Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:12
"See, they will come from afar—
some from the north, some from the west,
some from the region of Aswan."
(The Lord calls people to Him from every corner of the earth

and from every situation and condition,

from the north, from the Babylon of exile from the people's inheritance;
from the west, from the Gentiles who will eventually be drawn in;
and from the southern regions, from the places of Egyptian enslavement.
The Lord declares those having lived in exile,
those seeking to renew their lives in a fresh beginning,

and those hearing of salvation for the first time
all will be drawn to the salvation of God.
In our lives today, not only is the Lord calling people from afar to come to Him,
but He is also calling the disparate parts of our lives

that cause us to be exiled from living life fully,
that have not yet received the good news of redemption,

and that have been enslaved in captivity.
He is calling us out of our past thinking, of our past priorities,
of our past attitudes, of our past walk with Him,
to come to Him and to align with Him and His purposes for us.
As we center in on the truths and promises of God,
the scattered and broken places in us of fear or anger
or shame or helplessness or sickness come into alignment
with Who God really is and where He wants us to reside,
living in faith, in hope, in security, in power, and in freedom in Him.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:11
"I will turn all My mountains into roads, and My highways will be raised up."

(To make a road for us, what appears to be impassable heights
the Lord will bring down.
To make a road for us, what appears to be an impassable valley of darkness
the Lord will raise up.
Where there seems to be no way,
where, in face, humanly speaking, there is no way,
the Lord will make a way.
Just as kings of old were welcomed into a city on a smooth and level highway
that had been smoothed and repaired and made level for him,
so the Lord welcomes us into His city of refuge from our places of captivity
on a highway that He makes smooth and level for us.
As we look to Him, He guides us through the impossible mountains of difficulty in our lives.
As we look to Him, He guides us through the dark valleys of despair in our lives.
Since the mountains and highways belong to Him,
as we walk through those mountain and desert places,
He makes them a smooth and leveled transit that take on us the very paths
that He has ordained and designed for us today.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:10
"They will neither hunger nor thirst,
nor will the desert heat or the sun beat down on them.
(The Lord has declared He will set His people free from their exile in Babylon,
and He promises He will provide for them, that they will not lack
even though the journey will take them through difficult
and, at times, desolate and unknown territory.
He will protect them from outside forces
so that even in the scorching heat of the desert He will shield them.
Today, He promises us He will be our provision in everything we need
and our shield against the fierce heat of the desert places in our lives,
places that are unfamiliar and uncharted,
places of desolation and desperation.)
He Who has compassion on them will guide them
and lead them beside springs of water."
(The Lord's kindness and care for us never falters
even though our disobedience and rebellion
have taken us into exile and away from Him.
His faithful compassion remains to lead us back to Him.
Not only will the Lord provide sustenance and protection for us
in our return journey to Him,
but He will guide and direct us through the unfamiliar and unknown places,
uncharted places of desolation and desperation.
As He frees us from our places of captivity,
He always guides us to new places of restoration and renewal,
places of rest beside streams of the living water that come from Him,
hidden streams about which only He knows
and to which He leads us even as we journey through the desert today.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:9b
"They will feed beside the roads and find pasture on every barren hill."
(Just as the Lord provided an escape for His people
from the captivity and exile of Babylon,
so today He also provides escape for us from the places of darkness,
places of oppression, shame, fear, regrets, and hopelessness.
Even as a shepherd provided pasture and sustenance for his sheep,
so the Lord promised to provide the daily life necessities for the Israelites
as they made the challenging journey back to their homeland.
As the sheep under the Shepherd's care, like sheep,
we desperately need provision and sustaining support,
and we have the Lord's promise that He will be everything we need
as we journey out of captivity and exile back to Him.
If we are traveling on well-trodden roads where no vegetation can grow,
our Shepherd will cause abundant supply to be at our disposal,
to spring up where supply normally does not naturally grow.
He will even provide what we need when life takes us
away from the beaten paths and on the high and dangerous mountain pathways
where the barren heights also prevent vegetation from growing.
These are the very places where the Lord intervenes and makes a way,
makes provision, in the very places where there is no way,
where there is no provision, where there are no resources outside of Him.
Our Shepherd makes a way and supplies abundance and provision
in the very midst of our need today. no matter where we are,
no matter what our need, no matter the road or high hill,)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:8b-9a
"I will keep You and will make You to be a covenant for the people,
(God promises to preserve and provide for His Son during Jesus' earthly mission
as He becomes the foundation for God's new covenant with man,
a covenant of salvation by God's grace and mercy.
Because God has assigned Jesus to serve
