Day 6 – Holy, holy, holy – and send me

Day 6 — Isaiah 6:1-13 Holy, holy, holy – and send me

Opening prayer

Heavenly Father, please give me a true vision of your greatness and holiness. Help me to see myself rightly, to confess my sin honestly, and to rejoice that through your mercy sinners can be cleansed and sent. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Headline

When Isaiah sees the true King, he is undone by his sin, cleansed by God’s grace, and sent out with God’s word.

Isaiah 6:1-13

6 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. ² Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. ³ And they were calling to one another:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty;
    the whole earth is full of his glory.”

⁴ At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

⁵ “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”

⁶ Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷ With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

⁸ Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

⁹ He said, “Go and tell this people:

“‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding;
    be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’
¹⁰ Make the heart of this people calloused;
    make their ears dull
    and close their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
    hear with their ears,
    understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”

¹¹ Then I said, “For how long, Lord?”

And he answered:

“Until the cities lie ruined
    and without inhabitant,
until the houses are left deserted
    and the fields ruined and ravaged,
¹² until the Lord has sent everyone far away
    and the land is utterly forsaken.
¹³ And though a tenth remains in the land,
    it will again be laid waste.
But as the terebinth and oak
    leave stumps when they are cut down,
    so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.”

Comment

Isaiah 6 is the story of the prophet’s call, but it is also much more than that. After five chapters exposing Judah’s rebellion, hypocrisy, pride, and bad fruit, this chapter takes us deeper. The problem is not only out there in the nation. It is also in the prophet himself. And so Isaiah 6 becomes a pattern that runs through the Christian life: seeing God as he is, seeing ourselves as we are, receiving cleansing we could never achieve, and then being sent in God’s service.

The setting matters. “In the year that King Uzziah died” (v.1), earthly stability had been shaken. But in that moment Isaiah sees the greater reality: the Lord is still on the throne. Uzziah has died; God has not. He is “high and exalted”, attended by seraphim, while the temple shakes with their cry: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty” (v.3). This threefold repetition marks holiness out with unique emphasis: God is morally perfect, utterly majestic, and completely unlike us in his blazing purity.

Isaiah’s response is immediate and right: “Woe to me!… I am ruined!” (v.5). Up to this point, Isaiah has pronounced woes on others. Now, in the presence of the holy God, he pronounces woe on himself. That is what the holiness of God does. It ends comparison with others. It strips away self-defence. Isaiah sees that he is “a man of unclean lips” and that he belongs among “a people of unclean lips.” The great issue is no longer merely Judah’s sin, but his own.

But confession is not the end of the story. One of the seraphim takes a live coal from the altar and touches Isaiah’s mouth: “your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for” (v.7). The altar is the place of sacrifice, the place where sin is dealt with. Isaiah is not told to cleanse himself. God provides the cleansing he needs. This symbolic cleansing points forward to Isaiah 53, where the full and final cleansing comes: the Servant of the Lord will bear the sins of many. The point is: sinners cannot make themselves clean; God himself provides the covering for sin through Christ.

Then comes the great turning point: “Whom shall I send?” (v.8). The man who was crying, “I am ruined,” now says, “Here am I. Send me!” (v.8). Cleansing leads to commission. Yet the mission is sobering. Isaiah will preach to people who hear but do not understand. God’s word never leaves people unchanged; it softens or hardens. Even so, judgment is not the last word. The chapter ends with the image of a stump, and therefore with hope. Out of what looks like ruin, God will preserve a holy seed. Isaiah 6 introduces judgment, but also preserves the hope of a remnant and future grace.

Why does God want you to hear this today? Because everything depends on seeing him rightly. A small view of God produces a small Christian life. But when we see the King in his holiness, we stop pretending. We confess our sin. We cling to the atonement God provides in Christ. And then, forgiven and restored, we are ready to say, in whatever sphere he places us, “Here am I. Send me.”

Reflect

• What does this passage show you about the holiness and greatness of God?
• In what ways are you tempted to minimise your own sin rather than confess it honestly?
• Where might God be calling you today to say, “Here am I. Send me”?

Closing prayer

Heavenly Father, I praise you that you are holy, holy, holy. I confess that I am sinful and unclean, and that apart from your mercy I could not stand before you. Thank you for the atoning work of the Lord Jesus, through whom my guilt is taken away. Please make me humble, grateful, and ready to serve, so that I may gladly say, “Here am I. Send me.” In Jesus’ name. Amen.