I posted here about the Advent Readings I am doing this year based on the passages put together by Mars Hill Church to focus on the themes of hope, peace, joy, and love. This week all of the readings are about peace. Our reading for yesterday was Isaiah 42:1-9.
I always teach out of the NIV because I mostly speak to groups of students, however, I usually like to mixup the translations I read during my quiet times. Last night I was rereading this passage from Isaiah on my iPhone using the YouVersion software from the iTunes free app store. It is put together by the folks at LifeChurch. There are over 40 different translations in 20 different languages in their software. I decided to read the passage in a few different translations and decided I really liked the way it was spelled out in The Message translation. I don’t ever teach from The Message because I think it is too loose of a translation, but it was a great new look at a familiar passage. Check it out:
Isaiah 42:1-9 (The Message)
Isaiah 42
God’s Servant Will Set Everything Right
1-4 “Take a good look at my servant.
I’m backing him to the hilt.
He’s the one I chose,
and I couldn’t be more pleased with him.
I’ve bathed him with my Spirit, my life.
He’ll set everything right among the nations.
He won’t call attention to what he does
with loud speeches or gaudy parades.
He won’t brush aside the bruised and the hurt
and he won’t disregard the small and insignificant,
but he’ll steadily and firmly set things right.
He won’t tire out and quit. He won’t be stopped
until he’s finished his work—to set things right on earth.
Far-flung ocean islands
wait expectantly for his teaching.”
The God Who Makes Us Alive with His Own Life
5-9God’s Message,
the God who created the cosmos, stretched out the skies,
laid out the earth and all that grows from it,
Who breathes life into earth’s people,
makes them alive with his own life:
“I am God. I have called you to live right and well.
I have taken responsibility for you, kept you safe.
I have set you among my people to bind them to me,
and provided you as a lighthouse to the nations,
To make a start at bringing people into the open, into light:
opening blind eyes,
releasing prisoners from dungeons,
emptying the dark prisons.
I am God. That’s my name.
I don’t franchise my glory,
don’t endorse the no-god idols.
Take note: The earlier predictions of judgment have been fulfilled.
I’m announcing the new salvation work.
Before it bursts on the scene,
I’m telling you all about it.”