Isaiah 61:10-11

10 I will greatly rejoice in the LORD; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. 11 For as the earth brings forth its sprouts, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to sprout up, so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to sprout up before all the nations.

Two things stood out to me when I read these verses:

1) I’m struck by the NT sort of imagery Isaiah uses for the salvation he’s enjoying. This talk about being clothed with garments of salvation and covered with a robe of righteousness—these are descriptions I would have expected to find in the NT rather than the Old. Hmmm... Surely Isaiah didn’t have a full-fledged concept of imputed righteousness... One thing is clear: the salvation he was praising God for was, at least in part, still future for him (v 11). He was looking forward to the day when “the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to sprout up before all the nations”—a promise that appears to me to be fulfilled in Christ in the gospel.

2) I’m challenged by Isaiah’s intentionality about praising God for His gift of salvation. Often I need to be more deliberate about just praising God rather than waiting until I feel like praising. But it’s significant to me that Isaiah’s praise definitely wasn’t dry and empty. It sounds nothing like an obligatory ritual. His imagination is going full speed as he reaches for the most vivid images he can conjure up—a bridegroom and bride adorned with beauty for their wedding. The value of imagination when it comes to worship and praise...