The Enraptured Center

“I, the Lord, have called You… to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the prison, those who sit in darkness from the prison house” (Isa. 42:6-7, NKJV).

Seven hundred years before the fulfillment of these words, Daddy speaks to Jesus through His oracle, Isaiah. He announces to Him His breathtaking purposes for the coming wondrous work of depositing Him in Mary’s womb. He does this for our sake. There is no other reason for this conversation between Them to be recorded here. It’s for us.

Here’s the spectacular thing about this introduction to the reality of the coming Messiah. Everything Daddy is calling Jesus to do and become… flows out of Their mutual delight. Look at verse 1 of this chapter:

“Behold! My Servant whom I uphold, My Elect One in whom My soul delights! I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles.”

Daddy’s heart is so overflowing with overwhelmed love for His Son, He has to announce it seven hundred years before it’s time. Later, we are to hear the expression of His surging heart again at Jesus’ baptism, and once again at His transfiguration: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!” Daddy cannot hold it in.

The One in whom Daddy delights came to make the blind see. He came to release prisoners from the darkness that held them all their lives in cruel, unrelenting slavery. He came to breathe hope into our wilted, hopeless spirits. He came to save us from our sins.

All of this, absolutely all of this, flowed out of the bliss of mutual delight. Jesus’ stores of energy and power as He ministered, and ultimately as He gave His life, sprung from His sense of being utterly cherished by Daddy. Freely He ceaselessly received His love, and freely He ceaselessly gave it out.

Isaiah’s prophecy goes on to proclaim, “He will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth” (v. 4, NIV).

This assurance, too, was to flow from Their blissful, perpetual, communing in joyful love. As Daddy delighted in Jesus and Jesus delighted in Daddy, no discouragement could ever reach His emotions. Absolute steadfastness of purpose characterized His earthly sojourn. He knew Whose He was, and this carried Him through with a steady stream of supernatural joy bubbling up constantly from within Him. His face set like flint, not once did He falter. To His deepest core, He knew. He was Daddy’s.

Daddy, Jesus, and Holy Spirit wrote this down for us through Isaiah because They wanted us to intimately know this same delight, in them. They wrote it down because they are alluring us into Their love circle. When we allow the pleasure of our belovedness to overtake our earthly lives, everything else will flow out of it. We, too, will walk forward with unswerving constancy, tenacity, purpose, and joy. We, too, will be vessels of His overflowing love.

What power He can release through an enraptured soul!

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How much of a difference would it make if everything we did in life flowed out of a sense of belonging permanently to a tender, passionate love circle?