What is the biggest barrier to communion with God? I know that among Christians I am going to get a very consistent answer - sin. We all know that sin affects us coming to God in prayer and fellowship, but do we really take time to understand the reality of the fracture it creates?
Isaiah was writing to Israel as he looked forward to a time when Judah would be taken into exile by the Babylonians. They needed encouragement to know that God had not forgotten them and that he is faithful to his covenant. Israel were meant to be God's chosen people who communed with their God. Instead, Israel had been separated from their land and their temple destroyed. The intimate communion that God had with his people had been severed and there is only one side to blame. Israel exiled from the promised land is a full display of the fracture that sin brings between God and his people.
Isaiah 59:1 Behold, the LORD's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear.
Imagine hearing this message as a people in exile separated from the temple worship of their God. He is not so small that his power only exists within the confines of the temple. God's reach is infinite and ample to save his people. He hears every cry and sees every tear of a repentant heart. Israel should be greatly encouraged by knowing that God is able to hear and help them. God loves his children, and they are never beyond his ability to save.
If you are struggling in your intimacy with God, this is a great statement for you too. God knows those who have put their faith in Christ. He knows his saving power and he is purposed to save to the uttermost. This means that our distance from God is only ever one-sided. Our distance from fellowship with God is only ever due to our own sinful thoughts and actions.
Isaiah 59:2 but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.
Because of the devastation of sin, we isolate ourselves from intimate communion with God. This means that while God is not unable to hear or help, we cannot walk and wallow in sin expecting God to bless us with intimate fellowship. Putting these two verses side by side, Isaiah was both encouraging and warning Israel. Sin puts us in a position of a severed intimacy with our God, but our God is not beyond hearing our cries and restoring us with his power. Sin is powerful and brings separation, but God is more powerful and through repentance and faith, he brings complete restoration. The proof of God doing this is seen so prominently in the cross.
We have all sinned and experience the isolation of God in sin, but God's grace is bigger, and his mercy is infinite. We should never be complacent about the ruin that sin brings, and we should never be complacent about the mercy and grace that God gives. Sin separates, but God (in and through Jesus Christ) saves.
If you are feeling the isolating effects of your sin today, call out and know the restoring effects of God's grace as he hears your confession and forgives you in Christ.
Imagine if we wrote the opposite position to Isaiah 59:2. But Christ has made atonement between you and your God and has brought you into intimate communion so that he hears every praise from your mouth.