Come Down

Oh that you would rend the heavens and come down. —Isaiah 64:1

Earlier in his prayer, Isaiah already said, “Lord, would You look down from heaven” (Isa. 63:15). Now he’s saying it’s not enough for God to look down; He needs to come down!

This is no mindless, half-hearted prayer. It’s passionate, earnest, fervent, desperate, and pleading!

As Isaiah looks forward prophetically to the time when the remnant in exile will be praying and crying out to God for deliverance, the people realize their only hope is for God to come down. The hope is not that God will throw off the Babylonians but that God Himself will come down and visit His people—that He will change their hearts and correct what it was that led them into exile in the first place.

The Babylonians are not the issue. You don’t even see them named here. But what you do see is God’s people crying out, “Oh, God, that You would rend the heavens and come down.” Nothing else, nothing less will suffice.” The need is so great that nothing short of a divine visitation will do.