Isaiah 54:8 In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you,” says the Lord your Redeemer.
When we read “I hid my face from you” it evokes feelings of panic and dismay. No one wants God to hide His face from them. Just the idea of His doing this causes me great anxiety. I pray that you and I never experience His anger and hiding of His face.
Yet we also see that with everlasting kindness, He still had compassion on the people He had been angry at. We know that even if He hides His face in anger, He still loves us and wants all people to be saved (1 Timothy 2:4). He won’t hide His face forever. And even if He does hide it for a while, He still hears our prayers, still listens for our cries of repentance. He will smile down upon us once more, of this we can be certain. God is slow to anger, but He is also swift to show mercy (Psalm 103:8).
While He may seem to abandon us when hiding His face, this is not His true nature. The Father can be likened to a relentless pursuer or the father who ran to his prodigal son while still a long way off (Luke 15:11-32). We are told God will leave the 99 to seek and save the sheep so lost that coming home unaided is impossible (Matthew 18:12).
Not only does He show us kindness, but that kindness is everlasting. Everlasting means exactly what it says – it lasts forever. God’s love isn’t conditional. His “everlasting kindness” is coming, even when His presence feels withdrawn or far away. This verse offers comfort to any who are feeling abandoned or far from God. We are reminded that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Deuteronomy 31:8).
Here is a quote that summarizes all of this in a beautiful way: “He never withdraws his loving gaze nor does he ever leave his children, but when we are in rebellion, God indeed appears to ‘hide his face’ and ‘abandon’ us for a time. From our perspective and in our experience, it’s as if God has withdrawn and rejected us (as it might have seemed to the prodigal son or the Psalmist in Ps. 22:1). But in reality, when we reorient ourselves to God’s loving care, we can see how he never truly left and had not in fact hidden his face (Ps. 22:22-24).” (https://www.ptm.org)
If you are in a place where you feel He has hidden His face from you, remember today’s devotion. He loves you and wants to be with you. Turn to Him the same way the prodigal did. Run home to His open arms. He will run to greet you and will show kindness in celebration of your reconciliation.
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