Tearfund: Lent Devotional 37

Redeemed

‘I have swept away your offences like a cloud, your sins like the morning mist. Return to me, for I have redeemed you.”’ (Isaiah 44:22)

The root of the word ‘redeem’ is to ‘buy back’. In our Isaiah passage, the image is of a relative who comes to take upon themselves the debt of another – to ‘buy back’ their freedom from sin. In the same way, Isaiah tells us, God redeems his people. In our Christian lives, we celebrate that Jesus has redeemed us through his death on the cross.

This Lent, as we think of Rwanda, I’m reminded of visiting a Tearfund project in its capital – Kigali – in 2018. A group of women were making shopping bags out of old rice and maize bags.

There was so much of ‘redemption’ in the story of those women and their bags. They had – quite literally – brought the materials back to life – re-used them, and made something practical and beautiful and useful. With these bags they could now make a living and provide for their families. And in doing so, many of them had encountered the love of the Redeemer for themselves.

Heavenly Father, thank you that you are a redeeming God. Thank you that Jesus came to Earth to ‘buy back’ your people. May we rejoice in the knowledge of our redemption today. Amen.

Rev Kate Wharton
Rev Kate is Vicar of St. Bartholomew's Church in Liverpool and Assistant National Leader at New Wine.