God of Deliverance (5th Sunday of Lent)

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Isaiah 40-46 is concerned mainly with comforting the Israelites during the Babylonian Exile. It is a reminder to them that, despite the punishment they are enduring because of their sins, God will not remain angry with them forever, but will restore them to their land. In the meantime, He exhorts them not to fall into the temptation to worship the gods of the surrounding nations, who are created by human hands and possess no real power. Only the God of Israel is the true God, and He shows it by prophesying what will happen in the future and bringing it to pass.

Our Old Testament reading begins by referring back to the Exodus from Egypt, when God created a way through the Sea and drowned Pharaoh’s chariots as they pursued the Israelites (vv. 16-17). By reminding Israel of this, God is letting them know that there will be a new Exodus from Babylon.

In the meantime, they must not dwell on the past. Even though they were exiled due to their sin, their iniquity has already been paid for, as it states earlier in Isaiah:

Comfort, O comfort my people,

says your God.

Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,

 and cry to her

that she has served her term,

that her penalty is paid,

that she has received from the Lord’s hand

double for all her sins. (Isaiah 40:1-2)

Instead of dwelling on the past, they are encouraged to look to their future deliverance. On that day, they will once again praise the Lord (v.21).

This continues the past series of OT readings which narrate the Bible’s salvation history, beginning with Abraham. Here we come closer to the period when Christ comes to save His people, and we already begin to see hints of it. Although the “new thing” that God is about to do refers to the immediate return of the Exiles, it also serves as a foreshadowing of the even greater deliverance that God will fulfill through Christ’s Passion.

Finally, this passage reminds us that, just like the woman caught in adultery in today’s Gospel reading (John 8:1-11), God always makes a way of deliverance for those caught in the destructive consequences of sin. What matters is we do not dwell on past sins (the “former things,” as Isaiah puts it), but that we repent and seek God’s deliverance (the “new thing” He is doing), and praise Him for He has provided it for us.

J. Luis Dizon