This is not a traditional Advent text or Christmas text, is it? You’ve perhaps never heard this one read in the weeks leading up to December 25th. It doesn’t tell about a baby who is born to people walking in darkness or a Messiah who is coming. Yet I believe it is a text we should read and process and understand because it tells us about the new kingdom that the coming Messiah would usher in.
This is a prophecy about the new things God will do and the new way that God will do them. The original audience, Jews in exile in Babylon, were struggling because they were far from home and therefore could not worship God in the temple. They saw their lives as broken and their future as uncertain. They were paying for the consequences of the sins of the entire nation, and they must have wondered, “Will anything ever be good and whole and right again?” Maybe we have been wondering the same thing.
The prophecy Isaiah shares with these people—and with us—is the truth that God is in the restoration business. He takes broken people and broken places and gives them hope by making things new. He did this fully in sending His son, Jesus, to live for us, to teach us about God, and ultimately to die for our sins.
The picture this prophecy describes is of a great banquet with the richest foods and finest wines. It tells us that the restoration God will bring includes wiping away our tears, removing our disgrace, and defeating death. The prophecy promises a time of joy and fulfillment, a time of joy and peace, a time of God’s abundant blessing for His children. It is a prophecy of hope for people who were and are discouraged, frustrated, and sad. It offers the hope, made certain in Christ, of the restoration of all things.