Isaiah 58

Isaiah 58:2-3 NIV

For day after day they seek me out;
they seem eager to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that does what is right
and has not forsaken the commands of its God.
They ask me for just decisions
and seem eager for God to come near them.
'Why have we fasted,' they say,
'and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
and you have not noticed?'
"Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
and exploit all your workers.

When I read Isaiah 58:2 I thought, "That's the kind of church I want to be a part of. Those are the people of God I want to hang with." "They seem eager to know my ways ... they ask me for just decisions and seem eager for God to come near them," the verse says. But as I read on I realized that the key word is "seem." It doesn't say that they are eager but that they seem eager. Reading through the chapter one quickly comes to realize that there is an hypocrisy prevalent in the lives of these people. What they seem to be is not what they are.

They have come to understand the spiritual discipline of fasting as some kind of magical means by which to manipulate God into doing what they want. When they don't get their wish they respond, "Why have we fasted ... and you have not seen it?" The truth is, their fasting is impotent because their lives are inconsistent with what they say they desire and believe. They fast for justice but dispense injustice. Their lack of ethical behavior nullifies their supposedly spiritual activities.

It's easy to point fingers at a group of people that lived several millennia ago. Yet, this is precisely the same issue many of us face today. Do our lives match our lips? It's easy to talk holiness, justice, righteousness and truth. Do we live it? That's the real question.

Father, forgive me for my own hypocrisy. Today may I live what I say I believe.

By His grace,
Rick weinert