Second Isaiah addresses Israel in Exile with a message of hope and joy. This passage compares the return from exile to a new Exodus the titles used for God are both
strong and emotion-filled “your redeemer” that God is the best brother or sister you ever had; “the creator of Israel” puts cosmos power behind God’s commitment to Israel This second part of Isaiah is a
partials trial, Yahweh’s sovereignty is at issue. In each of the oracles in the section Yahweh is identified in a different way: ‘your creator’, ‘your redeemer’, as one ‘who makes a way in the
sea’ and as the ‘one who made you.’ 
God is also called ‘Holy One, the Creator of
Israel, and your King.’ The point of the trial senses in Second Isaiah is to argue that Yahweh, Israel’s God, is indeed the creator not only of Israel but of the cosmos and clearly the one who
then is able to both judge and redeem the people.
At this point in the Lenten season we are trying to focus our attention on the days leading up to the death burial and resurrection of Jesus, Isaiah throws us a curve by saying “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old.” Admittedly, there are lot of things we’ve already forgotten, and maybe a lot more we’d like to forget, but forgetting is not something the bible, and especially Isaiah, recommends. Remember, yes; forget, no. Remember the Sabbath. Remember my covenant, remember this day; remember my name; remember the commandments, remember the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt ect.
Why would Isaiah tell the people to forget the former things? Except to remind people that memory alone is not enough that other things are required of God’s people that
simply reciting their pedigree, repeating the Lord’s Prayer, confessing the Apostles’ Creed, showing up at church every Sunday morning. He want us to get rid of all the
excuses we make for not doing what Christians by definition do: we are to teach Sunday School, serve as Elders, deacons, give our money to support the mission of
Christ’s church, feeding the poor, making peace with our enemies; we are to walk the walk and not just talk the talk. The Lord wants us to 
forget the former things so that we can move forward to the new things that He has in store for us.
Just remembering is not enough if we are going to move forward; remembering the resurrection is not enough. Lazy Christian, comfortable Christians, casual Christians, hold-back Christians, do nothing Christian, beware lest you forget to follow the Great Commission; teaching them to observed all thing that I have told you. Sometime God tells us to forget the former thing, because I plan to do a new thing; but we go on doing things the way we’ve always done them. We go on being critical of every new thing that comes our way. We go on destroying our own denomination with our mouth
God wants us to stop relying on the past to determine the future. Train your heart not on what has been but on what will be, because God’s says I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.” The new thing Isaiah is talking about is the rock Christ Jesus. He is the river that satisfies our every thirst, He took our place in the wilderness; for He was there forty days and forty nights.
The coming of Jesus far exceeds the Exodus experience, Jesus the Lamb that taken away the sins of the world. The Red sea Exodus was temporary freedom, Jesus provides eternal freedom, Isaiah takes away one memory only to replace it with the gospel, the good news, that sets the captive free, that open doors man can’t close and close doors that should not be open. Forget the old way of doing things this is a new time, a new order; we do not have to slain the lambs, the goats, the turtledoves, because the ultimate sacrifice has been slain.
Isaiah tells us that sometimes we have to let go of what is in our hands, in order to take hold of something new. We need to forget a few things, we need to change a few
things, we need to become something new. Paul says: “Therefore 
if anyone is in Christ, he/she is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, all things have become new (1 Corinthians 5: 17).
God wants to do something new in us, but first we have to let go of the old. We want God to change us a little, but God want to transform our lives.
God is telling the people through the prophet and us that He wants to give us a fresh start. The first step to making a fresh start: (1) stop making excuses for past failures; stop blaming others for our own past mistake. (2) Take inventory of who is on your team, sometime we cannot move forward because the wrong people are on our team. (3) We must act in faith; even though Israel complained and suffering for many years they still had faith to know that God would bring them out of bondage, so if you want the new thing that God has promise you must act in faith. After we have act in faith (4) We must renew our thought; for the bible say: “Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus. After we renew our thought (5) we must trust in God. In order to move forward we need to depend on God for everything, Proverbs 3: 5 says: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding, stop dealing with those self-help books, stop using your own will power; God specializes in new things, but it is only through Jesus Christ that it is possible.
“Forget the former things and lest move forward”
