Isaiah 49:1-7
Listen to Me, O islands, And pay attention, you peoples from afar. The LORD called Me from the womb; From the body of My mother He named Me. And He has made My mouth like a sharp sword; In the shadow of His hand He has concealed Me, And He has also made Me a select arrow; He has hidden Me in His quiver. And He said to Me, "You are My Servant, Israel, In Whom I will show My glory."
But I said, "I have toiled in vain, I have spent My strength for nothing and vanity; Yet surely the justice due to Me is with the LORD, And My reward with My God." And now says the LORD, who formed Me from the womb to be His Servant, To bring Jacob back to Him, in order that Israel might be gathered to Him (For I am honored in the sight of the LORD, And My God is My strength), He says, "It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant To raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also make You a light of the nations So that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth."
Thus says the LORD, the Redeemer of Israel, and its Holy One, To the despised One, To the One abhorred by the nation, To the Servant of rulers, "Kings shall see and arise, Princes shall also bow down; Because of the LORD who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel who has chosen You."
Too Small a Thing
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:
Here we are tonight, Epiphany. It is the end of the Christmas season. It was once the date that man celebrated as Christmas. They still call it the Christmas of the Gentiles. It is the day we hear the account of the visit from the Magi, those Gentile scholars who followed the star so long ago, and found the Savior, the one born to be King. Their gifts are famous: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
The gospels of the season of Epiphany contains the accounts of the visit of Jesus to Jerusalem when He was twelve years old, the changing of water into wine in Jesus' first miracle, the healing of Lepers and the healing of the Centurion's servant, Jesus calming the sea, the parable of the tares sown among the wheat, and the account of the transfiguration. These are all miracle accounts, told in this season of the year to pursue the theme of Epiphany, the shining forth of the divinity of Jesus through the flesh and blood of the man. That is what Epiphany means, to shine forth.
Our text tonight is the Old Testament Lesson for Epiphany, although it doesn't matter too much, since the Epistle lesson for Epiphany is also Old Testament, and also from Isaiah. This is one of the prophecies of the coming of the Lord, and it fits well with the Gospel of the visit of the Magi. Our theme is, Too Small a Thing.
The prophecy does point toward the events in our Gospel lesson, and more. It points to Jesus as the Servant of God, chosen to do something really special, namely, to become the light for the Gentiles, and bring salvation to the whole earth. Jesus did those things. He is called the Light of the World, and, in fact, calls Himself the Light of the World, in John 8. He is the light of salvation. Our text speaks about princes bowing down, and kings seeing and arising. The events of our Gospel certainly seem to be foretold, with the Magi bowing down before Jesus and giving Him the gifts, and with Herod rising up in fear and anger and striking down the children of Bethlehem and the surrounding areas. Herod was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.
Too small a thing, points us toward the expectation of Israel that when the Messiah came, He would be for them, and lift them up and make something special of them. God tells us, through the pen of Isaiah, that it was His desire to spread His salvation to all men. The New Testament articulates this plan of God with great detail, although even Paul seems surprised as he writes to the Ephesians, speaking of the divine economy, and the mystery which had been kept hidden for ages that the Gentiles, too, would come in and be lifted up by the work of the Messiah of the Jews.
Here is Jesus described as He must have seen Himself, and not unlike John described Him in the first chapter of His Gospel. He is called "the despised One" and "the One abhorred by the nation". John wrote, "There was the true light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him." When Isaiah wrote about the nation that abhorred Him, scholars say that the word he used for nation - goy - refers specifically to the descendants of Abraham, when used in the singular as it is in our text.
Isaiah quotes the Servant as saying that He was called from the womb, and named from the body of [His] mother, by God! The angel Gabriel named Jesus before He was conceived, You shall call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins, and announced that He would be called the Son of the Most High. The servant says, in Isaiah, that He is the Servant of God in whom God will show His glory. All of these passages in our text show us that Jesus is the One spoken of and the One planned for through long ages by God for the salvation of all men. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.