as our mediator and advocate before the Father,
Jesus saves and preserves us today because of God's covenant with us,
a covenant not made by us, a covenant we had nothing to do with creating.
This covenant is all God's doing, and now, because of Jesus' great sacrifice,
we can rest in God's provision for us no matter what we face today.
God has declared He is in covenant with us through Jesus Christ.)
to restore the land and to reassign its desolate inheritances,
(Part of the covenant promise is that God will restore to us
the destroyed and desolated places
where the enemy has invaded and devastated our lives.
He will restore our inheritance that had been stolen
by our doubts and our disobedience and fears
and gives us an inheritance in Christ Who is Himself our inheritance.)
to say to the captives, 'Come out,' and to those in darkness, 'Be free!'"
(Jesus is still calling us out of all the places of captivity in our lives
and freeing us to be the whole and chosen people He has called us to be.
Because He is the light of the world, we do not have to yield to darkness.
Darkness has to flee in the presence of His light and truth.
He has made His light to shine in us making us
free and whole and more than adequate in Him today.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:8a
This is what the Lord says:
"In the time of My favor I will answer You,
(The phrase time of favor refers to a season of delight,
a time of great joy when the Lord will finally reveal the glory
of the salvation He has planned through His Son.
As Father God speaks lovingly and reassuringly to His Son here in Isaiah,
He tells Jesus that He will answer Jesus' needs
as God leads Him to fulfill the mission the Lord has set before Him.
God will not only answer His Son,
He will not only be attentive to Jesus' needs
as He embarks upon the mission God has laid out for Him,
but the Lord will delight in this season
when He will sustain and strengthen and guide Jesus
to complete His God assignment.
The Lord's time of delight in and favor for us is just as real as it is for Jesus.
After all, the very reason God sent Jesus to earth
was to reconcile us to Himself.
Today is the very season when God delights in us
as He leads us into the assignments He has set for each of us.)
and in the day of salvation I will help You;"
(God already knows the deep suffering, the deep commitment, required
for Jesus to maintain and complete His journey to and through the cross,
and His promise is that He will provide everything Jesus needs
to accomplish God's mighty plan of salvation.
The Lord already knows the challenges we will face
in what He has called each of us to walk to and through today,
and He declares not only His delight in our walk with Him through these places,
but also vows His complete provision and support for all we need.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:7b
"Kings will see You and stand up, princes will see and bow down,
because of the Lord, Who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel,
Who has chosen You."
(Though Jesus was despised and rejected
by the very people to whom God had sent Him,
though they considered Him an actual abomination,
God has declared that those responses will not be the last word.
Jesus' mission failure was only temporary and did not detract
from Him and His faithful obedience and submissive service.
God proclaims that Christ the Messiah will be honored
by all the kings of the earth, by all the mighty.
They will honor and acknowledge Him as Lord
because the Great I AM has declared it so.
The powerful of the earth will rise in honor and recognition of Jesus as Christ,
only to bend their knee and prostrate themselves before Him.
God's sovereign purposes will prevail and do not depend
on the wavering, misguided, and blinded opinions of man.
Today, the Lord has also chosen us and declared
that even when situations to which He has called us
result in rejection and seeming failure, He, the Eternal God Almighty,
will cause us to be honored and our name restored in His due time
because He is faithful to His called and chosen
and because He looks on our obedience and submission to His service,
not on the success or failure of our mission--that is entirely in His Hands.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:7a
This is what the Lord says—the Redeemer and Holy One of Israel—
(The Lord God Almighty, the GREAT I AM, the Self-Existent One, the Eternal God,
asserts Himself to His people, proclaiming Who He is, declaring His titles,
an assertion that proclaims His sovereignty, His position, His character,
His standing, His purpose, His ownership.
That same Lord today declares and asserts the same proclamation to us,
reminding us that He is talking to us, that we belong to Him,
and that we should listen to Him.)
to Him Who was despised and abhorred by the nation,
to the Servant of rulers:
(God speaks not only to the second Person of the Trinity, to His Son,
but to His people as well.
As Father God speaks about the foretold, future situation
to which He had called His Son, the situation that Jesus would face
as He walked out God's salvation purposes,
God's prediction is clear, that Jesus would be rejected and humiliated,
actually considered an abomination,
that He Who was God would serve as a lowly Servant,
receiving none of the high honor that was due Him from His people.
If Jesus Himself, God Incarnate, met with rejection,
with derision, defeat, suffering, difficulties, and dishonor,
is it any wonder that those same descriptions might apply to us
as we walk out Sovereign Father's purposes for us.
Jesus' example shows us we need to keep our focus on Him through the trials.
Rather than feeling disappointment and disillusionment
and doubt and despair when trials beset us,
rather than falling into the trap of seeing ourselves as a victim and a martyr,
rather than feeling sorry for ourselves,
rather than worshiping at the altar of the idol of fear,
