Isaiah 1:16-17

Read Isaiah 1:16-17

These next two verses beautifully demonstrate the patience and loving-kindness of God towards those whom He will call. Here He tells them the way of repentance…the only way to return to His good graces! Not that all will repent, but God lays out for them very clearly what He requires of them.

Were their hands full of blood? Wash them and make them clean!

Was doing evil a way of life? Put these things away and stop!

The beauty here, of course, is that the only way this can be done is by God’s grace and mercy! Unmoved by God, the people would continue in their rebellion and not even desire to respond in repentance! Here, then, we see what so many blind people refer to as a paradox: man must respond to God, but He cannot and will not do so unless the Father sends the Spirit to elicit this response! What they cannot do, what they refuse to do, God will draw from them, and when their hearts have been changed, they will then respond with a glad heart!

What else though? If a people repent and turn from their wicked ways, then they will be changed. And here in verse 17 we see a clear rebuttal of that particular heresy known as antinomianism. What will they who turn to God do? They will do good, they will seek justice and stand against oppression. Furthermore, as James 1:27 clearly teaches, they will look after the orphan and the widow.

How clearly we see that salvation WILL result in good works!