Even the depressing sound of the self-description of the Servant and His work sounds a lot like Jesus must have felt, at least according to His humanity. But I said, "I have toiled in vain, I have spent My strength for nothing and vanity; Yet surely the justice due to Me is with the LORD, And My reward with My God." Jesus had three years, during which time He marveled at how little His disciples believed and how little they seemed to know, or want to know. And yet, just like Jesus, the Servant places His trust completely in God.
It wasn't the nature of the sufferings of Christ that made the salvation of just the Jews 'too small a thing', it was the nature of the love of God and the Grace of God that cause Him to plan such an enormous thing, and to send His Son into the flesh, to become truly human so that He might rescue and redeem us. When God said it was "too small a thing" He was simply announcing that there was much more to His plan than merely redeeming the nation of Israel.
We can imagine how the ministry of Jesus would have looked like He had toiled in vain. He walked among man and taught His disciples and did those miracles which mark Epiphany so clearly for three years, and the end of which they crucified Him, and His closest associates ran and hid, and sometimes denied Him. The unbelievers in the visible church often talk about how Jesus' ministry went wrong and failed and fell short. But, of course, He did not fall short or fail - that is just a human analysis from the point of view of one who does not know and does not believe.
Isaiah even speaks about the doctrine of election, perhaps without knowing it. He says that it is too small a thing that He should raise up the tribes of Jacob and restore the preserved ones of Israel. It is not all of Israel, just "the preserved ones." And all that He will do is because of the the Lord who is Faithful, the Holy One of Israel who has chosen Him.
This is the prophecy of the Hidden One. In the shadow of His hand He has concealed Me, And He has also made Me a select arrow; He has hidden Me in His quiver. And it is this hidden One who shines forth on Epiphany. He was unexpected - even though the Jews were looking for Him for centuries. He was not what they wanted, even though He was precisely what they needed. He is still the unexpected. Everybody wants their religion their way, but God has done it all His way. He redeemed us, and then He chose us, one by one, and called us by name. He still works in ways that seem hidden to the world around us. They think that they must make it happen, say the prayer, make the decision. But God calls us by the preaching of the Gospel. He enlightens us with faith by the power of the Holy Spirit at work through His Word. They cannot see the gift of the Lord's Supper. It doesn't make sense to them, and they will not simply take God at His Word. The select arrow remains hidden in His quiver.
But that is what we celebrate tonight. We celebrate that glory of God came shining through in the One chosen by God for whom it is too small a thing to merely rescue and redeem Old Testament Israel, but who has become for us life and forgiveness and salvation and hope and joy. We deliberately begin to prepare to observe and celebrate the great deeds of our salvation in the suffering and death and resurrection of our Lord.
We begin by recognizing that He is the Servant spoken of here and elsewhere in Isaiah. Jesus is the One in whom and through whom the Father shows His glory, because the glory of God is not lights and people going "Oooh!" and "Ahhhh!". The glory of God is that He stepped away from all the God-glory stuff and became one of us for us and to rescue us, and even went as far as the ignominious death on the cross, full of curses and shame. He became sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be come the righteousness of God in Him.
The glory of God which shined through the flesh of Jesus is the glory of God who did the impossible out of love for us - His creations, which matter not one little bit, except that He loves us! Power, yeah, God has that. He has all power. Can He light up the sky? Yes, He does every night - and every day, but that only marks Him as God and beyond our comprehension. His true glory is saving us when He did not have any need to do so. People still cannot wrap their minds around that yet. And it is wonderful!
That is glory! Glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth! And it is the glory of Jesus who hid His deity in the flesh of a man, and walked among us for thirty-some years, and then died for us. Your sins are forgiven. God loves you. And He gives you salvation and everlasting life just because "It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant To raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also make You a light of the nations So that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth." It does, and that is Epiphany!
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.
(Let the people say Amen)
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