when we look to the pattern Jesus sets before us,
He shows us we need to remain obedient and submissive in trials
because, just as He demonstrates, we will be, finally, completely victorious!)
May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:6
He says: "It is too small a thing for You to be My Servant
to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make You a light for the Gentiles,
that My salvation may reach to the ends of the earth."
(Jesus accepted the call of His Father to bring salvation to His people.
Even though they rejected God's Messenger and His message of good news,
the Lord's sovereign purposes were not thwarted nor altered.
In fact, the rejection of Jesus merely revealed God's larger purposes.
Not only was Jesus' mission not deterred,
but the Lord turned the seeming defeat of Jesus' mission
into a path through which God's far greater purposes would be fulfilled.
He simply made Jesus a Savior and Messiah to the whole world.
Here's a lesson for us today:
When we feel we have failed God,
when we feel we have inadequately fulfilled our calling,
we can be assured that, just like Jesus' call which would meet seeming defeat,
God's purposes for us are much wider and extend further
than we can see with our human perspective.
When we feel God has somehow failed us
because the situation for which we have prayed
has not ended in the result we thought should happen,
when we feel God must be disappointed in our performance,
God declares His call is much broader than we perceive.
While He was still a man here one earth, Jesus did not see His salvation
extended to the Gentiles and to the ends of the earth,
but that did not mean God's plan of salvation was made null or deterred.
Even when we don't see the results we hope for,
the results we thought we heard God speak to us,
His plans, His ways, His thoughts, higher far than ours,
still forever prevail and are still forever sovereign.
He Himself redeems impossible situations
and He Himself causes us to fulfill the mission to which He calls us.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:5b
. . .for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord and My God has been My strength—
(Because Jesus was given the high honor and privilege
to walk out God's purposes through Him to bring salvation
to the scattered, wandering, and lost sheep of Israel,
because He was chosen to bring glory to the Father,
because His obedience and submission honored the Father
even though God's people rejected His Messiah,
even though Jesus essentially failed in His outreach to the Jews,
God the Father has honored and strengthened Christ the Son.
Just as Jesus sought and gained strength to do what was humanly impossible,
so God the Father and Christ the Lord have invited us today
to accept the same high honor of the calling the Lord has bestowed on us,
to carry His Name and to be His outreach to the world.
Just like Jesus Who faced the rejection of the very people to whom He was sent,
when the Lord chooses to allow us to experience difficulties and hardships,
we, too, are most powerfully challenged in those very times
to draw from His strength and to allow His strength
to be made perfect and complete in our inabilities and weakness.
Today, even in the face of seeming defeat and rejection and scorn,
even with the prospect of what looks like a failure in our mission from God,
the Lord declares and promises that we are honored and strengthened through Him
because the mission which He has given us is safely in His sovereign Hands.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:5a
And now the Lord says—He who formed Me in the womb to be His Servant
to bring Jacob back to Him and gather Israel to Himself,
for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord and My God has been My strength—
(Just as Christ Himself was formed in Mary's womb
with a specific and unique mission to fulfill from God,
so we, too, as we are knitted together in the womb
have a call on our lives from God Himself to gather His people back to Him.
The meaning behind the word gather refers to a people scattered away from God,
much like sheep whom the Shepherd goes out to gather back into the fold.
Not only are we to gather our scattered selves to God the Father,
but we are also to be the servant of the Lord
and allow the Lord to reach through us to those around us
to gather the lost sheep back to Him.
Just as Jesus Himself was given the high honor and privilege
to walk out God's purposes through Him,
bringing glory to the Father through His obedience and submission,
just as He sought and gained strength to do what was humanly impossible,
just as He faced a wall of opposition from the very people to whom He was sent
and His labor for them seemed in large part in vain at the time,
so we are invited today to accept the high honor the Lord has bestowed on us
to carry His Name and to be His outreach to the world
even in the face of hardship and trial, of opposition and rejection,
and of what seems to be unproductive labor and even failure.
When the Lord chooses to allow us to experience difficulties and hardships,
those are the very times we are challenged most powerfully
to draw from His strength and to allow His strength to be made perfect in our inabilities.
Today, the Lord says that we are honored and strengthened in Him
to carry out His purposes.
That is His declaration and promise to us today.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:4b
"Yet what is due Me is in the Lord's Hand,
and My reward is with My God."
(Christ has just spoken prophetically through Isaiah
that His mission to God's people will not produce
their commitment to the Lord at that time
or their acknowledgement of Him as their long-awaited Messiah,
nor fulfill, again, at that time, God's ultimate purposes toward His people.
Just as Jesus' mission was temporarily blocked by people and their rejection,
just as He submitted to an expanded and far greater purpose of God's mission for Him--
