Dr. Rodney Plunket

The Old Testament scholar, John D. W. Watts, commenting on Isaiah 40 writes, “Nothing in human existence is as fragile as power.  God can take it away in an instant”[1].  Isaiah 40:28-31, the verses that served as our Scripture reading this morning, accentuate the limited nature of human power; and those verses build a truth upon that fact.  Those verses emphatically declare that the limitless power of God is available to all who truly put their faith in the Lord God.

Please consider with me the way the prophet makes this declaration.  In verse 28 he declares that the Lord God “gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless.”  In verses 29-31 the prophet reveals the magnitude of the power that God gives.  He writes,

          Even youths will faint and be weary,

                    and the young will fall exhausted;

          but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,

                    they shall mount up with wings like eagles,

          they shall run and not be weary,

                    they shall walk and not faint.

The prophet affirms what all people of great faith have experienced.  Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, King David, Elijah, Elisha, Jesus our Lord, and the Apostle Paul have all taught us that great power comes when we submit to the Will and Word of God and allow God’s power to strengthen us, God’s power to elevate us, God’s power to transform us, and God’s power to conquer the Evil One in our lives.  The prophet alludes to exceedingly difficult situations, situations that exhaust even the persons most filled with youthful vigor.  And the prophet makes clear that even in those situations we must not respond by trying harder; we must respond by waiting on the Lord.

This is a call to radical faith.  This is a call to trust no longer in personal power, personal intellect, personal wealth, or personal beauty or strength.  The world puts so much stock in those things.  The world looks to them as the resources which allow an individual to fly to the top in any career and to the top of a truly satisfying life.

The prophet could not be stronger in his denunciation of such a view.  Real power, the prophet affirms, comes from waiting on the power of God to show up.  When that happens, it does not matter how fatigued you are, you will fly like an eagle.  Watts makes a noteworthy point when he writes,

The figure of the eagle’s wings is apt.  The soaring eagle is borne aloft not by his powerful wings, but by the wind’s currents lifting his rigid pinions.  Those waiting are those prepared to be lifted up and carried aloft by the spirit of God in his time and his way”[2].

And the Hebrew word that is translated as “wait” here “means to wait or to look for with eager expectation.”[3]  This is not an uncertain waiting.  This is a waiting in faith.  This is a waiting that looks forward to what God is going to do next.  This is a waiting performed up on tiptoes as the believer stretches to see out over the horizon and out into the future because of the eager desire to rejoice at the wonder God’s power is going to perform.

God’s people have been recreated in Christ Jesus to soar like eagles.  We must not rely on intellect, will, strength, wealth, or form of face or body.  The “lifting” that those attributes can deliver will stay in this life.  It will matter not at all in the life to come.  What we are to do is soar, soar as the power of God lifts us up like a mighty thermal lifts up a great eagle higher and higher in the sky.

On June 30, 1999 the family of the late Dr. Jim Crisp gave me a book entitled Slipping the Surly Bonds by Dave English.[4]  It is a book of quotations on flight.  Many of you will know that Dr. Crisp was an avid glider pilot.  Just inside the cover, a note from Jim’s family communicates that “Jim loved to give this book to fellow adventurers.”  Above the family’s note, a label is fixed; and on that label is a quotation from Leonardo da Vinci.  The note from Jim’s family tells me that this quotation was one of Jim’s “favorites.”  It is indeed a great quotation, and it is especially appropriate for today’s lesson.  Leonardo da Vinci wrote,

When once you have tasted flight,

you will forever walk the earth

with your eyes turned skyward,

for there you have been, and there

you will always long to return.

Once we truly fly to the heights raised by the power of God into the spiritual stratosphere, once that happens, we will not be focused on the things of this world; we will not be deceived into thinking that human will or human power or earthly wealth or physical beauty or strength are worthy of trust or adoration.  Once we have been taken up by the power of God we will long forever to fly with that eternal power lifting us ever higher and ever deeper into the heart of God.

This morning is senior Sunday.  We are focusing upon all of our graduates; and we are calling upon them––yes, upon us all, but we are especially calling upon them––to be men and women who have a radical faith in the living God, a faith that lifts them ever higher and ever deeper into the heart of God.

Some people who graduate from high school or university seem to think that they have graduated from God.  They have been taught and trained.  All they need to do now is go out with their finely honed skills and conquer the world.  May the prophet’s words ring in your ears.  The prophet’s words make clear that an uneducated person of limited ability who is lifted by the power of God has much more power than anyone who fails to look to the power of God as that which lifts a person to the heights that truly are heights, heights that are heights in the eyes of God.

Brook Roberts, one of our youth ministers, is going to come now; and, based on his very personal knowledge of our high school graduates, he is going to further challenge you to soar by the power of God.  Brook, come speak to us.

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