests of the Lord who were men of valor, and they withstood King Uzziah and said to him, “It is not for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord, but for the priests, the sons of Aaron, who are consecrated to burn incense. Go out of the sanctuary, for you have done wrong, and it will bring you no honor from the Lord God.” Then Uzziah was angry. Now he had a censer in his hand to burn incense, and when he became angry with the priests, leprosy broke out on his forehead in the presence of the priests in the house of the Lord, by the altar of incense. And Azariah the chief priest and all the priests looked at him, and behold, he was leprous in his forehead! And they rushed him out quickly, and he himself hurried to go out, because the Lord had struck him. 

Both father and son suffered for their own prideful mistakes. Despite initial trust in the Lord, albeit without a whole heart, they eventually trusted more in their own strength than in the Lord.

Uzziah was on the right path a bit longer, but then his heart became proud, and he thought himself privileged enough to enter the Holy Place of the Temple and offer incense, which only the priests were permitted to do. He presumed that he could approach God on his own merits if God even existed. When the valiant priests “withstood” him, instead of repenting, Uzziah became angry, and when he became angry, leprosy broke out on his forehead—an external manifestation of an inward spiritual condition.

"Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted." (Matthew 23:12; see also Luke 14:11; 18:14; James 4:6,10; 1 Peter 5:5b-6)

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As pastors and Christian leaders, do we presume too much? Have we begun to believe that the Lord’s blessing is a result of our own competence and leadership skills? Do we think that we are entitled to recognition and being platformed above others? If so then we should remember that the Lord is faithful to tear down the idols we build to our own egos. Will we humble ourselves and become teachable again, or will we stiffen our necks and grow angry revealing our unclean hearts?

It seems that leprosy of the soul is far more prevalent today than that of the forehead, and so sadly, it often goes untreated. Will you, along with the psalmist and me, ask the Lord to do his cleansing work inside and out?

Search me, O God, and know my heart!
    Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any grievous way in me,
    and lead me in the way everlasting! (Psalm 139:23-24)

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