I love the beauty for ashes verses in the Bible. Isaiah 61 reads like my own personal memoirs from God:
“The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me”…oh yes, it is! He has given me His Spirit!
“Because the Lord has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor” …oh yes, He has! I preach whenever I get a chance that God has a better life for you to live, God has a better plan and He will show you that you don’t have to be poor in spirit; you don’t have to grieve over past sin and past hurts your entire life.
“He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted” …oh yes, He has! I love to tell people that God is not mad at them! He does not hold sin against you when you are brokenhearted over it yourself! He wants to heal your heart, and heal your spirit. He wants you to come full-circle and back around to what He intended for your life from the start.
“To proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound” …you see, just as God has a plan for your life from the very beginning, in this fallen world we have an enemy in the devil, and He will do everything he can to steal, kill and destroy the plan of God for you. Sometimes we succumb to the enemy and he gets us all bound up in sin and unable to get free. But God knows how to get us free and He will do it! Once you get free of the enemy’s grasp, you can’t stop telling of the Lord’s freedom! I will never stop telling people that you too can be free! You too can be out of the prison of sin and free from its effects!
“To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God” …God said that vengeance belonged to Him alone. God loves to put the devil in his place. I like to think of the big hand of God just smacking the devil away as we repent, love God, praise Him, and thank Him for His loving kindness! When we do this, a miracle occurs; God exacts his vengeance through us, the born again ones, in the form of FAITH. Faith in God destroys the enemy! When you believe God, and you resist the devil – He has to flee!
“To comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness” …there it is! This is what God will do for all of His people who come to Him heavy laden with sin! As soon as you repent and give your heart to God, He starts bringing your life full-circle back to where He intended you to be. He takes the stick that the devil beat you with and hands it to you so that you can beat the devil back. Your mess becomes your message, your test becomes your testimony! You can’t stop telling about the goodness of God and His restoration of all parts of you; that child that loved to play Mommy, that little boy that loved to preach, that teen-ager who wanted to change the world for Christ…. When the devil comes in like a flood, God raises a standard against him. God’s standard is truth and justice.
“For I, the Lord, love justice” …
There are many out there who are broken-hearted over sin. You have gone down a wrong path and you want desperately to turn around. You can do it today. You can be restored to everything God intended for your from the beginning. You can come full-circle in your life. God can bring you right back to where you need to be. Call out to Him. Come to Him and you will see that His arms are wide open and He is ready and waiting for you. He loves you and He hasn’t changed His mind about you. He will receive you and He will comfort you and restore you. He will give you beauty for ashes, and joy instead of mourning!
