And when we no longer fight and lay down arms, we acknowledge and confess how it stands with God and us. I have said already this cannot happen unless we have heard what is spoken through the prophet: “Hear ye! But with great mercy will I gather thee! But with everlasting lovingkindness will I have mercy on thee! But my lovingkindness shall not depart from thee! neither shall the covenant of peace be removed.” Take heed that by repeating three times the awful “But!” he says this wholly other? And parenthetically he adds, as if God permitted him to share his counsel: “I have sworn that I will not be wroth with thee nor rebuke thee!” And for the sake of the second he spoke the first. Only because he speaks that glorious word, does he speak this dreadful word. Only where this light is can that shadow fall. That may be the way, this is the goal. And the way is here for the sake of the goal, not the reverse. That may be called knowledge but this the truth; and the truth is before knowledge; and when the truth is here, knowledge ceases. Or, that the truth of man, this the truth of God; and this is greater, infinitely greater, than the truth of man, and only by beginning with it can that be known. Behold, now the prophet says that which hitherto we have missed; what we thought we had to add by deceitfully limiting or supplementing. Does it not become clear to us how much richer, more powerful, and more believable, the threefold “but” of the prophet sounds than the little “and yet!” which we keep ready for our justification and deliverance? Do we not keenly feel the difference between that which on our lips is only a pious wish that will never be fulfilled, and that which on his lips is a promise that bears its fulfilment with it? He received them at that moment when all their pious and impious wishes became dumb. Not therefore—but then “spoke the Lord.” What is the content of this promise?
Again one may ask himself whether one can and may seriously repeat after him what he has said here. But the Bible is open, let us read it to the end. True, the prophet says God will not always be angry, nor has he wholly forsaken us. True, God reveals himself, rending the veil of his secrecy just there where it seems to be most impervious. True, God is in the center of our life, just there, where, through death, is confirmed what our life in truth is. No, God is not angry forever; He is angry so long as time lasts, but His grace is eternal. And if it is the disagreeable human pride in which God’s wrath takes form, punishing us with that with which we sin, it is true also that this pride is not eternal, that it lasts only as long as time; eternal is the other—the forgiveness which destroys sin, though we still must bear its penalty; eternal is the truth that we are God’s dear and humble children. And, understand it well, there is no time that is without eternity, no condemning human truth without a comforting divine truth, no earthly goalless way without the light of the heavenly goal. We are not what we appear to be, that is, what we have made and are ever making of ourselves in our rebellion and revolt. We are not what we must acknowledge and confess ourselves to be, far removed from God, separated from God, laden with the divine curse. How could we acknowledge ourselves as such, if we were not already the children of grace and mercy?
Our acknowledging and our confessing are indeed true to that which we are at the moment; grace, that triumphs in our acknowledgment and confession, is eternal. And while it triumphs, the moment is to the “small moment” as an island in the endless ocean. And now the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, yea, the “moment” may be death and hell itself, it is still only the “moment.” “My loving-kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall my covenant of peace be removed.” But, remember, this is not a truth like other truths. One cannot affirm or defend it or formulate it into a system. With each breath we would be deprived of the right and the ability to say this, if God had not said it. One can hear it only as God’s promise. As a discovery and conclusion of man, it is mere folly. The prophet does not let us doubt that it is only true because God does and will do it: “I will gather thee, I will have mercy on thee, I will not be angry with thee.” Take this “I” away, and you will take everything away! Let it be understood then that we do not do this, we do not know this, we do not have this. God does and knows and has this, and we await it as our heavenly inheritance.
To wait for Him in hope and to be happy, because the Spirit confirms in our hearts what the Word says: “I will … saith the Lord!”—that is our portion. For the moment continues, and does not cease to be the moment of wrath. And so we also will not cease to be (without the Spirit and the Word which are God’s) children of the Old Testament, by nature children of wrath. The answer to the second great word, that the prophet speaks, can only be faith. And faith that is not empty-handed is not faith.
But can we indeed believe? Is not everything only an artificial human comfort with which we deceive ourselves? What shall I say? The Christian Church must learn again to proclaim the word of God’s grace and to listen to it as to God’s word. Otherwise it cannot be believed. Without this we hang and hover half way between as those who are apparently dead: not really condemned and not really pardoned, not really abandoned to the wrath of God and not really happy in hope, all by halves, all weak, all only “as if,” all only figuratively and with reservation.
Perhaps this is the greatest calamity of our time, that such preaching and hearing of the word of grace, as the word of God, has been taken from us and has not yet been restored to us. And yet we hunger and thirst for reality, for the reality of revelation, without which faith, even though it removes mountains, has no reality to speak of; it is only our little faith. The prophet says: “Thus saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, the Merciful One.” This is reality. Christ in his witnesses is reality for which we hunger and thirst. We may doubt their witness and we do so continually; but we can also believe it, overcome our “no” through its “yes.” God be praised, “who according to his great mercy, begat us again to a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead!” He who will conquer us is the Spirit in whom we pray: “Our help and our beginning is in the name of the Lord who hath made heaven and earth.”
The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but Jehovah will be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory. Thy sun shall no more go down, neither shall thy moon withdraw itself; for Jehovah will be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended.—Isaiah 60:19–20.
“The Lord will be thy everlasting light!” This is, like the content of the whole Bible, an announcement, a promise. Nothing more, but nothing less.
“Behold I stand at the door and knock!” A strong large hand reaches out after us. What does it want of us? What will become of us in its grip? That is none of our business. We need only know that we are in this hand. He, who knows this, understands the Bible, the heart of the Bible—Jesus Christ. One may live without knowing this, for Jesus Christ does not thrust himself upon anyone. We must again and again remind ourselves that we have forgotten this fact. We may call to Him: “Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest!” but He will not become once for all a member of any household. The announcement is and always will be a question addressed to each of us. For Jesus Christ is and always will be the living word of God; and his thoughts are not our thoughts and our ways are not his ways. We may or may not hear; Jesus Christ speaks to those who have ears to hear.
“The Lord will be thy everlasting light!” How shall we take this? The words of the text speak a twofold truth—twofold at least for our ears. First: All lights, the greatest and most brilliant, even the sun and the moon, must lose their splendor and radiance, for another incomparable light will take their place. “I am the Lord!” and: “Thou shalt have no other gods beside me.” But let it be remembered that the sun of this light will never set and the moon of this light will not lose its brightness. The days of thy sorrow will have an end. The great enemy, who seeks to rob us of all things, is also the great friend and helper who seeks to give us all things. O that in one word we might speak and hear this contradiction! Here it is actually spoken in a single sentence: “the extinction of all lights and the rising of the one true light, God’s taking and giving, judging and pardoning, casting into hell and exalting into heaven, killing and making alive, law and gospel.” Hear the one without the other