"How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaimed peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, 'Your God reigns!'"
~ Isaiah 52:7
I would just like to start off by saying that I love the imagery in this passage. In my mind's eye I can see a man standing on the top of a mountain with his arms thrown out wide and his head tilted up high. He's yelling at the top of his lungs, "Your God reigns!" Isn't that just awesome? And by "awesome" I mean filled with awe, not "that's awesome, dude!"
Now, I have never gone mountain climbing, and I probably never will. (Unless I marry someone who's really outdoorsy and makes me.) It's not because I don't think it would be fun or invigorating. I just know it's a lot of work...and I'm not sure how I would handle the altitude. That being said, if I were to climb a mountain, I would make absolutely sure that I had the best pair of hiking boots available. I use my feet a lot (I'm sure you do, too), and they're more then kind of essential. I beat them up enough without the help of a mountain.
There are two big things that stick out to me in this verse. First, Isaiah mentions how beautiful the person's feet are. I instantly think of my roommate who isn't a "foot-phobe" per se...but she's pretty close. They just gross her out, and I think beautiful is the last word she would use to describe feet. I don't think many would. It's not the first word that comes to my mind.
Think about this; they didn't have hiking boots back when Isaiah was writing. Woah. They had sandals. Yeah. Now, imagine how dirty and cut up and person's feet would be after climbing a mountain in sandals. Why on earth would Isaiah be describing them as beautiful? Because they carried good news! They didn't let the mountain stop them from bringing good tidings of salvation.
This leads into the second thing that stands out to me: the person climbed the mountain just to proclaim that "your God reigns." This in itself is beautiful.
I feel like today you and I make excuses to not share out faith. We wait for opportunities to enter our comfort zone, and even then we don't take them. And few of us go to other nations and climb mountains or cross deserts or swim rivers to proclaim the name of God.
The Apostle Paul quotes this passage from Isaiah in Romans 10:15. Paul was traveling all over to spread the good news and I imagine his feet were...beautiful.
I hope that you will have BeautifulFeet someday. Begin your journey today.
Anna, I really appreciate that you discussed the Isaiah verse for the focus of your post! When I read the title, I instantly thought of Romans 10:15. Not very often do I pay attention to what Paul was quoting when he made this bold statement.
ReplyDeleteIt is so true...spreading the good news of the Gospel is not usually seen as a daily routine activity for most Christians. I think we often waste a lot of time waiting for "just the right moment" to say something and we feel like we are out of place to be speaking if our setting is the everyday ordinary. Not so!
"Thou camest to our hall of death, O Christ, to breathe our poisoned air, to drink for us the dark despair that strangled our reluctant breath. How beautiful the feet that trod the road that leads us back to God! How beautiful the feet that ran to bring the great good news to man!" *O God, O Lord of Heaven and Earth*