Our Daily Bread -- Strength for the Weary

June 3, 2016

Read: Isaiah 40:27-31
Bible in a Year: 2 Chronicles 19-20; John 13:21-38

Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. —Isaiah 40:31

On a beautiful, sunny day, I was walking in a park and feeling very weary in spirit. It wasn’t just one thing weighing me down—it seemed to be everything. When I stopped to sit on a bench, I noticed a small plaque placed there in loving memory of a “devoted husband, father, brother, and friend.” Also on the plaque were these words, “But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint” (Isa. 40:31 esv).

Those familiar words came to me as a personal touch from the Lord. Weariness—whether physical, emotional, or spiritual—comes to us all. Isaiah reminds us that although we become tired, the Lord, the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth “will not grow tired or weary” (v. 28). How easily I had forgotten that in every situation “[the Lord] gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak” (v. 29).

What’s it like on your journey today? If fatigue has caused you to forget God’s presence and power, why not pause and recall His promise. “Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength” (v. 31). Here. Now. Right where we are. —David McCasland

Lord, thank You that You do not grow weary. Give me the strength to face whatever situation I am in today.

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When life's struggles make you weary, find strength in the Lord.

INSIGHT: After prophesying that God would use the Assyrians (Isa. 1-38) and Babylonians (Isa. 39) to punish Judah, Isaiah comforts Judah with the hope of future deliverance and restoration (Isa. 40-66). In chapter 40, Isaiah speaks of God’s sovereignty, majesty, and loving providential care. Addressing the Jews’ sense of abandonment (v. 27), Isaiah assures them that God has the power to restore them and will indeed do so. Isaiah reminds them that the everlasting, omnipotent, Creator God is the source of their strength (vv. 28-29) and calls on these despondent Jews to persevere in their faith, to rise to a new level of commitment, and to wait for God to bring His promises to fulfillment (vv. 30-31). Sim Kay Tee

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