for salvation to be extended to the whole world of the Gentiles--
we also often experience blocks to what we think has been the Lord's purpose for us.
We, like Jesus Himself, often need to look through to the Lord's wider purposes
and to submit to His plans even though they may not look like we thought they would look.
Jesus proclaims that He willingly lays the outcome to His mission with God,
relying on and submitting to God's purposes still encased
in His suffering, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension.
Rather than be deterred by blocks and rejection and trials,
when we follow Jesus' example, we continue to stand in the middle of God's plan for us
even when hardships and challenges arise,
knowing that God is true to His Word and rewards our obedience and submission to Him
with the awesome outpouring of His blessings and peace.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:4a
But I said, "I have labored in vain;
I have spent My strength for nothing at all."
(As Christ the Messiah sent to save God's people,
sent to be their Savior and King, Jesus sees from the beginning
that His efforts toward the Jewish people will have limited impact.
He will be rejected by them, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
He will be scorned, slandered, tricked, and beaten
by the very people to whom His message of redemption and salvation is first given.
His heart's cry for His Own people go unheard by them.
He will labor for them and minister to them, and yet they will reject Him.
In fact, His initial mission to the Jews is still to be made manifest to them,
and His message has been given to the Gentiles,
a mighty outpouring of grace that we are invited to embrace.
If even Jesus Christ Himself experienced such opposition, such hostility,
to the sovereign plan of God for His life,
we know today that our own God-mission may also not yield
the immediate impact in our lives and in our outreach
that might seem warranted because of God's Hand in our endeavors.
If Jesus Himself experienced such seeming ineffectiveness to His efforts
to complete God's purposes for Him at that point in time,
we can be encouraged that even when we don't see the results we hope for
that we continue to walk out God's mission for us.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:3
He said to Me, "You are My Servant, Israel, in Whom I will display My splendor."
(The Lord has named His Messiah, His Servant,
calling Him by the name of His Own beloved people
through whom He is so closely associated by virtue
of God's redemptive plan to be carried out through this people.
God called His beloved Son from before the beginning of time
and the Son answered His Father's call
and portrayed the servant-hood of obedience and suffering
which resulted in a magnificent and glorious display of God's power and love.
Just as Jesus willingly obeyed God's call into the mission set before Him,
so we, too, have been called by God the Father
into the very real and present God mission in which He has set us today.
Our lives and circumstances today are not coincidental, not by chance, not happenstance,
but are directed and coordinated by the Lord God Himself
to empower us to walk out His purposes and, thereby,
to reveal His glory both to us and to the world around us today.
He calls us to be His Own.
Today, the Lord beckons us, names us, calls us as His very own attendant.
He purposes to make us His witness and a testimony
to His power and love and mercy and forgiveness.
He has chosen to reveal Himself to us and through us to others.
He has chosen to present Himself in all His glory and majesty in us and through us.
Just as Jesus revealed the magnificent glory and splendor of God the Father,
we, too, are invited to participate today
in the glorious unveiling of the Lord and of His great power and love.
What an absolute and incredible wonder
that the Lord shares this high privilege with us today.
How He has honored us!)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:2
He made My Mouth like a sharpened sword,
(The Lord has given His Son the Messiah
a message that pierces "even to the dividing asunder the soul and spirit,
and of the joints and marrow" and that is "sharper than any two-edged sword."
Because, as born-again believers, we are positionally in Christ Jesus today
and have all the rights and inheritance of the first-born,
God has also blessed us with the ability to speak the words of our mouth
so that they are acceptable in His sight and carry the power of His Truth.
The Word of the Lord has formed us and taught us so we can speak His Truth.
Because He has made our mouth like a sharpened sword,
His Truth will also go forth from us as a sharp, two-edged sword
to pierce the darkness around and in us.)
in the shadow of His Hand He hid Me;
(He is a canopy over us. He goes before us as a pillar of cloud in the day
and a pillar of fire by night to protect and cover us and hide us in Him.
He protects us under the very shadow of His wings.
His Hand, the very Hand of God, hovers over us protectively and lovingly
with His presence and provision
Even as His Word is like a sword, that sword of the Spirit protects us
and keeps us hidden away and safely encased in the scabbard
and the shadow of His mighty Word of Truth.)
He made Me into a polished arrow and concealed Me in His quiver.
(Just as an arrow is safely placed in the protection of the warrior
who will use it at the right time, God placed Jesus as a polished and ready arrow
to be pulled forth to proclaim His salvation
when God's time had come for His Messiah to appear.
The Lord has also hidden us away in His safe place, maturing us, growing us,
protecting us in His care until He draws us forth to use for His purposes,
sharpened and quick to the mark He has set for us.
What may look to us from our human perspective like wasted time or difficult times
is merely the Lord sharpening and polishing us
