Isaiah 30:18

Devotional Thoughts

By David Wilkerson

Out of the apostate church will arise a holy, repentant people who will yearn after the Lord!

How our Lord yearns to have a people here who long for Him only! He grieves over the apostate thing, but His compassion will bring forth a people who return, who repent — who want only Him! "Therefore the Lord longs to be gracious to you. And therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you. For the Lord is a God of justice; How blessed are all those who long for Him" (Isaiah 30:18).

Isaiah was addressing now a people of the future! He was speaking to a people who would make up the spiritual Zion — Jerusalem, which can never fall or collapse. It is a holy people whose main characteristic is their yearning hearts after God!

What was the mark of the apostate people? They did not yearn for the Lord, but longed after Egypt, the world, the flesh, the earthly. This is the sad lack of the church today! There is so little of this deep longing for Christ. So little of being shut in with Him, desiring Him as the fullness of life. We have a generation who will work for Him, we will witness, feed the poor, help the homeless, and minister to human need. But so few spend their days yearning for Him. God said, "My people have forgotten Me days without number" (Jeremiah 2:32).

While all around there will be collapse and weeping — this people will not weep! God is going to hear their cry and answer their prayer! "O people in Zion, inhabitant in Jerusalem, you will weep no longer. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when He hears it, He will answer you" (Isaiah 30:19).

There will be privations! There will be oppression from Satan, from the world, from circumstances, but God will be manifest among this people. The presence of the Lord will be precious to them. "Although the Lord has given you bread of privation and water of oppression, He, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher" (Isaiah 30:20).