God with Us Age to Age
A Danish study explored the phenomenon most of us have experienced: perceiving ourselves as younger than we really are. The findings suggest a constant—whatever our current age, we all see ourselves as 20 percent younger. A fifty-year-old tends to imagine herself as forty years old. (This conjures up a comical scenario in which a child thinks, “Wow, I’m five, but I feel I have the energy and looks of a four-year-old!”)
It doesn’t take a scientific study to state the obvious: We’re all growing older. And Scripture has much to say about this. Isaiah’s words were issued to an Israel that had aged and become weary, but as one commentator says, “This promise to Israel, enfeebled and grown old as a nation, is applicable to every aged follower of Christ.”
The prophet reminds us of God’s provision throughout the life of everyone who has been faithful to Him: “I have upheld [you] since your birth, and have carried [you] since you were born” (Isaiah 46:3).
So as we stew and fret about growing older, we’re reminded that God is still with us. He promises: “Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you” (v. 4). Whatever age you are (or the 20-percent-younger version you imagine yourself to be!), embrace today God’s promise: “I have made you and I will carry you” (v. 4).
By Kenneth Petersen- Bread Ministries
Isaiah 46:3-9 (NIV)
3 “Listen to me, you descendants of Jacob,
all the remnant of the people of Israel,
you whom I have upheld since your birth,
and have carried since you were born.
4 Even to your old age and gray hairs
I am he, I am he who will sustain you.
I have made you and I will carry you;
I will sustain you and I will rescue you.
5 “With whom will you compare me or count me equal?
To whom will you liken me that we may be compared?
6 Some pour out gold from their bags
and weigh out silver on the scales;
they hire a goldsmith to make it into a god,
and they bow down and worship it.
7 They lift it to their shoulders and carry it;
they set it up in its place, and there it stands.
From that spot it cannot move.
Even though someone cries out to it, it cannot answer;
it cannot save them from their troubles.
8 “Remember this, keep it in mind,
take it to heart, you rebels.
9 Remember the former things, those of long ago;
I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like me.
