We all know the feeling of kicking our legs furiously just to keep our head above water. And sometimes despite your best efforts, you can’t peek your head above water without being met with a rush of water that pushes you back down. At times, life can feel like that. It can be the crushing weight of a losing someone you love, the anxiety that sets in when a thesis or dissertation deadline is coming up and the amount of work seems insurmountable, or the burden of dealing with family conflict that can’t seem to be resolved. The Israelites, who suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Babylonians, surely felt this hopelessness as they toiled in captivity. But Isaiah assures them that God—who created the heavens and the earth—gives breath to His people. Just like the huge gasp for air that you take when you finally reach the surface, God fills us, restores us, and gives life to us. He opens the eyes of the blind and frees prisoners from confinement. He brings us from darkness into light, from Good Friday to Easter Sunday.

Isaiah provides us with powerful images of the kind of God that we have. We are often enslaved to the things in this world that can hurt us, let us down, and bring us unrest. But how beautiful that in the midst of those difficult times in life, we have a God that is constant in His love for us, who cares about every aspect of our lives and provides us with a peace that surpasses all understanding. That peace comes from knowing that Jesus took our sins to the cross and was abandoned by God so that we never have to be. I pray that this Holy Week, God gives you rest and grants you peace. And I hope that, like Mary did with her oil, we can pour out ourselves and our time to adore and honor Him.