Hi, welcome to Redeem the Commute. I’m Ryan, your host for the daily challenges.  This week’s topic is part of our series called EPIC where we’ve been exploring how Jesus is found throughout the Old Testament part of the Bible. We’re reading some epic old stories from the Old Testament, some of which you might have heard before, some of which might be new to you. But our hope is that in each of them we’ll see how they’re part of one big epic story: the story of the Bible, the story of the world, God’s story.

Our daily challenges are meant to help you explore what it means to follow Jesus, even if you don’t have a lot of time. That’s why we have a rhythm that keeps us in sync, even if we’re not a community that meets together in person regularly. This means every Monday we introduce the week’s idea. Every Tuesday we study it in the Bible. Every Wednesday we see how that challenges and transforms our thinking on the topic. Thursdays we try to apply and live it out. Friday is a day for prayer and reflection before we take a rest on Saturday, and Sundays we meet together with other Christians in community.

At the recommendation of a friend, I started watching Gracepoint last year.  It’s the story of a small town in California where a boy is found dead on the beach, and a troubled detective investigates.  Like any good detective story, they kept me guessing.  I would announce one theory or another every night of the series – it was suicide, it was the father, it was the plumber, it was the priest, it was the friend, it was the friend’s dad.  And so on…

At the last minute, the truth was revealed.  It was one of the people I’d thought of, but then again, I’d suspected just about everyone at one point or another, and it wasn’t the most recent person I’d suspected.

Looking back, it all made sense.  The signs were there, after all.  But hindsight is 20/20, and I didn’t see it earlier.  In fact, it could have been other people – the UK version of the show actually had a different ending, even though much of the series was the same.

That explains why we might see this week’s scripture differently than those who went before us.  The prophet Isaiah wrote about a “suffering servant” in his book of prophecies.  It’s poetic, so more like a trail of clues than what we’re used to reading.

People in Isaiah’s day, and for the next 500 years, tried to discern who this suffering servant was, and what he’d do for them.   But for Christians, the mystery is solved – the suffering servant sounds way too much like Jesus to ignore.

Question: Share a time when you struggled to figure out a riddle or mystery.