with trembling
In the latter portion of Isaiah we read of the future of God’s people – a future in which there is judgment, salvation, new heavens and a new earth wherein all is put to right. As chapter 66 opens, echoing from a few chapters earlier (Isaiah 57:15), God gives a reminder of His omnipotent sovereignty – and then states,
“But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.“
A few different words throughout the Bible are translated as tremble – and looking to their origins and contexts builds a picture we all can understand of how deeply our body is affected by our mind and spirit… giving us strength and health or making us weak and even ill.
Trembling combines a deep element of fear with some aspect of time. These feelings and emotions (whether positive and negative) can saturate our senses as we wait in anticipation of some-thing about to happen or some-one about to act.
Throughout the Psalms we read numerous examples that paint this picture.
“Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling.“
– Psalm 2:11
“Trembling took hold of them there, anguish as of a woman in labor.“
– Psalm 48:6
As I consider all this, it gives me pause… What causes us to tremble? What strikes terror in us? …or fills us with overwhelming awe and wonder?
Have our senses in various ways become dull? Perhaps through continual exposure to and indulgence of excitement and amazement and entertainment and pleasure… or, conversely, to the innumerable forms of brokenness and trauma in our world?
Can we even begin to grasp the concept of trembling at God’s Word?
This hints at something saints have recognized for decades… even centuries. We need to begin the recovery of a recognition of Who God is. A. W. Tozer writes of this in Knowledge of the Holy in a way that unites reverent fear with holy love in recognition of the God Who is infinitely other and beyond our comprehension – yet Whose presence is more intimate than our very breath.
The God Who created all things out of nothing by His very Word – this is the same God Who then formed us from the dust of the earth in His own image and breathed life into us. This all-powerful, all-knowing, all-present, all-sovereign, perfectly pure and holy God Who alone can destroy both body and soul (Matthew 10:28) is the same God Who so loved us (John 3:16-17) that He became one of us in Christ Jesus (Romans 5:15; 1 Timothy 2: 5) to forgive us and save us from all our sin, giving us eternal life – and He longs to make His dwelling within us by His Spirit (John 14:15-17; Ephesians 2:19-22; 2 Timothy 1:14).
God’s longing for us is described all throughout Scripture as jealous love – yearning with deep agony for us all to return to Him. How completely this should humble us, filling us with contrition, and leaving us trembling at His Word!
May we be awakened with incomparable awe of Who God is and rejoice with trembling!
Lauren Daigle gives us a wonderful reflection on this truth in her song, Tremble. I invite you watch and listen as she sings to Jesus and remember this theme:
“I will always live in wonder of
The fact that I awake Your jealous love”