Isaiah 58
58
Your Prayers Won’t Get Off the Ground
1-3a “Shout! A full-throated shout!
Hold nothing back—a trumpet-blast shout!
Tell my people what’s wrong with their lives,
face my family Jacob with their sins!
They’re busy, busy, busy at worship,
and love studying all about me.
To all appearances they’re a nation of right-living people—
law-abiding, God-honoring.
They ask me, ‘What’s the right thing to do?’
and love having me on their side.
But they also complain,
‘Why do we fast and you don’t look our way?
Why do we humble ourselves and you don’t even notice?’
3b-5 “Well, here’s why:
“The bottom line on your ‘fast days’ is profit.
You drive your employees much too hard.
You fast, but at the same time you bicker and fight.
You fast, but you swing a mean fist.
The kind of fasting you do
won’t get your prayers off the ground.
Do you think this is the kind of fast day I’m after:
a day to show off humility?
To put on a pious long face
and parade around solemnly in black?
Do you call that fasting,
a fast day that I, God, would like?
6-9a “This is the kind of fast day I’m after:
to break the chains of injustice,
get rid of exploitation in the workplace,
free the oppressed,
cancel debts.
What I’m interested in seeing you do is:
sharing your food with the hungry,
inviting the homeless poor into your homes,
putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad,
being available to your own families.
Do this and the lights will turn on,
and your lives will turn around at once.
Your righteousness will pave your way.
The God of glory will secure your passage.
Then when you pray, God will answer.
You’ll call out for help and I’ll say, ‘Here I am.’
A Full Life in the Emptiest of Places
9b-12 “If you get rid of unfair practices,
quit blaming victims,
quit gossiping about other people’s sins,
If you are generous with the hungry
and start giving yourselves to the down-and-out,
Your lives will begin to glow in the darkness,
your shadowed lives will be bathed in sunlight.
I will always show you where to go.
I’ll give you a full life in the emptiest of places—
firm muscles, strong bones.
You’ll be like a well-watered garden,
a gurgling spring that never runs dry.
You’ll use the old rubble of past lives to build anew,
rebuild the foundations from out of your past.
You’ll be known as those who can fix anything,
restore old ruins, rebuild and renovate,
make the community livable again.
13-14“If you watch your step on the Sabbath
and don’t use my holy day for personal advantage,
If you treat the Sabbath as a day of joy,
God’s holy day as a celebration,
If you honor it by refusing ‘business as usual,’
making money, running here and there—
Then you’ll be free to enjoy God!
Oh, I’ll make you ride high and soar above it all.
I’ll make you feast on the inheritance of your ancestor Jacob.”
Yes! God says so!
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Isaiah 58: MSG
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.
Isaiah 58
58
True Fasts and Sabbaths
1“Call with the throat; you must not keep back!
lift up your voice like a trumpet,
and declare#Or “announce” to my people their rebellion,
and to the house of Jacob their sins.
2Yet#Or “And” they seek me day by day,
and they desire the knowledge of my ways
like a nation that practiced#Literally “did” righteousness,
and had not forsaken the judgment of its God;
they ask me for righteous judgments,#Literally “judgments of righteousness”
they desire the closeness of God.
3‘Why do we fast, and you do not see it?
We humiliate our soul, and you do not notice it?’
Look! You find delight on the day of your fast,
and you oppress all your workers!
4Look! You fast to quarrel and strife,
and to strike with a wicked fist.#Literally “fist of wickedness”
You shall not fast as you do today,#Literally “the day”
to make your voice heard#Literally “cause to hear your voice” on the height.
5Is the fast I choose like this,
a day for humankind to humiliate himself#Literally “his soul”?
To bow his head like a reed,
and make#Literally “he makes” his bed on sackcloth and ashes;
you call this a fast
and a day of pleasure to Yahweh?
6Is this not the fast I choose: to release the bonds of injustice,
to untie the ropes of the yoke,
and to let the oppressed go free,
and tear#Literally “you must tear” every yoke to pieces?
7Is it not to break your bread for the hungry?
You must bring home#Literally “a house” the poor, the homeless.
When you see the naked, you must cover him,
and you must not hide yourself from your relatives.#Literally “flesh”
8Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall grow quickly.
And your salvation shall go before you;
the glory of Yahweh will be your rear guard.
9Then you shall call, and Yahweh himself will answer.
You shall cry for help, and he will say, ‘Here I am!’
If you remove from among you the yoke,
the finger-pointing#Literally “stretching out of the finger” and evil speech,#Literally “the speaking of evil”
10if#Or “and” you offer your soul to the hungry,
and you satisfy the appetite of the afflicted,
then#Or “and” your light shall rise in the darkness,
and your darkness will be like noon.
11And Yahweh will lead you continually, and satisfy your soul in a barren land,
and he will strengthen your bones,
and you shall be like a well-watered garden,
and like a spring of water whose water does not fail.
12And they shall rebuild ancient ruins from you;
you shall erect the foundations of many generations,#Literally “generation and generation”
and you shall be called#Literally “shall be called to you” the bricklayer of the breach,
the restorer of paths to live in.
13If you hold your foot back from the Sabbath,
from doing your affairs on my holy day,#Literally “the day of my holiness”
if#Or “and” you call the Sabbath a pleasure,
the holy day of Yahweh honorable,
if#Literally “and” you honor him more than#Literally “from” doing your ways,
than finding your affairs#Hebrew “affair” and speaking a word,
14then you shall take your pleasure in#Or “on” Yahweh,
and I will make you ride upon the heights of the earth,
and I will feed you the heritage of Jacob your ancestor,#Or “father”
for the mouth of Yahweh has spoken.”
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