to be at the ready when He aims us to the mark.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 49:1
Listen to Me, you islands; hear this, you distant nations:
(Because this is the Messiah speaking, not only should Israel listen to Him,
but also the far nations of the earth because He is declaring His qualifications.)
Before I was born the Lord called Me;
(He has been called forth and appointed to His work.
He did not just step into the need,
but He was divinely selected and assigned to His work of salvation
before the foundations of the world were laid
because God knew we would desperately need a Savior.
We, too, before we were born have been called.
The Lord God, the Most High God, has called us out, selected us,
divinely singled us out for His special purposes.)
from My mother's womb He has spoken My name.
(Having been given the name Jesus before He was even placed in the womb.
Jesus was called to His divine mission of salvation
for not only the Jews but also for the nations.
The Lord has also named us a special name that He Himself has chosen for us,
a name that relates to the divine mission to which He has called us.
He says our name repeatedly as He knitted us together
even from our our earliest conception
because we are so precious to Him
and because He wants us to recognize His Voice calling our name
from our earliest moments of life.
He has been calling us from birth and continues calling us today.
He eagerly desires that we fulfill His divine mission for us
and all the purposes He has ordained in our lives.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 48:22
"There is no peace," says the Lord, "for the wicked."
(The Lord has promised deliverance for His people,
that they will be able to flee the land of their exile,
that He is redeeming them from their disobedience and rebellion,
that He is bringing them back to their place of promise in their homeland.
He is also warning those who choose to stay in Babylon, the land of their exile,
that they will not enjoy the peace and salvation
that He has proclaimed for those who choose to follow Him,
as well as warning those who do choose to return to their homeland
that continued wickedness on their part will yield no peace even there.
When we obey the Lord, when we choose to follow Him
into His promised land of salvation,
we can enjoy the shalom of complete and total peace in every aspect of our lives,
even in the midst of turmoil, even in the midst of the journey itself,
away from and out of our difficult circumstances.
Today, this statement has often popularly been changed to say
that there is no peace for the weary, an absolutely false statement.
In Christ, we have true and complete peace, peace that floods over us like a river,
peace that is beyond human understanding because it is the peace of God.
This is a peace that allows us to sit at a table spread before us by the Lord
even in the very presence of our enemies
because, in Him, with Him, through Him, we have nothing to fear.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 48:21
They did not thirst when He led them through the deserts;
He made water flow for them from the rock;
He split the rock and water gushed out.
(Israel's stay in Egypt had begun in safety and provision,
only to disintegrate into enslavement to Egypt's power.
When God's people became helpless slaves
to the ways of that world and those people,
the Lord was the only way of escape.
We, too, often begin our stay in places in the world's system
where we have been safely placed there through the Lord's provision for us.
Then we fail to preserve our trust in Him
and begin to yield to the world's lies and become hopelessly entrapped.
Only through the Lord's deliverance can we escape such slavery.
Here in Isaiah, God's people have been exiled to Babylon,
another kind of slavery caused by their disobedience
and rebellion against God's ways.
Today, we, too, often suffer the consequences
of our halfhearted and lukewarm adherence
to the life to which God has called us
or of our outright rebellion against the Lord,
and we find ourselves in places of exile.
In either case, whether we have originally gone to Egypt for safety
or to Babylon in defeat and exile, the Lord is reminding His people here
that just as He led them out of slavery through the wilderness
and provided for them in the midst of nothing,
so, too, today, He will lead them out of their enforced exile
and back to their home and place of safety in Him.
His safety and provision in the desert of our lives is in the Rock in that desert,
and that Rock is Christ Jesus, from Whom
flows rich rivers of the waters of refreshing and salvation,
the water of His Word and the water of the Presence of Holy Spirit.
No matter what desert exile we are in today,
wherever we need that water of provision,
that same Rock, Christ our Source, is present
to provide more than ample salvation.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 48:20c
Send it out to the ends of the earth;
say, "The Lord has redeemed His servant Jacob.
(The Lord God of Israel has proclaimed the freedom of His people Israel,
and this salvation message is to go to the farthest most parts of the earth.
The message is that the Lord has triumphed
over His enemies and over the enemies of His people.
In the same way, He delivers us His people today,
not only from the journey we take into sin, but from the bondage of sin itself.
This is the Good News. He has saved us!
He has redeemed us, He has delivered us, He has brought us into His salvation.
We need to proclaim this message to ourselves and to others,
the very message of Christ's Good News,
the truth of His salvation, both by our words and our acts,
so that we and others will be turned toward the Deliverer
instead of believing the lies of the enemy.
The Lord not only delivers us for our sake,
but so that others may see and be drawn to Him as well.
Our redemption and deliverance today are a proclamation to the world
that Jesus saves and delivers!)

