The Window No One Noticed Was Dirty

On an overcast morning, the windows of a farmhouse kitchen look perfectly clean. The family eats breakfast, pours coffee, glances outside at the gray sky without a second thought. But then the clouds break. A shaft of direct sunlight pours through the glass, and suddenly every smudge, every fingerprint, every streak of grease becomes visible. The window hasn't changed. The light has.

This is precisely what happened to Isaiah in the temple. He had served faithfully among God's people, spoken prophetically, walked the corridors of Jerusalem's worship. But when the Lord appeared — high and lifted up, the train of His robe filling the temple, the seraphim shaking the doorposts with their cry of "Holy, holy, holy" — Isaiah saw himself as he truly was. "Woe is me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips."

He wasn't worse than he had been the day before. He was simply standing, for the first time, in unfiltered light.

And here is the mercy: the Almighty did not leave him exposed and shattered. A burning coal touched his lips. Guilt was removed. Sin was atoned for. The same holiness that revealed the stain also provided the cleansing.

Then came the voice — "Whom shall I send?" — and Isaiah, now clean, now free, answered from a transformed heart: "Here am I. Send me."

The light that exposes is the same light that heals.