Surprise Pathway

'History repeats itself', they say; 'what goes around, comes around.'  But Isaiah says 'don’t limit your imagination to what has happened before. Keep looking ahead because God is as much a God of tomorrow as a God of yesterday. While God is consistent and faithful, God is not predictable. Yahweh is full of surprises!'

This is what the LORD says—

he who made a way through the sea,

a path through the mighty waters,

Forget the former things. See, I am doing a new thing!

Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?

I am making a way in the desert

and streams in the wasteland.

Isaiah 43:16, 19

The ancient story of the Exodus was the identifying hallmark of Yahweh’s covenant with Israel – and Isaiah writes centuries later saying ‘it’s going to happen again’ – but with a new twist! Once again the Lord of all the earth is about to rescue his people from oppression and bring them home. Centuries before in the exodus he had made a path through the sea, this time he would open a way through the desert that lay between Babylon and home.

As formidable as the oppression of Egypt and the resistance of Pharaoh had been, God’s power proved mightier - and will do so once again. Even though Israel was captive to imperial Babylonian and Persian decree which blocked their return, God would again do the impossible and open a path. He would not only open the way, he would sustain his people in the most hostile and barren settings - with springs in the desert!

In my early twenties when I first read Isaiah seriously, I loved this text.  It expressed the kind of hope-filled vision and expectation that resonated with my youthful idealism. Also, someone had recently coined the phrase “do your own thing” that captured the free spirit of the late sixties – and here was God ‘doing his thing’ – a new thing at that. For me it was an exciting biblical text urging a staid older generation to open the eyes of their imagination and expect God to do things in a new way.

Four decades later I can say that this has been God’s hall-mark (or water-mark) in my life. When my son Jeff was born pre-mature a thousand miles from home and God looked after us; when God turned my spiritual fatigue into a new vibrancy of life, when God opened up a sabbatical I never thought possible, when we had no funds and he supplied our needs, when the roof caved in on my work situation, when ministry burn-out morphed into a restful spirit, when I was bereaved and longing for a new life and a life companion, God surprised me in ways I never anticipated.

I have learned that beyond any question, God delights in doing new things, unexpected things – good things. God opens up paths where you thought there was no path and supplies streams in the driest of ground. In the darkest moment of human history, Jesus did what no one alive expected - he rose, folded up his own death shroud and opened a surprise pathway for the rest of us through life’s ultimate barrier. And that was just the beginning. Sign-posts of his new creation shimmer on the horizon and around us everwhere - springs in the desert!  I can’t wait to see what other surprises await us when dawn opens into the full light of Day.

Lord, when the present and future scare me, help me to remember your great deeds of the past – and to expect you to do the unexpected tomorrow and today. Amen

Art Credit:
Colette Isabella - La Traversee de la Mer
Phillip Ratner - Opening the Sea