No matter which country you visit, when places of power come into view, you generally find what you would expect: foreboding architecture, opulent surroundings, symbols of strength and prowess. Whether it’s the Kremlin, the Pentagon, or Red Square, governments exert massive expense and energy to send the visible message that they are powerful and ought to be feared. It’s the same for those who hold positions of power. Rarely do we see a leader on the world’s stage appearing disheveled or out of control. Image is power says common wisdom.

Into this reality (which was no less true in AD 30 than in AD 2009), entered Jesus: the carpenter, the man from the backwater town of Nazareth, the one who would come to be known as the suffering Servant (Isaiah 52). There was absolutely nothing about Jesus’ family connections, educational pedigree, or life station that commanded respect or projected the image of worldly power.

No wonder, then, that the prophet Isaiah tells us that Jesus would “startle many nations” (v.15). The nations of the world (and their leaders) would be flabbergasted at the prospect of such an unassuming, unbecoming man holding any claim to be the King of kings. It makes sense that the mighty and the powerful would “stand speechless in His presence” (v.15).

I’ve come to believe that God’s movement in His world will most always startle us. We see so little. We understand so little. Truthfully, we hope for so little. We are so little. We need a God larger than ourselves, far larger than what we could imagine. A God who will come and redeem us in ways we could never have dreamed.

But herein lies our true hope. When God comes to us in His way, we “understand what [we] had not [even] heard about” (v.15).