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 354 4974

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 48:20b
Announce this with shouts of joy and proclaim it.
(The Lord has just proclaimed His people's freedom
from the exile and bondage in which they have been living
and that they must be ready mentally and physically to flee this place.
It seems redundant to have to tell His people to flee from their oppression,
to proclaim their release and freedom with joyful expectation.
Yet, when the Israelites were actually released
from their exile in Babylon by Cyrus years later
and Ezra was given permission to take the people back to their former home,
many of God's people elected to stay right where they were in Babylon
instead of making the journey back to their homeland,
back to the place the Lord had decreed was their place of residence,
back to the land of promise, back to the heritage the Lord had given them.
In so many ways, we today still resist leaving the places of bondage in our lives.
Our bondage and exile into the lies of the enemy have become too comfortable,
so familiar they no longer seem so oppressive.
We often settle in there and make do, finding ways to cope
with the discomfort and oppression, so much so that,
when the Lord provides a way out,
we even prefer to remain living in the now familiar place of exile
and decline the promises and heritage the Lord has provided.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 48:20a
Leave Babylon, flee from the Babylonians!
(Israel was living in enforced exile in Babylon,
but the Lord has made a promise their deliverance was in His plans.
Though they were not yet released from their shame and exile to a foreign entity,
the Israelites are to stand on the Lord's promise that deliverance is assured.
They are to begin preparing their hearts for their future
by standing on the fulfillment of the Lord's promise now in the present.
The need to begin now the flight from their place of bondage
and, when their release physically happens, they are told
to flee the place of bondage immediately.
When we are in great difficulties, we have to focus on the truth
that the Lord proclaims over us and stand on His promise of delivery
even before our deliverance is actually realized
and even though the circumstances seem to dictate something else entirely.
Then, upon release, we must flee the bondage or temptation or exile
in every possible way that we are connected to it.
Today, the Lord has proclaimed our freedom.
Today, He instructs us to rejoice in leaving the places
where we have been held captive.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874

Good Word for Today!

The Lord Be With You Today!

Isaiah 48:19
Your descendants would have been like the sand,
your children like its numberless grains;
their name would never be blotted out
nor destroyed from before Me."
(The Lord is telling His people the dire consequences of their disobedience.
Now living in exile, Israel had been reduced to little influence,
to reduced size, and to pain and suffering.
Had they obeyed the Lord, had they been faithful to His loving commands,
they would have been great and their legacy would have been great.
The consequences of their and, by extension, our failure
to seek the Lord and His righteousness last far beyond our own existence.
Their and our successors, our offspring, had we taught and molded them in God's ways,
would not only have been great in number,
but they would have been powerful God-followers and influencers.
When we look at our descendants beyond the sense of just our progeny,
we also see the Lord's promise that, when we obey Him,
when we are faithful to Him even, and especially, in the midst of great trial,
He expands and increases our influence,
He expands and increases our resemblance to His Son,
and He is faithful to reward our obedience
by inviting us by name to live in His very Presence.
He yearns for us to make a mark on our world,
and we do that by giving our lives to Him in obedience and service,
and the eternal consequences of our faithfulness are beyond our comprehension.)

May the Lord richly bless you this day!

In Christ's love,

Blessings,

Sally
513 254 3874