In this episode of the Witnessing Christ Podcast, Mike and Molly continue their conversation with Professor Ken Cherney of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary about the book of Isaiah. This time, the focus shifts specifically toward witnessing: How can Christians use Isaiah to have meaningful, gospel-centered conversations with their Latter-day Saint friends and family?
Isaiah repeatedly emphasizes something fundamental about the biblical God: there is no one like Him. Against the idols and gods of the surrounding nations, Isaiah presents the Lord as utterly unique. He is not simply a greater or more advanced being. He alone is God, and there is no Savior apart from Him.
That biblical picture creates opportunities for important conversations with Latter-day Saints about the nature of God, suffering, and why God does not always fit neatly within our human understanding. But these conversations ultimately lead somewhere even more important—to Jesus Christ and His finished work for sinners.
In this episode, you’ll hear:
- Why Isaiah emphasizes the absolute uniqueness and incomparability of God.
- How Isaiah’s descriptions of idolatry help us understand the difference between God and humanity.
- How different understandings of God affect the way Christians and Latter-day Saints approach suffering.
- Why we should be cautious of a God who always makes perfect sense according to human reason.
- How Isaiah 55 combines God’s incomprehensible greatness with His incredible promise of forgiveness.
- What it means to receive God’s gifts “without money” and without payment.
- Why Isaiah 52–53 gives such a powerful picture of Christ’s substitutionary suffering.
- How Christ’s complete work challenges the idea that we must contribute something toward our forgiveness.
- Why Christians should bring witnessing conversations back to Jesus and the cross.
- Practical passages from Isaiah that you can use in conversations with your LDS friends and family.
One of Isaiah’s clearest messages is that God’s ways are higher than ours—and nowhere is that more wonderful than in the way He saves sinners. Isaiah 55 pictures God giving His blessings without payment, while Isaiah 53 shows exactly what that gift cost: the Servant was pierced for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities, and punished so that we could have peace.
Someone did pay. Jesus did.
That means the gospel isn’t an invitation to finish what Jesus started. It is the announcement that Christ stood in the sinner’s place and accomplished salvation completely. Rather than beginning with an argument, Christians can simply open Isaiah with their LDS friends, read these remarkable passages together, ask questions, and let God’s Word show them the gift Christ has already won.
Ultimately, that is the goal of witnessing with Isaiah: get to Jesus. Get to the cross. Get to His substitutionary atonement. From there, everything else can be seen in the light of the free and complete forgiveness God gives through Christ.
Music used in this episode under license. License code: BSIPX0EWJ87RCGZL
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