Are We Repairers of the Breach?

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This morning was a sweet time of refreshment…of reflection…and of God’s amazing voice in my life.

Last week, Jeremiah gripped me. This week, it’s Isaiah..chapter 58 to be exact. I challenge you to read it, ask your husband to read and teach and chew on it with you.

The gripping question that God has given me this week is, “What does it look like now, today, for our family, to ‘free the oppressed, feed the hungry, clothe the naked…to become the ‘Repairer of the Breach’?”

This question merges with many strands of thinking I’ve had lately…

“The world must see Jesus in the church–in the families that make up the church”…

“It is paramount, if we do no other thing in our lifetimes, that we not only live a pure religion, but we raise up another generation that will carry the torch…it’s not enough that we merely live out the faith if the generation behind us does not…we must raise warriors.”

“Our marriages are so much bigger than the church is teaching…for they are the very picture of Christ and His bride. How do we say to the world (with all our fancy evangelical approaches) ‘Come! Embrace what we have!’ When marriages within the church are falling apart left and right? What DO we have if our lives say that Christ is not faithful to His bride?”

As we entered worship this morning, a young man in our church, still single but valiantly embracing godly manhood, stood up to bring us to intercession before God. He prayed…

“Thank you, Lord, that the younger generation of this church outnumbers the older. We pray that all of the covenant children here would grow up strong in the faith. That they would become a people who stand fearless before the idols of the age, shaking the culture upside down and becoming the new giants in the land. That they would be a people who future generations will look back upon as the generation that turned the tide. That they would be a people whose God is the Lord Almighty.

Thank you, Father, for giving us blessings beyond nuber, promises that will not fail, and a hope that will never die. Enable us to serve you daily in all that we do. Let us not grow weary in well doing, knowing that even the routine tasks of everyday life, when done cheerfully to your praise, are fundamental in crushing the very gates of hell.”

Yes and Amen, I said!

Then in His providence, the sermon was specifically on the urgency of the Christian family to come along side other families who are hurting, to share with them the love of Christ, to guide them and instruct them. “Bring them into your homes”…and in your homes let everything be pointed to Christ. Beauty, order, melody, harmony, unity, love, respect, grace, reverence–let it all say to those around us, “Our God is a great God, and He delights in His people–come, embrace that God with us.

That is when the world sees that yes, God’s people are different. Their homes are a place of refuge…they are, indeed, Repairers of the Breach.