26 March 2024 Tuesday of Holy Week

And he said to me, ‘You are my servant,
Israel, in whom I will be glorified.’
But I said, ‘I have laboured in vain,
I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity;
yet surely my cause is with the Lord,
and my reward with my God.’…

And now the Lord says…

‘It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the survivors of Israel;
I will give you as a light to the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.’

From Isaiah 49: 1-6, NRSV

In this, the second of the “Servant Songs”, we are introduced to a servant of the Lord who was formed whilst still in the womb. Isaiah does not make clear the identity of this servant. It could be about himself or another of the prophets or indeed the people of Judah who were at that time in exile in Babylon. The servant refers to failure to achieve the task – to have laboured in vain. For Isaiah and the other prophets this sense of failure would have arisen each time their words were ignored or ridiculed. For the people of Judah, failure to remain faithful to God had resulted in the loss of freedom and the scattering of their people. Despite the sense of failure, it is clear that the servant still trusts in God. God’s response is not to dwell on failure but to expand the task. The servant is now tasked with bringing light to all the nations. This huge task was not to be for just one person or group of people. We recall John the Baptist who was also chosen and given a task to do before his birth. We also recognise this mission in the service of the Lord in the person of Christ who came “not to be served but to serve”. For all who follow Christ, the task remains the same.

• • What can we learn from the Lord’s attitude to the “failure” of his servant?
  • Who does the Lord choose to complete his task today?

Be conscious of those you “serve” and are served by this week and of the light you can both give and receive in these situations.